Administrator

We are thrilled with the response to the latest generation of our community platform, IPS4 and hope you have been following the exciting progress and enhancements with IPS4.1. I’d like to take this opportunity to highlight IPS’ Community in the Cloud service. IPS provides hosted/cloud service to thousands of communities and because we built the software and we limit our service exclusively to our software, we’re able to tailor and optimize our environment specifically for our products. This leads to an efficient, well supported, turnkey solution with a one-stop provider. There’s no waiting as you ask your host to review error logs, make potential configuration changes, repair database tables because a server was improperly shut down or the database ran out of room to expand or update outdated software to comply with the latest requirements. In the unlikely event you have an issue with your community and we don’t already know about it, we will have all of the tools and access required to take care of it with minimal, if any inconvenience to you. If you’ve previously considered our CiC packages but have hesitated due to disk space constraints, we’re pleased to announce that we have made significant enhancements to our offerings, including doubling the storage capacity on most packages. Whether you’re an existing or prospective client, please take a few minutes to review our offerings on our website. Here are a few of our more Frequently Asked Questions regarding our CiC service: Do I have to pay for each application separately? On all but our Standard 25 package, all IPS applications are included. Starting at $30/mo., you get nearly $500 worth of software wrapped up in a turnkey cloud-based solution. What happens if I exceed my “online visitor” allotment? Online visitors are determined based on the number of people simultaneously active on your community within a 15 minute window. This is not a hard limit, so if you are on, for example, the Super 65 package and you have 100 online visitors for an hour, there will be no change or overage. If, however, your average online visitor count exceeds the package amount for several days consistently within a billing cycle, you would be automatically upgraded to the next package. You can then downgrade after the next billing cycle if your activity levels have decreased. Can I install modifications and themes? Yes! You may install virtually all applications, plugins and themes from the IPS Marketplace. I’m already an IPS self-hosted client, can I move to your CiC service? We’re asked this daily and the answer is, absolutely. In fact, we will move your entire community to our CiC service at no charge to you and will work to make the transition as smooth as possible for you and your users. We can then deactivate your self-hosted license so you’re no longer paying renewals and should you decide to make use of it in the future, it will be as simple as reactivating. What happens if I want to leave the CiC service and self-host? That doesn’t happen often, but your data is just that - yours. We do not charge you to provide a copy of your database and attachments upon request. You would need to purchase a self-hosted license to obtain the files that power the community in a self-hosted environment. Can I use my own domain name? Yes. Initially, you will need to choose an IPS provided subdomain (eg. my community.invisionzone.com) - after your community is activated, we can switch it to your own domain. As always, please don’t hesitate to contact sales@invisionpower.com with any questions. No matter how you choose to use IPS4, we appreciate your business! [url={url}]View the full article[/url]

We have made a huge upgrade to our editor in IPS Community Suite 4.1 with a focus on speed an usability. I made a video overview of the new editor to point out some of the key changes. Before viewing, here are the release notes about the editor for your reference: Uses div-mode which is much faster and more reliable. Clicking into the editor is now pretty much instant. Auto-linking and member mentions to use new APIs for better reliability Quotes, code boxes, and spoilers can be dragged and moved and there is no more "red line" When cmd/ctrl right-clicking: options to remove or break-out of quotes, edit links and edit image properties Pasting asks if you want to convert to plain text Totally new code plugin with syntax highlighting as you type Option to make enter behave as a new line rather than with spacing Editor is responsive, and ability to have small editor show in areas with less space Member @mentions in posts can now be selected by tab key The major things to note are that the editor is much faster loading, particularly on mobile devices. It makes the mobile experience much more pleasant. Check out the video for some more information or register on our site here and post a topic in our test area. We are really happy with the editor upgrades and early feedback has been great. We hope you enjoy it! We are still on track to release 4.1 in early October. Expect beta release soon. [url={url}]View the full article[/url]

The two largest changes in IPS Community Suite 4.1 are the new Menu Manager and Activity Streams. I will do a quick overview of what we were thinking with designing each one and show a nice video to summarize. I made a video to quickly go over the new Activity Streams and also a bit on the new Menu Manager. I hope you will see just how powerful and flexible they are. You can do everything you could do in previous versions of our software plus a whole lot more. We are really excited to see all the inventive uses our clients come up with for the new Activity Streams. If you are not interested in hearing me ramble in the video, and who can blame you really, here are some screenshots and info on the Activity Streams in general. AdminCP Interface: The streams you see there are some examples of the default ones that come with 4.1 and a few others we made. The one labled View New Content we renamed from Unread Content to demo that it is the same thing just in a different name Admin creating a stream: All these admin-defined streams show up here: And if you want them to show somewhere else you just use the menu manager: If you do not like the "All Activity" stream (or anything else really) just remove the link to it: Then, once you actually view a stream, the use can choose how they want to see it. In the full format or in condensed: Once the user selects their preferred view format the system will remember it. There is no way for the admin to set the default view format because we did not really think that made sense. While many of us that run a site are power users and might want the condensed format because we "understand" what is going on, new users would not have that knowledge. Therefore, it makes more sense to show them all the content at first until they understand what it is they are seeing then they can choose, if they want, to condense it down. In early previews of 4.1, some people were confused about the All Activity stream versus the custom streams that can be told what to do (like creating a View New Content stream). Also, some did not realize you could create admin-defined streams that could be tailor-made to what you want them to do. It is a bit different than old versions but in a good way in that you have a lot of flexibility. We hope you enjoy! We are still on track to release 4.1 in early October. Expect beta release soon. [url={url}]View the full article[/url]

