Is this possible? :: One Forum that takes threads from other Forums

mrsocks

Hello,

I am looking to create a site that takes threads from a few other forums and displays them on my 'forum'.

The responses, login, auth, creditials, etc... dont need to be handeled by my site, I just want to display some threads with links to the actual site where the thread was created.

Ex:
MySite.com shows 3 threads.
Thread 1 : (from carbb.com)
Thread 2 : (from busBB.com)
Thread 3 : (from ScooterBB.com)

Each of these threads are links to their respsective sites that people can click on and be directed to the threads.

I hope this makes sense.

Is this possible ?

Thanks.

Is this possible? :: One Forum that takes threads from other Forums

Piranha

As I understand it you don't want to actually take the threads, you only want links. Then it is easy to do, just use <a href="http://phpbuilder.com/board/showthread.php?t=10339183">this topic</a>.

Even if you want to actually grab the content it is possible. But note that it may be illegal to do.

mrsocks

Piranha wrote:
As I understand it you don't want to actually take the threads, you only want links. Then it is easy to do, just use <a href="http://phpbuilder.com/board/showthread.php?t=10339183">this topic</a>.

Even if you want to actually grab the content it is possible. But note that it may be illegal to do.

i know i could write the page with the links with static html, but I want to be able to dynamically write that page, so if day one, the first thread on carbb.com is 'how do i change my oil' and day two it's 'why does this squeak'.... i want the links to change on my sie to reflect that.

I want to be able to have code that reads the site threads list and then takes the first few from each site and shows them on my site.

fortunately, all the sites use the same bb system, so i think i have some ideas on how to do this, but i wanted to know if something was already done like this.

Piranha

Ok, so you are not wondering if it is possible after all? You are wondering if someone have done it and want to give you the code? I have no idea about the second question, neither have I any idea how you should go through others sites to know if it is the right topic.

mrsocks

Piranha wrote:
Ok, so you are not wondering if it is possible after all? You are wondering if someone have done it and want to give you the code? I have no idea about the second question, neither have I any idea how you should go through others sites to know if it is the right topic.

I would like to know if it is possible.
I would like to know if anyone has any suggestions.
I would like to know if anyone has done this so that they can share their experinences.
I would like any info anyone can offer as to where I would start on this.
I woudl like the content to be dynamically generated ... not static html with links.

Piranha

Good, now I and others can clearly see what you are after. I could now say that all the questions is yes/no questions and you might get yes/no answers. But since I have already got you to rephrase it once I won't say that.

I have a comment on the last one, it is damn easy:

<?php
// You get the variables from somewhere, probably a database. But for the example I will only add a variable in the php-tag.
$variable = "http://www.somesite.com/viewtopic.php?topicid=44";
?>
<a href="<?php echo $variable: ?>">Look at this</a>

And a little about the second last. A good way to start every PHP script is to first design everything (website to know what content you will use, database to store the content, programming in between), then program. And when you program do it in small parts and check it often. It is quite easy to get and display the links, your problem will probably be if you want this done automatically to design a good way to order topics in categories.

mrsocks

Piranha wrote:
Good, now I and others can clearly see what you are after. I could now say that all the questions is yes/no questions and you might get yes/no answers. But since I have already got you to rephrase it once I won't say that.

I have a comment on the last one, it is damn easy:
<?php
// You get the variables from somewhere, probably a database. But for the example I will only add a variable in the php-tag.
$variable = "http://www.somesite.com/viewtopic.php?topicid=44";
?>
<a href="<?php echo $variable: ?>">Look at this</a>
And a little about the second last. A good way to start every PHP script is to first design everything (website to know what content you will use, database to store the content, programming in between), then program. And when you program do it in small parts and check it often. It is quite easy to get and display the links, your problem will probably be if you want this done automatically to design a good way to order topics in categories.

wow....
i don’t know what's worse; your grammar or your 'help'.

db access to the other sites is out.
here is the direction I have been thinking of.

-use fopen to specify the pages i want to access.
-use fread to get the contents from that website.
-use a reg-ex to find the content between comment tags
-load the info into some sort of array or local file
-then only grab the first few threads and display them on my site.

This way, the links (threads) on mysite can change automatically every time this script runs.

.... i bit more complex than 'damn easy' <a href> tags.

Instead of starting from scratch, I am wondering if anyone has done this or has any real world experience to pass on.

thanks

Piranha

The grammar is bad, I know. It is because I'm not native english.

About setting the link I see it as two separate things: Catching data and displaying it. Since you asked about dynamically generated I thought that you had problems with displaying it dynamically, thus the answer. What help do you expect when you can't even explain your problem accurate?

Piranha

Just a friendly tip for you: You came here and asked for help. Insult people that answer won't get you far. Ok, you don't care what I think about you and probably don't want me to answer to your threads in the future. But others that sees this thread will notice how you act and probably be a little more reluctant to help you out as well.

mrsocks

Piranha wrote:
The grammar is bad, I know. It is because I'm not native english.

from the comments you gave to another users about their english:

Piranha wrote:
by the way use punctation it is much easier to read when the poster uses capital letters points commas good grammar and correctly spelled english as you can see in this paragraph it is not easy to read when the person havent tried to make it easy and if it is not easy to read your posts where you ask for help people wont read them and wont answer them either

http://www.phpbuilder.com/board/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=10797616

i would have expected more.

Anyway,
I am well beyond caching and displaying.

I could read and spout back lots of quotes about how things are supposed to work, but if you dont have any real experince creating or developing something like this, please no longer respond just to bump your post count.

This community is about help and the condesending comments are not needed.

Roger_Ramjet

Yes it is possible.

Thing is it sounds to most people as if you are stealing content, otherwise why no db access from original forum. So don't expect much help here.

mrsocks

Roger Ramjet wrote:
Yes it is possible.

Thing is it sounds to most people as if you are stealing content, otherwise why no db access from original forum. So don't expect much help here.

interesting point.

What I am trying to do is just consolidate a few message boards dedicated to the same thing (all the different boards know about each other and are friends). Most people want to be able to monitor all of the different boards and main discussions, so instead of going to each one independantly, they can go here, see what;s going on where and post to any of the threads.

nothing malicius (sp?), just a 'portal' type landing area. I dont want to ask any of the boards for their db info because I wouldnt give that info out to anyone. Not that they might not mind, but why deal with it if I dont have to.

suntra

Piranha wrote:
The grammar is bad, I know. It is because I'm not native english.

I'm on your side, Piranha, I'm a French Canadian, so English is my second language... but at least, I do speak more languages than just English 😛

mrsocks

suntra wrote:
I'm on your side, Piranha, I'm a French Canadian, so English is my second language... but at least, I do speak more languages than just English 😛

i would not have said anything about it if it were'nt for his (Piranha's) lesson to another poster from the Philippines

http://www.phpbuilder.com/board/showpost.php?p=10797616&postcount=5

I respect and envy the fact you speak more than 1 lanuage.

Weedpacket

mrsocks wrote:
(all the different boards know about each other and are friends)

So the simplest approach would be to set up a web service on each of these boards that you can query and fetch all the posts that have been made from each since the last time you queried. Kind of like an RSS feed.