Question About NWNx Forums Registration

[Jesterb769]

This is a question for the admin, not relating directly to NWNx, but rather to a bit of customization I noticed on your forums here -- I hope you don't mind.

I noticed that the registration here requires not only email verification and the normal letters/numbers within an image, but also the addition of NWN (or NWNx) to the end of the registration code -- a measure that, I imagine, was put in to help out in controlling forum 'spam' users.

My own forums have recently come under a wave of fake, and I assume computer-generated, users, whose only purpose is to advertise viagra or whatever else in links in their profile. E-mail verification and the little image registration code arn't stopping them, but I think the measure added in these forums may.

So... long story short: How did you do that? Any help (or referrals, if its just a simply phpbb mod/hack I've missed), is much appreciated by myself and other fellow NWN gamers

-Jester
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Jester the Occasionally Merciful
World of Raathi
Creative Director/Admin

[Papillon]

Just some small changes to some of the sources files. I'll send them to your email if you send me your address in a PM.

And yes, the modification requires at least a little bit of intelligence by the one who registers. It stops the bots quite effectively.
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Papillon

[Papillon]

I've been getting PMs by a couple of other people as well, so I'll just post a link to a small zip package here. Do not expect documentation or nice source code comments, the changes are just to few and simple.

Here is what one has to do (based on phpBB 2.0.21):

[Zebranky]

... including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of MERCHANTABILITY and FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. This software is provided AS-IS.

*high-fives Pap, his partner in having the GPL memorized*

[Jesterb769]

Papillon is completely correct in not needing any real documentation for this. Inserting the working code into phpbb (I was/am working with phpbb 2.0.17, so its not exclusive to v2.0.21 by a long shot) is simple, and highly effective. Even I, with my extremely limited abilities, was able to impliment this without any trouble.

Although now that I think of it, I would perhaps caution against making this modification too... obvious to the public. Afterall, if it draws enough attention, the people who program those malicious little spam-bots will notice as well. Just a thought *shrug*

Anyways, thank you papillon for sharing your great modification. Simple, but very effective.
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Jester the Occasionally Merciful
World of Raathi
Creative Director/Admin

[Papillon]

Sure, if there is something I can do against spammers, I'll do it

If the mod becomes too public, you can always modify the logic behind the additional letters, say "Please add a dot after the code" / "Please add the result of 1+2 to the code" / "..."

Bots just don't understand stuff like that.
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Papillon

[PhoenixQB33]

It work like a charm!!! No longer need to delete 20+ bots a day.!
Thanks Papillon.

[william_hunter]

Wouldnt it be nice to be able to send a nice electromagnetic pulse down the line to the spammers house?

Spam all you want then, punk. EMP away!
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The Realm of Tharagon NWN PW