Add-on XenReviews [CrowdFund]

Would you buy this add on?


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Is there a way to install this and run it to help with the development? I'd like to be involved. I think I can help with the affiliate links part of it for those who use it as a product review engine like I will.

You are welcome to buy a license by visiting http://xenreviews.com/buy/. The current price is $75 for a year license. This will raise to $90 once the first full version is available. Your year doesn't start until we release the first full version, so you can help test with out it counting against your license length.

I think you have to wait til it's released now. Those of us that helped crowd fund it have access already to it.

Licenses are still available for purchase. They just cost more and the lifetime upgrade package is unavailable.
 
We do have a lot of Reviews, which are originally created in vBulletin as ordinary thread-startpostings, and which will now be migrated to xF as threads.

Maybe it is a stupid question, but would it be possible, to manually change a thread-start posting into a review, by letting the author edit it... and retain the following thread with comments?
 
We do have a lot of Reviews, which are originally created in vBulletin as ordinary thread-startpostings, and which will now be migrated to xF as threads.

Maybe it is a stupid question, but would it be possible, to manually change a thread-start posting into a review, by letting the author edit it... and retain the following thread with comments?
It's not that stupid:
http://xenreviews.com/threads/import-a-thread-to-a-review.318/
 
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We do have a lot of Reviews, which are originally created in vBulletin as ordinary thread-startpostings, and which will now be migrated to xF as threads.

Maybe it is a stupid question, but would it be possible, to manually change a thread-start posting into a review, by letting the author edit it... and retain the following thread with comments?
Hey! Not a stupid request at all. I've actually received this request a few times already. The bottom line though is this - yes it can be done, and yes it's fairly easy, but you will most likely be missing a lot of the data required to make the entry look "full" and healthy.

For example, my Reviews system allows for extreme customization - custom fields for any and every category. My problem with importing threads is where is this extra data going to come from? If you've required for a very strict review submission format on your current thread-based review system, then it might be possible to parse that extra data out based on your strict format. If you've just allowed people to free-for-all how they do it though, it's going to be more difficult to import the data over - because it won't have a consistent structure that I can program around.

Nonetheless, we do plan on spending a good amount of time on importers as that is a healthy way to steal competition :)


I appreciate the interest in the project!

Jeff
 
Alpha 4 released!

Another week another alpha release.

This release will mark our fourth official alpha release. These last four releases have helped us squash out a fair number of bugs, and the bug reports have continued to slow down with each release, which I am very happy about.

That is why with this release I wanted to implement something new, that way there's more things for you guys to break and strengthen. I've chosen to include with this release the Merchant Services that will be packaged along with XR. This add-on will be a huge part of XR's monetary and affiliate features. I chose to develop it as a separate add-on because that will allow users who don't wish to use XR as a monetary system to simply disable it, and it will allow people to modify it and use it for other add-ons (it is more of a framework than an add-on really).

Currently it's implemented very simply. You'll notice a new cart drop-down up by your inbox, you'll notice a new admin tab dedicated to it, and you'll notice on items in XR that you've claimed that you'll now have an option to upgrade that item. I currently only have one upgrade included, but if you play around with the admin panel portion you'll see how easy I've made it to develop or install custom item upgrades - or anything you wish to sell on your site really.

Along with that I've included basic improvements to the XR core such as
  • Added cron entries to clean up the database on an hourly/daily basis
  • Began redesigning how reviews are displayed (new comments / helpful link) - next step is including custom fields with their output
  • Created the ability to have custom review types - this will allow us to have things like editor reviews, sponsored reviews, etc. This is another big feature, more to come on this next week.
  • Design improvements to "item view" - you'll notice a new 'faded' show more box

Enoy! If the releases continue to be as stable as they have been I will continue implementing this new larger portions of XR every week. I have many of them ready I have just been waiting for the right time to push them out there.


Like always, please throw us all suggestions and bugs!

