Limit Number of Classifieds by One User

ldk · October 21st, 2004, 09:08 AM

I just installed Classifieds and I love it!

I have an idea for a feature that I suspect others would find helpful as well. It would be great to be able to set a limit to the number of ads any one user could post. I can totally imagine people abusing Classifieds boards with too many ads.

Anyone else like the idea of this feature?

Chris2707 · October 21st, 2004, 12:10 PM

It would be better controlled with usergroups - controlling a single user would be messy. For example, in vBulletin I have new users in a primary usergroup who cannot use private messaging - as soon as they post 1 message, they get added to a secondary usergroup that allows private messaging. If we got trouble with that user, we could manually revoke the secondary usergroup and they can't private message any more.

If PPC is integrated with vBulletin, I would do something similar - i.e., only give classifieds posting rights with a secondary usergroup (as I do now with Photopost Pro).

ldk · October 22nd, 2004, 05:44 PM

Hmmm... I don't really see where you're coming from. Right now you can allow or disallow posting ads based on member group. I understand that. So are you saying, wait until someone spams the Classifieds board with too many ads and then manually move them into a user group that doesn't allow posting ads?

I think that's an OK solution but I have Classifieds tied into my forum and there are over 14,000 members so this would be a little unwieldy.

It would be nice to just have a configurable limit to the number of ads that can be posted simultaneously per user. So whenever someone goes to post an, the software checks to see how many ads they currently have and doesn't allow them to post if they've reached their limit.

Maybe I'll poke around and see if I can figure out where in the code this would be done...

Chris2707 · October 22nd, 2004, 05:55 PM

No I didn't say anything about unlimited ads - what I mean is that rather than say user 1 can have 10 ads - you would have user 1 in group a and group a has a limit of 10 ads. If the person subscribes to the forum they get moved to group b and that group gets 20 ads.

It's probably just splitting hairs - what I'm getting at is not making things user level but group level. I don't know how other forums software works but vBulletin has got it half right with a primary usergroup and secondary usergroups - in this case the secondary usergroup controls how many ads - so on my forum a secondary usergroup is called pClassifiedsA (this is set in vBulletin to have no permissions at all - the primary group gives permissions) - in Classifieds, I then say that pClassifiedsA can have 10 ads at a time - one ends, they can add a new one but never more than 10 going at one time.

I think if Classifieds 2 gets released without a limit on adverts, then it's going to be a mistake and it would require hacking - and that's something I've always hoped to avoid doing in Photopost.

rastacat · November 11th, 2004, 10:15 PM

Hi all. I recently bought all the photo* programs and was looking forward to putting them into use but couldn't figure out how to limit the number of ads so checked into the forums here. A bit surprised to see the ads are unlimited.

We run a number of busy classifieds which were going to be replaced by photoclassifieds but some guys will go nuts posting a ton of ads - we allow them for free. The programs we use now allow us to set a maximum number of ads (global value of 15 is what we use). If they want to post more they can delete some of their old ads, has worked great.

Would really like to see the ability for a maximum number. One of our sites uses an honor system for a limit of 10, it's not uncommon to find guys blow past that and hit 50 or 60 ads.

Thanks for reading.

ldk · November 12th, 2004, 06:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rastacat

Would really like to see the ability for a maximum number. One of our sites uses an honor system for a limit of 10, it's not uncommon to find guys blow past that and hit 50 or 60 ads.

I'm glad someone agrees. And I'm also a little bit surprised that no one else has chimed in on this thread.

It seems like a simple way to limit spammers while still allowing legitimate users to post a reasonable number of ads.

Michael P · November 13th, 2004, 10:43 AM

I'll look into this; seems like we could limit the number of "active" ads on a per usergroup basis.

Lee Wilde · December 13th, 2004, 02:05 AM

This would be very useful for our site as well :-)

arenapub · December 14th, 2004, 08:13 PM

This would definitely be a plus, I'd welcome it also.

akiy · January 31st, 2005, 12:37 PM

Bump. Has there been any progress in this?

akiy · February 8th, 2005, 12:47 PM

Bump^

akiy · February 10th, 2005, 10:11 AM

Bump^^

zOrg · January 5th, 2006, 10:58 AM

b-u-m-p ^^^

sbuncha · January 8th, 2006, 05:31 AM

You could charge more for a full page ad. That is what I am doing.

I have set up an "Abused ad" category and made the Usergroup Access Permissions where only admin and super moderators can view that category. If someone abuses a single ad listing, it can be moved there until they pay the additional money and then it can be moved back.

Chuck S · January 13th, 2006, 11:56 AM

Hello I have added the uplimit per day for usergroup into the beta so what you want is also a total number of ads a user can post by usergroup on your system?

This is easy enough let me know if I got this right.

rastacat · January 19th, 2006, 11:28 AM

The limit number per usergroups would be perfect for us. You made us a custom job last year that did that, but the upgrades removed it.

registered users get X total ads.
group 1 get XX total ads.
group 2 get XXX total ads.

some guys treat a couple of our sites as a real business venture and get right of hand with how many ads they post. The per day would not help us as they will simply max out every day.

Thanks for keeping this thread open and in consideration.

Al

Chuck S · January 19th, 2006, 11:36 AM

The beta3 of classifieds 2.5 has a total ad restriction in the usergroup permissions

rcull · April 6th, 2006, 04:01 PM

It is good to see the maximum number of ads now in the classifieds 2.5.

I would like to see that as "free" ads then a person could continue to post ads at a cost. Perhaps this might lead to various pricing levels that could be applied to usergroups.

I suspect many other classified users would like to see it used in this manner too.

rcull · April 24th, 2006, 09:12 AM

Here is how I think it should work...

In your "Edit Catagories", you should place a cost of an ad, say $10.00.

Then you go to your "Edit Usergroups" and you place a number in the "Max Ads Limit?" box, that is the maximum number of free ads that a user in that group can have at any givin time. Any user can still purchase additional ads as they see fit, beyond the "Max Ads Limit?" placed in the box by their user group.

The "Max Ads Limit?" should only apply to "Free Ads".

I am sure no-one wishes to limit paying customers.

I have done some experimenting with the limit.

I just did a test usergroup. I set it's limit to one. I posted a test ad for three days. After that I went to attempt to post another ad. I got the "you have exceeded your maximum alllowed limit of 1 ads."

It didn't even give an option to pay for an ad. Why would anyone put a limit on the number of ads that can ever be posted. I don't understand how the photopost developers could figure that was what was wanted.

If they really think that is what the majority wanted, there are enough people out here that want it limited as I described above. Perhaps they can give us a choice as how to limit the ads.

I am giving a lot of thought as to how advanceing through usergroups could be used with this to work well. I am not sure it can be done without having the ad limit defaulting to a pay option.

rcull · July 20th, 2007, 07:25 AM

I still hope there are plans to do something with this...