Enthusiast FAQs – Please read this first

[AmelieKeymaster]

This post was originally added to the CodeGrrl forums by Angela, author of Enthusiast.

1. So, what is Enthusiast?

Enthusiast is (at the smallest level) a listing management script, geared towards fanlistings but very easily customized to be a hatelisting, namelisting, *listing, or clique (no country) script. That’s Enthusiast series 2, for which development has stopped. Enthusiast 3, on the other hand, is more than just a listing management script, but also a listing collective management script: think listing management + collective management + affiliates management script in one.

2. Where can I find it?

Enthusiast 2 and Enthusiast 3 can both be found at my scripts archive, Indiscripts.

3. I want to switch to/from Enthusiast and another script, how do I do this?

There are conversion/import scripts that can be downloaded at Indiscripts, please check if your script has an appropriate converter. If your script does not have an appropriate Enth converter, you can request for one to be made, and there is also an add member addon for Enthusiast 3. Below is a quick list:

- To convert PHPFanBase to Enthusiast 2, there is a conversion script available at Indiscripts > Enthusiast > Downloads > Enthusiast 2 > Modifications.

- To convert PHPFanBase to Enthusiast 3, there is a conversion script available at Indiscripts > Enthusiast > Downloads > Enthusiast 3 > Modifications.

If you have any conversion scripts that you’ve made, you could consider sending it to me for putting up at Indiscripts — credits for the conversion script will, of course, remain yours.

If there is no conversion script available, you might be interested in the Add Members Addon (which can be downloaded at Indiscripts) which will allow you to add members by hand into your fanlisting, and not send out member information emails.

4. I want to use Enthusiast 3 across multiple domains. How do I do this?

I have written a tutorial for this which can be found here on my fanlisting collective.

5. I’m having problems using Enth3, and I’m using NL-ConvertToPHP. What’s wrong?

For your list/members page, you need to use this code in your file:

<? } elseif (substr_count($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'], "list")) { ?>

(Where “list” is what you use to access the page, e.g. page.php?list)

You must use this code instead of the default which normally looks like this:

<? } elseif ($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'] == "list") { ?>

Note that the code only needs to be changed for the members page. If you are having problems with any other sections of Enth, try changing the code there too, but they should work fine with the normal NL-ConvertToPHP code.

6. My members list shows up fine, but when I click on a country and/or choose a country from the dropdown menu, I get a blank page!

Please check your members’ page code. Does it look something like this?:

<?php



include 'header.php';



if (!$_SERVER['QUERY_STRING']) { ?>



<h2>Members</h2>



<?php include 'config.php';

include $path . 'show_members.php'; ?>



<?php }

include 'footer.php'; ?>

If so, remove this part:

if (!$_SERVER['QUERY_STRING']) {

(leave the ?> though) and also remove the } from the bottom. You don’t need to use NL-ConvertToPHP if you only have one page – NL-Convert is meant for several pages all in one. There is no point using it with just one page! Amelie explains this in more detail.

7. I get an error that says something like “Table ‘databasename.settings’ doesn’t exist” — what am I doing wrong?

You’ve edited the wrong config.php. Redownload the script and try again — the config.php that is OUTSIDE the /enth folder of the zip file is for your fanlistings and collective, DO NOT use it for your admin panel otherwise you will get this error. Instead, edit the separate config.php that is inside the /enth folder — this one is especially for the admin panel and it won’t give you any errors. Don’t be tempted to copy the first config.php (the one for fanlistings/collectives) into the enth folder/on top of the one in the enth folder – the config files are not the same and editing the wrong one will give you errors.

If you are getting this error on your fanlistings, it means you have not created the fanlisting database properly. Check in your admin panel and see that the fanlisting and its database was added correctly.

8. With Enthusiast 2.x, I’m getting this error: “MySQL Error #1136: Column count doesn’t match value count at row 1″ — what do I do?

If you don’t have additional fields set:

1. Open your config file, set $additional_field to false and delete all the $additional_field_names lines except $additional_field_names = array();

2. Run alter.php (i.e., if your Enthusiast installation is at yourfanlisting.com/enthusiast, go to yourfanlisting.com/enthusiast/alter.php)

If you do have additional fields set:

1. Open your config file and make sure $additional_field is set to true and the $additional_field_names lines = ‘yourfieldname’; are correct/enough. No more, no less.