Jeff
 
For example, my Reviews system allows for extreme customization - custom fields for any and every category. My problem with importing threads is where is this extra data going to come from?For example, my Reviews system allows for extreme customization - custom fields for any and every category. My problem with importing threads is where is this extra data going to come from?

As long as this extra date could be provited by the Author, I would find a way, to have many of the reviews converted... I would arrange a lottery or a price contest... :)
 
I can't register on the forums :(. I'm waiting for the confirmation email and it's not coming into my gmail. It's not in the spam folder either, so you guys may want to check your SMTP server.
 
As long as this extra date could be provited by the Author, I would find a way, to have many of the reviews converted... I would arrange a lottery or a price contest... :)

I was thinking more along the lines of an automatic importer, which would make providing these extra datas more difficult. I guess your idea is more of a tool / conversion tool that people could "move" a thread into the Reviews system though? That could definitely be possible but that is something I would not be able to complete until we are closer to a stable release.

I can't register on the forums :(. I'm waiting for the confirmation email and it's not coming into my gmail. It's not in the spam folder either, so you guys may want to check your SMTP server.
My apologies. I had restarted the server a day or two ago and forgot to restart the mail server as well. If you still have troubles getting in please let me know.
 
I think I'll be buying a license here soon. I wanted to ask another question. Will it be possible to make certain categories display differently? I'm thinking of using this plugin for 2-3 different things - product reviews, business reviews, and a one page vendor list. But each of those categories will require different layouts and slightly different functionality. I'm sure I can use a bunch of conditional statements in the templates but I was wondering how much can be achieved through the settings. Here is my supporting vendor page that I'm looking to replicate:
http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/vendors

I envision having 3 top level categories to cover the sections I mentioned above. This way I can set usergroup permissions differently for each category. The trick is, I don't necessarily want the supporting vendors list showing up as a "review" category.

Would it be best to just use a separate solution for the supporting vendors page? Any suggestions?
 
Just last week I began work on a new feature which will allow custom category types, custom item types, and custom review types. Any custom type can be created by making a few simple PHP handler classes to define that category/item/review's custom properties (a custom template, different page handling, etc). It's hard to explain exactly how it works, but yes it will do exactly what you are asking, and actually the uses you plan on using this for that you listed are the exact reasons I made it do custom types - to distinguish from products + businesses. By default XR will come with a a few custom types (like business), but it will be very easy for our community to develop their own types that they can share with other users as well.

As for the vendors page, XR is also going to have a "brand" system, where each brand will have their own page with some information and products of that brand. It looks to me like your vendors page is mostly a list of brands. So I think you could use XR for something like this. XR still has a long way to go and a long way to evolve, and my strongest priority with the project is making it dynamic.
 
Sounds great. If I were to migrate over before the "brand" system is built out, what would you recommend I use in the meantime for my vendors page? If I'm going to change over to the "brand" system I'd rather not put too much time and effort into a temporary replacement if I'm going to move it all again. Could I set up a custom item type for now that will be easy to port to the brand system?
 
An item type won't be related to how the branding pages work at all, no.

I misunderstood your request a little bit though - I guess you want the vendor page to be links out to their websites? So it would be more like an item list just with external URL's. This would probably best be done with a custom item type, yes.

However, I just want to make sure you are aware we are still in Alpha stages (probably 1 or 2 more releases before we start beta) and I'm not recommending the add-on be used in a live environment yet because of how much things get changed around in these early stages.
 
Wow!! I did not even come across this thread till today. Which is good in a way coz my wait period for a stable release would be much shorter than you all. :whistle:

This add-on is cucking frazy. Really glad that a crowd funded add-on has come off so well. Going through all the features now and from the looks of it I would be buying it within a day after I go through all the threads on the developer support site.
 
Hi - this looks exciting and I do want to purchase this add-on (missed crowdfunding since I was too late to the XF party).

One thing I noticed is that http://xenreviews.com is being blocked by Google and Chrome due to malware/ malicious site linking.
 
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