First I'd like to thank the community for their support of magicModules and our module ventures. In appreciation of this, we offer up totally free of charge and with full support: magicHyperRedirect, a commercial quality replacement of our tab redirect module magicRedirect.

mHR offers the same tab redirection as mR but adds a host of new features.

You can now specify passing the users user id in the querystring as well as what parameter name it is known by. For example http://www.yahoo.com?uid=2 or default.aspx?username=2. This facilitates connecting DNN to legacy or non framework applications.

Redirection is now CONDITIONAL. If you do not specify any conditions it behaves as before, but if you do, redirection only occurs if the person hitting the tab matches all the conditions specified. All conditions of course are optional and administrator controlled.

Here is a rundown of the conditions as well as some ideas for use.
Date Range: Redirection here happens only when the tab is viewed between the dates specified.

User Roles: Redirection happens if a user is *in* or *not in* a user role. Combined with the built in module viewing roles this can be very powerful. For example if you set a modules viewing role to registered users, you can add a "sign up form" for special services to a tab as well as a redirect. Users that have already signed up can be redirected while those that havent can be shown the form.

User Data: Redirection based upon the presense or abscence of User Data. Using this powerful condition you can redirect folks based upon userid (redirect only if userid = 44), based upon geographic location (redirect only if country = austria or if country <> china), redirect based upon missing or invalid information (redirect only if PostalCode = NULL)

These conditions can all be combined (redirect between 12/12/2004 and 1/2/2005 if the user is in the Group Licensed Users and they live in the United States)

magicHyperRedirect can be considered Beta until it has been throughly tested, when all the kinks have been worked out we will be releasing the full source project, until then it is downloadable as a PS install for DNN 2 only. (We have no plans for a DNN1 release).

It is released under the magicModules "No Bull Free Module License" ; Use it, Love it. Do whatever you wish with it. If you sell it or any product derived from it you will hear from our lawyers.

You can get magicHyperRedirect from our site; http://magicModules.srmediagroup.com. Support for this module can be had from the forums on our site or via my personal email.

(apologies in advance for the yellow box... its a new module we are testing as well as flogging some of our wares *smile* it helps with our toddlers Thomas the Tank Engine fetish)

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

I'm having some problems getting this to work. First, I've discovered that since you configured the dnn file to unzip the files into a directory with a period (.) in the name (magicModules.magicHyperRedirect), the module can't find the icon or CSS packaged with it. I've seen this same problem with other modules that create directories with company.modulename as the folder for the module. Anyway, I just updated the dnn file to unzip to a folder called magicHyperRedirect, which solved the icon and CSS issue.

However, the module only seems to work with a redirect with no conditions. If I configure any conditions, the module doesn't seem to do anything. I doesn't work for any of the conditions including date, user, role or any combination thereof. If I turn of the conditions, then it will work fine as just a basic redirect.

In any case, I'm jazzed about the potential for this module. Great idea and plenty of uses... I just can't seem to get it to work.

I've noticed the period thing. *cough* portal bug heh.

I've tested the conditionality things on three installs of DNN and they all worked. A couple of notes on conditions...

They never work for portal admins. You need to not be host or admin or in those roles for the redirect to work (or else you'd never be able to configure the module).

If you select more than one condition they ALL must be met in order to "pass".

If you select a silly condition (not saying you did just a mention) like UserID = dog, it will never redirect as error trapping (convert string to int32 = bad thing) will prevent the redirect.

Let's get this solved as I hate open issues and want this to work for everyone.

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

I just tried this on 2.0.4+ install, localhost.... and it seems to work fine....

Only thing a little "weird" is that if a condition is "not set" (or clear, in case of calendar) then that condition seems to "pass" - but if all conditions "not set" then that doesn't hold - never passes.

No biggie - as the "conditions" states at least one condition must be set.... but intuitively, if I forgot to set one (for some reason) I'd like something like "auto-uncheck conditions" for me (at least I would have a hint I missed something). Anyway, that would seem to me like the behavior is more "consistent" -- no conditions set equivalent to not using conditions.

Nice text, help on the options.

Nice job, John!

Cheers,

Yarko

Would like to see the "Role" "Unauthenticaated User" -- as there is no other way to say role "not in" all roles. Alternative might be checkbox selection of roles to select "in" or "not in".

