DragonList questions (and answers) thread

[Simon]

I'm starting this thread to ask about something I haven't been able to figure out for myself so far. I've posted this question on the DragonScripts support board a week or so ago but no replies so far over there. I know Mishi is busy with other things so I figured I'd ask the DragonList users community on this board about it.

So here's my question, to which I hope someone knows the answer. But anyone else with DL questions should feel free to add them to this thread too, so maybe it can be a resource for others.

Question follows...

In DragonList there is a way to create Sponsors, and to link their Paysites to those Sponsors. There's also a way to create Users, and to import lists of Free Sites which can be linked to those Users.

What I'm trying to find out is whether there's a way to import a list of Hosted Free Sites and link those to an existing Sponsor that I've created. Or do I have to crearte a new User account for each Sponsor too, and then import the Hosted Free Site as being linked to the User instead of the Sponsor?

Any input or suggestions on this welcome, as are any tips and tricks anyone has discovered while using DragonList.

Thanks!

[Preacher]

Originally Posted by Simon

...
In DragonList there is a way to create Sponsors, and to link their Paysites to those Sponsors. There's also a way to create Users, and to import lists of Free Sites which can be linked to those Users.

What I'm trying to find out is whether there's a way to import a list of Hosted Free Sites and link those to an existing Sponsor that I've created. Or do I have to crearte a new User account for each Sponsor too, and then import the Hosted Free Site as being linked to the User instead of the Sponsor?

I created a new user for each sponsor. So I have a user named Slickcash with all of the HFS imported to that name. I don't think at this time you can the HFS to the sponsors.

[Simon]

Thanks, Preacher ... folks told me that you or RedCherry would know the answer on this one. Figured I'd start us a DL thread in case there are more questions out there. Good to know that you do have to create a User for each Sponsor to do that. Makes me feel better that I'm not just an idiot who couldn't figure out how to do it the other way.

[Simon]

Follow-up question for the DragonList users out there.

Let's say I do use the workaround mentioned above, and I do create a new User for each Sponsor so I can import lists of their Hosted Free Sites. Doesn't that mean that there's no way to differentiate between those Sponsor Hosted Free Sites and custom-built Free Sites submitted by a webmaster?

The problem I'm trying to solve is that I wanted to use the click-tracking abilities of DragonList to help analyze traffic to HFS but didn't want to do that with Free Sites submitted by webmasters, since that would mean running them through the click tracking script instead of linking directly to the submitted Free Site.

So, my question is, has anyone found good workaround for this problem? Or is there some way to do this built into the program and I'm just missing it despite reading all the docs and the forum posts?

Any help or suggestions appreciated.

[Preacher]

Originally Posted by Simon

Follow-up question for the DragonList users out there.

Let's say I do use the workaround mentioned above, and I do create a new User for each Sponsor so I can import lists of their Hosted Free Sites. Doesn't that mean that there's no way to differentiate between those Sponsor Hosted Free Sites and custom-built Free Sites submitted by a webmaster?...

That's what I do, being as I display newest to oldest those HFS slip off the first page really quick anyway.

But, what you could do is set-up a different "type" named HFS and then you could track them seperately. The problem with this solution is that now submitters could submit to that type.

Needing something similiar myself, I went into the php of the submitter form and manually set-up the options in the form so that submitters cannot see the type option I don't want them to see, but the type still there for me to import into.

Hope that makes sense.

[Simon]

Thanks for that tip, Preacher. I may wind up having to do that anyway to hide some things for the same reason.

But I'm not sure about the other part of my question. If I make a new 'type' for the Hosted Free Sites, will I somehow be able to use DL's built-in click tracking for just the HFS 'type' while still linking directly to all of the submitted Free Sites? From what I could tell it seemed the 'count clicks' function was either on or off for all.

[Preacher]

Whoops, I thought it broke down by type, sorry about that. There's gotta be a simple way to pull that data out of the db though.

I would probably just vew the listed sites by type, ordered by click descending to give me a general idea of how things were going.

[LD]

Simon, just curious, what is the reason for not wanting to run webmaster submitted sites through the click tracking script? Sorry to sidetrack, but you've got me wondering if the click tracking script has some disadvantage...(?)

[Simon]

Originally Posted by Preacher

I would probably just vew the listed sites by type, ordered by click descending to give me a general idea of how things were going.

Yes, that could work if I had click-tracking turned on for everything. But my real goal here is to find a way to enable click-tracking *only* on the sponsor Hosted Free Sites but to not use the click-tracking on the webmaster-submitted Free Sites. Which it really seems I can't do, so I'll mostly likely just have tracking turned off for all Free Sites.

Originally Posted by LusciousDelight

Simon, just curious, what is the reason for not wanting to run webmaster submitted sites through the click tracking script? Sorry to sidetrack, but you've got me wondering if the click tracking script has some disadvantage...(?)

I guess it depends on how someone defines disadvantages, and also on considering who would be disadvantaged. DragonList's built-in click tracking requires that the links to the Free Sites run through a script, so the links become something like this:

http://www.yourdomain.com/linklist/go.php?sid=4

Now, I do think it would be a decided advantage for me to be able to track which (Hosted) Free Sites are getting the most clicks, and even to be able to supply submitters with click stats for their submitted sites. However, the reason I'd turn off the click-tracking feature is that I think most Free Site builders and submitters would prefer to have a link direct to their Free Site from the Link List page instead of having the link point to a script location on the Link List site.

I'm sure most Link Lists wouldn't want a submitter running their recip button/link through a script on the submitter's own domain instead of having that link point directly to the Link List's main or cat page. So I think it's fair to link directly back to the submitted Free Sites too.

Now, if times are changing and submitters don't care about the links being direct to their Free Sites, and would prefer to have the click stats instead, I'd certainly like to use the tracking features of DragonList. But I'd have to hear from a lot of good submitters about that before I'd turn click-tracking on.

So...anyone else want to share any tips, tricks or problems and workarounds with DragonList that may benefit other users?

[Tekster]

I agree Simon, I think most free site builders prefer to have the link direct to their Free Site (me included). I had some comments when I started about that since I didn't know any better and had the click stats turned on, now they are off.

[LD]

Thanks for the info...I'm turning it off now, live and learn.

Keep submitting...