Moderation features - My-Little-Forum/mylittleforum GitHub Wiki

The software provides a set of features for the moderation of forum entries.

Overview pages

Functions in the thread tree

The subject and metadata entries in the thread trees contain a set of icons at their end (probably with the addition of a category name). Some of them are visible for every visitor or user, some of them are only accessible by moderators and administrators.

The screenshot shows a thread tree in one of the overview pages. At the end of every entry line one can see a set of icons. Most of them are interactive. The icon with the eye in example is an informational icon only.

An opening entry, which is the first entry in a thread, shows an icon bar with up to five icons.

1. The first icon is either a speech bubble or an icon, that states, that the entry has no content (can be allowed in the forum settings). With the speech bubble one can open a preview of the entry which will be loaded into an overlay in the overview page, it will not appear when loading the forum in a browser without working JavaScript support. The no-content icon is informational only. The icons are visible for the whole audience.
2. The second icon provides a link to open the thread in a view, where all postings of the thread are displayed together (like in a message board). The icon does only appear when one loaded the thread view overview page but not in the table view overview. The icon is visible for the whole audience.
3. The third icon is displayed if the forum operator enabled one or both of the spam prevention methods Akismet or Bayesian Filter. It informs the forum team about postings which are not classified as ham or spam. Classifying a posting is possible from the posting itself. If the posting is classified, the icon disappears at next loading of the overview page. The icon is only visible for members of the forum team (moderators and administrators).
4. The fourth icon makes it possible to mark one or multipe postings for deleting them later with one click. The icon is only visible for members of the forum team (moderators and administrators).
5. With the last icon one can delete a single posting (together with its replies!) instantly. The icon is only visible for members of the forum team (moderators and administrators).

Moderation functions in the sidebar

For moderators and administrators the sidebar provides a box with a few moderation functions. The following screenshot shows the box with the two options that are visible all the time.

• Delete marked postings (visible all the time): delete all postings and their replies) which was marked in the thread trees before (with the fourth icon of the thread tree icon trail).
• Manage postings (visible all the time): following the link a form is shown where a forum team member can mark or lock threads under specified conditions. Those are ...
  • mark or lock all threads with latest entries older than X days.
  • mark or lock all postings
  • unmark or unlock all postings
• X non-activated user(s) (only visible if necessary): following the liknk a form team memvber can activate registered accounts which are inactive (self registration with later activation through a team member can be enabled in the forum settings).
• Display spam in thread list (X) (only visible if necessary): switches to the list of entries, that are (pre)-classified as spam. Forum team members can check these posting to confirm or change the classification.
• Hide spam in thread list (only visible if Display spam in thread list is active): switches the overview page back to show only entries which are not classified as spam.
• Delete spam (only visible if necessary): allows forum team members to immediately delete all entries which are marked as spam without a further check of the postings.

Posting view pages

Whether in the single post view or in one of the thread views, there is a set of function links for each post, which also contains moderation functions. The follwing screenshot shows the bar with all possible functions.

• To top (visible for all visitors): moves the viewport to the top of the page.
• add bookmark/delete bookmark (only accessible for registered users): link to create or to delete a personal bookmark.
• edit (accessible for all visitors, registered users or the forum team only depending on the forum settings): link to open the posting form for editing the posting.
• delete (accessible for all visitors, registered users or the forum team only depending on the forum settings): link to delete the posting.
• move (accessible only for forum team members): link to the form to generate a new thread with the selected posting as opening posting and its replies or to move the posting and its replies to another thread.
• spam (accessible only for forum team members): link to the form to mark an entry as spam, possibly train the spam filter with its content and delete it.
• not spam (accessible only for forum team members): link to the form to mark an entry as ham and possibly train the spam filter with its content.
• lock/unlock (accessible only for forum team members): lock or unlock the posting. One can not reply to a locked posting.
• lock thread/unlock thread (accessible only for forum team members): lock or unlock the complete thread with all of its postings. One can not reply to any of the postings in a locked thread.