2. Run alter.php (i.e., if your Enthusiast installation is at yourfanlisting.com/enthusiast, go to yourfanlisting.com/enthusiast/alter.php)

9. I’m getting MySQL connection errors about access being denied. What do I do?

There are two places to check: one, the config.php file for your installation, collective, and/or fanlisting; and the actual values you have entered in the fanlisting you have setup. Check for typographical errors, if the values are the correct ones (you may need to ask your hosting provider for these), if the user has access to the database, if the server accepts a connection from your script (in case of remotely-hosted sites).

10. I’m using Enthusiast 3.1.0 and I’m getting PEAR errors and sendmail errors!

Please note that PEAR is not something I made, and your server may have different sendmail settings. Check if your host has sendmail enabled and if you’re using the right path. If you’re getting errors in your error log, see this PEAR Mail documentation for a possible explanation of your error, and ask your hosting provider about it.

Also, even if PEAR Mail fails and it tells you it was unable to send a message — Enthusiast defaults over to sending the email via the native PHP mail() function. This means that emails sent by Enthusiast should still send, unless your host has disabled the native PHP mail() function/command.

11. I’m upgrading to 3.1.0 and I get this error: Error executing query: Unknown column ‘parent’ in ‘field list’ — what do I do?

Read the documentation included in the zip file. Trust me.

12. I have a problem, etc…

Please let us know as much as possible exactly what the problem is. A URL to the problem page, the connected configuration settings, the PHP snippet you’re using, will all be very VERY helpful, for us to know what the problem is. We can NOT help you unless you give us as much information as you can.

13. I found a security vulnerability!

Please email me (Angela), immediately. Keeping the vulnerability to yourself doesn’t do anyone any good in the long run. Posting it here for everyone else to see what the vulnerability is just attracts trouble. Don’t tell it to other staffers/members and expect them to fix it, as the script is not their responsibility, it’s mine, and I don’t want to burden them with it. So email the details to me instead, and I will find a way to fix it. If you have suggestions on how to fix it, feel free to let me know as well. So, to reiterate, email me immediately if you find a security vulnerability with Enthusiast.

14. Why are my images not showing?

These can be the result of several factors, but most often they happen when Enthusiast can’t parse the directory/web paths correctly. You might have moved your images; you might be using the wrong paths; you might be on a different domain than your images — all these are possible. First of all, all your images MUST be on on the same server as your primary Enth installation (i.e., in case you have fanlistings in other domains). This is because Enthusiast (the script) needs LOCAL (i.e., not through the Internet) access to your folders to upload files to your folders. And whenever the script needs these images, it performs a bit of URL/directory parsing. See this example:

Root path, absolute (absolute path of the hosting account's public_html folder):

/home/mycollective/public_html/



Root path, web (web path that corresponds to the absolute path):

http://mycollective.com/



Affiliates path (for example):

/home/mycollective/public_html/fanlisting/affiliates/

What happens is mycollective.com will replace the /home/mycollective/public_html/ part of the affiliates path to become http://mycollective.com/fanlisting/affiliates/, as it expects the images to be there. Please check your paths against this simple example and make sure your paths are correct for the images. Remember — if the script can’t find /home/mycollective/public_html/ in the image path, it won’t do anything.

15. Why aren’t I/my members getting any emails?

There are several reasons why emails may not be going out from Enthusiast:

• Spam: It’s possible that the email was seen as spam by some clients. Check your junk/spam folders to see if the message might be there.
• Volume of emails: Some hosts are very strict about the number of emails that can be sent out at any one time. If you send an email to a large number of people (e.g. email to all members, etc.) then this might have been blocked. Try sending to fewer people and see if this works.
• Host settings: A lot of hosts disable the mail() function used by PHP for security reasons. If this is the case, you need to change Enth’s settings so that it doesn’t use “PHP’s native mail()” (the default). Try one of the other options and see if that works.
• Enthusiast settings: Check your mail settings in Enth to make sure everything is set correctly. If your settings are set to use SMTP mail, make sure the settings are right here; try selecting that the server requires authentication if this is not selected already and check that the host, port, username and password are all correct. If you are using the sendmail option, check that the path to sendmail is correct (ask your host if you are not sure what it is).

If all the above steps fail, you should contact your host to find out what you can do about the emails.

Lastly, please try to find if your question has already been discussed before. Also, please keep support/troubleshooting questions in this forum, I will NOT be replying to any emails about Enth, no exceptions. Thanks! <3

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