Just a thought.

Thanks for the kind words Yarko, coming from you that means alot.

I too am not totally pleased with the UI involving the conditions. I wasn't sure how I wanted it changed and reckoned that on release I'd get a number of suggestions and together we'd get something really special going here.

Let's see how it goes with the suggestions and resume that discussion when we get more input.

You also stated that you wanted :

Would like to see the "Role" "Unauthenticaated User" -- as there is no other way to say role "not in" all roles. Alternative might be checkbox selection of roles to select "in" or "not in".

Well there is the general module visibiltiy options. If I set a module visible only to unauthenticated users and do a conditionless redirect with that one, I think that gives the same effect as you were shooting for. If I'm understanding you correctly...

I thought I had programmed it that if "use conditions" as checked but no conditions were set or they were only partially set that it let users "pass" anyways... I had a code bug and reverted a branch back to fix it... maybe I messed that up.

One new feature request I got via email today that I thought was ultra cool was to auto add a user to a group when the redirect was made... I think Ill be adding that one in before the final release.

I'd love to hear more commentary on this guys. Just today there have been 213 downloads of mHR and very little stirrings of commentary. Let's get some feedback here so we can make this a KILLER module!

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

.....Well there is the general module visibiltiy options. If I set a module visible only ...

Ahhh, I see... well.... I see that can work (still, would be nice to collect controls in one place I think)....

Thanks for the notes.

Re: "add role" - interesting, and even more so if it could be done for just the session.... (one way to mark a user as "redirected from.....<<someplace>>"). Not sure if that can be easily accomplished currently, but interesting concept.

The generic version would be "execute some arbitrary script, then redirect" - ooooh, the trouble admins could get themselves into! ;-)

Cheers,

Yarko

.... Once per session

Now THAT is an idea. Now we can create a mechanism (with a sister module say something called magicBounceBack) in which we can send a user to "someplace" say a sponsor tab and then "bounce" them back to where they originally wanted to go after seeing what we wanted to show them.

Maybe we could store the original place they wanted to go in viewstate without the need for another module?

This is a really cool concept, I think the only thing holding it back would be a decent UI so that the average user wouldnt have "brain melt" when figuring out how it worked.

.... execute some arbitrary script, then redirect

I have a concept of a module that works somewhat like mHR but instead of redirecting loads a module based upon conditions. Wheras mHR works on a tab level the concept module would work on a module level. For example (based on conditions) If a user is unauthenticated show them a login module else show them a members services menu module.

The concept module would simply be a shell to hold another module based upon conditions. The admin UI would feature a condition builder and a dropdown of availiable controls. There's some technical issues with module ids and module administration but I think they could be solved pretty simply.

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

hey john tahsnk for provding this... I am not one of the 213 ...but maybe I will get in later today.

The one thing I like is the ability to append the userid to the query string.... great idea

now I am thinking how about a mgicIFRAME... I dont have a need for it now but I have seen many people requesting the ability to pass userid to an IFRAME

thanks again for you support to everyone here.

I smell the brewings of that old library book trick...

Kids would write goto page 15... P15 goto page 37. P37 goto page 71 (your almost there)...

I can see it now.
To download this Free module click here.
Users are redirected to various ad/revenue generating sites.
After the 5th one they finally get the download and the publisher earns $20 in paid clicks.

Ingeniously Concept... It's free but you'll have to jump through a few hoops.

That's one way to slush fund this community. 50,000 downoads x $20 and the same for all updates and module developers. I like it...

.....loads a module based upon conditions

John! Yo!

Conditional module containers - precursor to general programming constructs for connecting module functionality thru "graphic" sort of web-page programming!!!!!

EEEEEAAAAA!!! This is cool.

Don't worry about those fearing "abuse" - programming languages can be used to write viruses (or just really cr*ppy code! ;-) ) but the good ones people recognize, and those prevail.

I think the bigger conceptual direction here is.... well.... pretty exciting. Look at the number of "non-technicals" on these forums, and think how well some level of this could (eventually) suit them.

Keep at it. When thinking of conditional "redirect" (analogous to conditional calls) and conditional "loading" (analogous to conditional code branching) and loading data based on user operation (conditional data assignment)..... gee - what's left for a general turing machine?

