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Monday, July 11, 2005

Integrating Active Forums & Private Messages
By Scott McCulloch @ 4:52 PM :: 6760 Views :: 18 Comments ::

A common function in most forum systems is the ability to send a private message to another user.

In a typical forum, when viewing a post by another user, it is common to see the "Send Message" link, as shown here:-

Private Messages is a popular messaging module available for DotNetNuke, you can read more about it here. We will attempt to integrate it with a popular forums module (Active Forums from www.activemodules.com). Find the page your Private Messages module is on and remember that URL.

Active Forums allows you to customize the user section on each post (called PostInfo). We are able to customize this section to provide a link to the private messaging module passing the ID of the post's author.

To customize the PostInfo section in ActiveForums:-

Navigate to the page your forums module is on.
Use the menu and select Control Panel
Click on Templates
Click on PostInfo from the list of Templates
Add a hyperlink in HTML to your private messaging module.(Adding a [USERID] parameter and remember the URL of private messages)
- e.g. <a HREF="/tabid/201/type/Compose/SendTo/[USERID]/Default.aspx"><img src="/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20PrivateMessages/images/icon_pm_message.gif" border="0"></a>
Click Update

You should now be able to see the changes reflected in your forums for each user as shown below:-

The good thing about the method is that you can link in to private messages from virtually any module. You should also be able to pass in a default subject by passing in a subject parameter.

Comments

By Anonymous User @ Wednesday, July 13, 2005 4:53 PM

Not a flame, just curious. If you're using ActiveForums then why is the private message module needed? isn't it redundant?

By Scott McCulloch @ Wednesday, July 13, 2005 5:18 PM

Active Forums doesn't have a messaging feature..

By Buck Anderson @ Wednesday, July 27, 2005 6:04 PM

Can you give an example of passing a subject parameter?

By Mark Matthews @ Sunday, August 07, 2005 8:41 PM

Wow! Just got around to trying this!! It works GREAT!! If you can provide the same feature to Simple Gallery, than this is a KILLER combo!

By stipe k @ Wednesday, August 10, 2005 4:53 AM

Scott, don't know if I'm doing something wrong, but it foesn't seem to work with AF 3.0.8 patch. Any ideas?

By Dave Buckner @ Sunday, August 14, 2005 11:33 PM

Very nice!

By Gene Vaz @ Sunday, December 04, 2005 8:48 PM

Would this be the same for DNN 3.2? I can not seem to get it to work with the current configuration you have shown.

By Anonymous User @ Sunday, December 18, 2005 11:16 AM

-o[p[p[o[p

By EJ Hunyadi @ Saturday, April 22, 2006 11:42 PM

This works like a charm: I can't believe it was so easy to set up!!!

By Andre Teixeira @ Wednesday, July 19, 2006 7:43 AM

Thank you! Due to this site I bought active forums and am extremely happy with it. This little script sure is easy to set up and helps a lot. thank you so much.

By Mike Webb @ Wednesday, October 11, 2006 7:22 AM

Excellent!! It worked perfectly the first time. DNN 4.3.5 AF 3.6.7.26575.

I added a Title="Send Private Message".

By Bhai Sesay @ Sunday, May 13, 2007 8:05 PM

Really nice. Easy to implement. Works the first time.

Bysschneider @ Thursday, June 21, 2007 1:51 AM

Great job. Any idea, if this could be integrated to the DNN Forum? That would also be nice :-)

By Jose Maldonado @ Friday, June 22, 2007 3:56 AM

Their modules are exceptional! this could be integrated to the forum of the DNN?

By Scott McCulloch @ Friday, June 22, 2007 5:44 AM

It could be integrated into the DNN forum, but I'm unsure if you can do it through the screens (does it support templating similar to active forums?)

By Jose Maldonado @ Friday, June 22, 2007 5:49 AM

I already managed to integrate it! I published the Forum_UserProfile.ascx file:

<a HREF="/tabid/422/type/Compose/SendTo/<%=Request.QueryString("userid")%>/Default.aspx"><img src="/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20PrivateMessages/images/icon_pm_message.gif" border="0"></a>
I am investigating for a greater integration, I will communicate. Greetings

By Andre Teixeira @ Sunday, November 11, 2007 9:38 PM

to integrate with the core DNN forum, i put this HTML tag (from post above) to the signature section of the user settings. that way the button appears on every post I do on my signature.

<a HREF="/tabid/PMTAB/type/Compose/SendTo/USERID/Default.aspx"><img src="/DesktopModules/DnnForge%20-%20PrivateMessages/images/icon_pm_message.gif" border="0"></a>

where PMTAB is the tab # and USERID is the user id. so I forced the tab and user id to the number that worked for me.

is there a token I could use on my signature that could be used for anyone? like a userid token?

By Steve J. @ Saturday, March 08, 2008 10:05 AM

Thanks, it works great!!!
Steve

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