Your Ideal Link List Script

[spacemanspiff]

I made a post like this a while back and got many good responses, but that was before the Big Crash, and all that has been lost.

I have a group of programmer friends that want to write the perfect link list script. The last time around it was one fairly unreliable guy that has since bailed. These guys are serious. They're actually waiting on me for more info, which is a pleasant change.

The goal is to include all the features of the top scripts available now, and to add all the features that ll owners would like to have.

So, please post anything that you think would make for a kick ass link list script. Even if you just want to bitch about something the one you're using now does, that will help too.

Thanks
SS

[Fonz]

I would like to see an overview of all sites within a category, so that you can just click the site you want to edit.

With my current script you have to use the search function to get to a site and edit it.

[spacemanspiff]

he he, you must be using the same one I am.

[Ramster]

Fonz has got it right on!!

A script that will allow you to VIEW the links per category and edit more than one at a time, say 10-50 even.

A search feature for surfers to use.
A Mouseover option for when you add in sponsor links.
A bot built in for link checking and recip checking that will remove bad links and suspend them for review.

Those are a few I can think of right now. Richard's script I use has a couple of these features and more but not all.

[Fonz]

Oh yeah.. and a bot that spiders the listed sites and searches for broken links/no more recips and stuff like that

[spacemanspiff]

Cool Ramster, I like the mouseover idea.

I don't know how other scripts are set up, but I would like the ability to have links sorted in multiple ways, like aphabetically, or by date added, or even rotating alpabetically on a daily basis, with the ability to choose different methods for different cats.

Also, my current script will build the whole html page, but I've modified it to build a just a bare bones list of links that I insert in the category page via SSI. It works fine that way, but it was a little technical to get it all set up. I'm thinking a choice of build options, like "build entire category page" or "build only link lists", with various appearance options like mouseovers or text fonts.

[spacemanspiff]

Yeah, Fonz, a bot is a must.

- check for recips
- check for redirects
- check for site changes. this part I'm not really decided on. I don't want to go as far as the tgp script bots, but I'd like to have sites that make substantial changes flagged somehow for a look-see. I just don't want this to end up being a huge list of sites to check every day. I'll have to ask the programmers how practical this might be. Maybe a checksum entry in a sql database would do it.

[Ramster]

I have useful scripts and it has the mouseover which is great. It also does sort alphabetically rotating by letter, good for the webmasters and you don't get a bunch of aaa sites submitted.

[Cleo]

I really do need to get a better script this year.

I also vote for these features already posted by others.
check for recips
check for redirects
check for site changes
A search feature for surfers to use.
A Mouseover option for when you add in sponsor links.

Also some way of easily moving mass amounts of listings from category to category.

[Ramster]

Originally posted by Cleo
Also some way of easily moving mass amounts of listings from category to category.

Oh baby, would that be good. I just added sub categories and I cannot put the existing links into a sub category without editing them 1 by 1. I have 7000 links, so that option is out. LOL

[Cleo]

Originally posted by Ramster
Oh baby, would that be good. I just added sub categories and I cannot put the existing links into a sub category without editing them 1 by 1. I have 7000 links, so that option is out. LOL

I just added two more categories. I just couldn't go through the pain of moving about 400+ links into each category and just said fuck it the submitters will fill them up quickly.

Last time I added two new categories I spent about three days on and off moving links, never again.

Really what I want more then anything is a decent bot and to know if a page has been changed since I approved it.

[Surfn]

I'm usually thinking outside the box, I would like a script that could do all of the above, plus search the web for sites that meet my criteria. A simple bot would do. I wouldn't have link backs but I could add a dozen or so new sites to all my cats everyday easily.

[spacemanspiff]

Two more biggies on my list. A 'change bot' and an easier sort routine for moving sites to different cats. That is one time consuming bitch with the script I have. Seems like you should be able to say "find all the sites with 'nude martians' in the title or desc and move em all to the 'martians' cat."

Surf'n, a web bot sounds like a good idea. I just don't know how it would work in practice. You could run a spider to grab sites on se's, complete with meta description or whatever, but it seems like there would still be a lot of reviewing time involved. I guess it would be easier if they were all in a database so you could accept or decline with a click, rather than having to fill in all the fields manually. I'll ask the programmers about that.