This could easily get "feature creeped" into un-usability, but .... with careful attention... appropriate abstraction, and kept as sparse as possible.... this could add some REALLY COOL ability to DNN - a administrative-level (potentially even graphically) "programmable" web portal!

Let's see where this can go - anybody with some "challange" (but 'real') use case ideas?
Let's see what kind of model, relationship diagrams, etc. come of this!

Cheers!

....functional modules, without general browsing population UI....

....modules contain modules....

so....

Load module (overload, with parameter passing)....
....can contain condition module... (if...)
........which can contian select data module....
....... and so on

ditto for:

Redirect module (with parameter passing)... (goto...)
Retrieve data module.... (get...)
Assign data module.... (set...)
Catch (exception) module.... (eek! context specific custom error handling!)

Now - a parameter and type mechanism in module databases would make this a little error robust and usable...

Phew! Somebody get me AWAY from the coffee pot! ;-)

(sorry, John! -- didn't mean to run away with your idea.... I just got a little excited ;-) )

I've been excited about smart containers for awhile now.

I've been thinking that the *container" is the place to do this upper level control. I have a prototype skin object now (well its sorta a skin object, kinda) that performs general CMS tasks. It displays its content (the module) based upon a similiar condition engine that mHR uses as well as adds a layer of conditionality based upon nLevel editorial approvals. It's certainly not production ready, nor is the concept totally sound either. For one I need to devise a new UI for module settings. You see now we as programmers when we design a module design the UI for it's settings. For such high level things as smart containers we need to come up with a structure by which modules can design and administrate other modules settings without "human" intervention.

Take for example a container that conditionally loads a module say a links module. Well the links module needs certain configurations in order to run correctly. Since we never really have an instance of the links module (it only exists as a submodule of sorts to the smart container) we need a new UI and mechinism by which to administrate and set up this module. For one thing it will lack a ModuleID as it really isnt a module (the smart container is the module), but if we hold that the smart container is just a container then there *IS NO* moduleID.

So in essence for this whole thing to work to it's fullest potential, a new mini framework has to be developed.

OR maybe not. Maybe it's as simple as a foreign key table and a new UI to admin "virtual modules".

I think several pots of coffee and a fifth of Absolut hold the answers to these questions.

Oh and Bert when I get a chance a magicIFrame is in your future. :)

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

Well - an instance - of an object needs to have an identity... just the current "moduleID" is targetted at somewhat static creation. In general, creating a moduleID within a session, and tearing it down at the end of the session (not committing it) should not be conceptually difficult.

But there's that general issue of user state, and current global nature of moduleIDs, userIDs, etc...
A high level look at contianment, and relationship of DNN objects might be interesting..

John - send me some email - yarkot aT hotmail dOt com - tell me if you have VisStudio, Visio, etc. Maybe we can bounce around some graphic / model view discussion on this (if you're interested). I'd like that - for me, this is touching on a theme that keeps coming up.

This is FUN STUFF! ;-)

Cheers,

Yarko.

BTW.... absolute.... currant... from the freezer...... *aaaahhhh*

i have most everything VS visio... fresh out of Absolut Currant though and that is my FAVORITE.

Never thought it would happen but the two year old kinda put me off drinking. I just don't have any interest in it now. Dunno if that's a good thing or not.

My email is on the site. Dunno how much time I can guarantee... running two companies... supporting the modules. I get like 700 mails daily ... Life is too short.

---

John Laroche

------------------------------------------

magicModules Custom DNN Design and Programming

http://magicModules.com

Take a looksy at Lencom's Visual Web Task. I've used it to build interactive spiders negotiating logins and navigating sites to extract data. If nothing else, their interface for setting conditions may give you some ideas.

Now, what if you could build fully Interactive Spider plugins for HyperRedirector?

Man, still no go with this puppy. I've tried it with conditions, without conditions, with only one condition, with more than one condition but not all... it seems to only work as a basic redirect if I don't have ANY conditions set. If I select the Conditions checkbox, it seems to ignore any conditions that I set and won't redirect regardless of the conditions that I choose. I understand that the conditions are cumulative. Does that mean that I must select a condition for ALL of the options? Can't I simply choose a date range condition? In my tests, a simple date range condition doesn't work (with all other conditions left unconfigured). What am I missing? What's the magic combination? I'm probably being dense... little help?