Thanks for all the great suggestions, and keep em coming.

[EclectiXXX]

Of course something using MySQL and PHP so it will be fast and efficient.

The ability to give submitters a preferred or approved status so they can add their own sites.

Multiple levels of security so you can have multiple reviewers, or perhaps ALA DMOZ reviewers for specific categories only...

[spacemanspiff]

Great idea on the preffered submitters thing, EclictiXXX. I've got some that I barely even look at, just hit the accept button.

I think I specified MySQL and PHP in the original specs, but I'll double check that.

Multiple levels of security sounds kinda intriguing. Maybe allow reviewers to add sites to certain specific cats, with no other abilities, like deleting or sorting? I'll look into that. If you have any other thought on that subject, let me know.

[EclectiXXX]

ok.

Here's what I mean. In DMOZ editors are given access to certain categories only. So it would be cool if we could do that for whomever we might have helping review and list sites.

The OTHER thing that would be handy is an IMPORT function. To import existing data bases into this. That would be both MySQL and flat files (I.E. Links 2.0 DBs...)

[spacemanspiff]

Originally posted by EclectiXXX
ok.

Here's what I mean. In DMOZ editors are given access to certain categories only. So it would be cool if we could do that for whomever we might have helping review and list sites.

The OTHER thing that would be handy is an IMPORT function. To import existing data bases into this. That would be both MySQL and flat files (I.E. Links 2.0 DBs...)

Yeah, I got the DMOZ analogy. I'm an editor over there. I guess I was overthinking it a little, wondering about security and abuse issues. But I don't suppose anyone's going to let someone they don't trust have access to their admin.

On the import function, I don't know if there will be a user friendly, push-button sort of import, but there will be one. If it can't convert a Links2 DB, IM not gonna use it.

[AcidMaX]

I already have a Link List script that I am writing that runs one of my own link lists and would be more than happy to build all these features into the script. For the sake of speed if there is another PHP programmer out there who is willing to work with me, we can finish the script up much faster, make it easier to maintain and add more features than the others.

Hit me up on ICQ and we can get rocking on it 70930467, otherwise I will take all these features and begin working on adding them to my link list script and finishing up my hosted gallery manager

Andy

[AcidMaX]

Just an FYI I was working on this all weekend, it will incorporate all your ideas AND a lot more. I added my own ideas to the list as well, should be a couple weeks and this puppy will be good to go. Will keep you guys posted if you want, but will definitely let you know when it has been released. I'm comparing my features to the other scripts out there and although it has many comparible features, it will have some that those scripts dont have, including all your suggestions.

Andy

[EclectiXXX]

One thing to have script writers remember... If they're using PHP andMySQL there is a tendency to want to always build the pages on the fly when they are accessed. This is a terrible idea for something as large and potentially as busy as a Link Site.

It's way better to use templates and let us rebuild static pages when we want to update the site...

[AcidMaX]

Originally posted by EclectiXXX
One thing to have script writers remember... If they're using PHP andMySQL there is a tendency to want to always build the pages on the fly when they are accessed. This is a terrible idea for something as large and potentially as busy as a Link Site.

It's way better to use templates and let us rebuild static pages when we want to update the site...

You very well could do completely dynamic pages if the code was done right, however, I am going to have two options. I that is dynamic with page caching and also have the option to generate static pages so it can fit both worlds. With the caching dynamic pages the site can still be dynamic when it changes, you just clear a local cache, as far as the serving it serves just as fast as a static page would be but provides more flexibility so I think I will be able to serve both types for people and let them choose.

-Andy

[MandyD]

Hi Guys

Sorry to jump in so late into the discussion, but I want every category to be able to have it's own templates! There's nothing worse than having to spend hours working out how to do it, please make template modification SIMPLE!

Thanks

[mogart]

I think that if you check AGS 3 and make all things they have + your script will be cheaper I will buy it

[MandyD]

I've never heard of AGS 3 - where can I check it out?

[Cleo]

I use SSI to pull my links into my pages so I could care less about editing templates. On scripts that use templates, like AGP, I just delete out everything and have it write a txt file.