Here is how to add back a simple MP3 html5 player back into IPS4. In your admincp > customize > Editor > Toolbars Select the "Add Button" then select the "Custom Tab" Upload the attached mp3 icon or one of your choosing Then enter the following on easy field. Title: MP3 Type: Inline Option: Yes Option Title: URL: Then paste the following in the HTML field. <audio controls> <source src="{option}" type="audio/mpeg">Your browser does not support the audio element.</audio> Then select the permissions and alter if needed, then save. Now you can drag the new button to any of the three editors you need. When entering a new topic or post, simply select the MP3 icon, paste the url and you have an inline html5 player for mp3 files.

The next major release for IPS Community Suite 4 is now in the final stages of development. We have added dozens of new features, enhancements to existing features, fixed the majority of 4.0 bugs (bug tracker will be updated soon), and made large performance gains. You can see the full list of items changed in our Release Notes section. Here we will review some of the larger changes and why we did them. New Menu Structure Our new menu structure is designed to highlight the two ways people go about interacting with a community: general browsing of specific discovery. The Browse tab looks just like the current, default menu does in IPS Community Suite with your list of apps. The new Activity menu is designed for discovery features like our new Activity Streams and the search functions. This is just the default menu and gives new communities an idea of the different concepts. When upgrading from 4.0 to 4.1 your existing menu items will be placed in this format with any menu items created under the Pages app moved to a location in the new menu. You will want to adjust things to best fit your community. Menu Manager The Pages menu manger has been removed and replaced with a Suite-wide menu manger that is much more powerful. As shown above, you can now have both a top and second level menu bar. If you choose not to have a second bar it will hide itself automatically and will then look much more like the older menu style. In addition to simply placing menu items, drop down menus, and special links: all menu items have permission controls so you can easily show or hide menu items based on a member's permission settings. Activty Streams The new Activity Streams are a discovery feature that takes the concept of the old View New Content, Activity, Followed Items, etc. and merges them into a unified system to allow for both admin and member-defined streams of content based on their preferences. The system is very powerful and allows for countless different ways for your members to discover content or for you to more easily expose content you want to highlight. Front end interface member created streams Streams that admins create are always visible to all members. Members can simply view those admin streams, create their own, or copy an admin stream as a base. Guests also have access to view all admin streams excluding those that reference unread or followed content as Guests do not have access to those features. Always available to all members is the All activity stream that shows a list of activity in order by date. The admin can define what shows in the All activity stream. Admin options for All Activity stream Members can share the link to the streams they create to other members. There is no need for privacy here as all they are sharing are their various filter settings - the actual stream data returned changes based on what member is actually viewing the stream. Use cases for Activity Streams are endless. Some examples might be: The current View New Content type of result. A Stream of all content from members you follow. Show a list of unread items from a specific list of members (perhaps members of staff). Maybe you are a prolific Gallery contributor and you want to see a feed of all unread comments on images that you posted. Rather than following every item you reply to, you can choose to create a feed of all content you have ever participated in. Get really fine-tuned and create a Stream showing unread comments in Blog only from members you follow. The Activity Streams feature is very flexibly and you can get really imaginative with its uses. It is a really big addition to IPS Community Suite 4 and we think you will enjoy it. We already do! Updated Editor We have updated our WYSIWYG editor in 4.1 to the latest version of CKEditor and we have also switched from iframe to div mode in the editor. That is basically technical speak to say that the new editor will be much, much faster and specifically behave much better on mobile devices. Many of the custom systems we wrote for 4.0 have been replaced with native editor functionality in 4.1 to allow for both speed and greater reliability. This does mean some things work a bit differently but you will quickly see the very small learning changes are worth the editor being so responsive. You can now move quote boxes with your mouse to embed them or move them above/below existing text. Another great feature is the new cmd/ctrl right-click menu that allow for contextual options. For example, cmd/ctrl right-click on an embedded image attachment yields: When pasting in rich text from an external source the editor will now prompt you asking if you want to keep that formatting: And admins can define paste and enter/return behavior in the new editor settings page: A small, but useful improvements is allowing @member mentions to be selectable by keyboard. Just do @member and use the arrows and tab key on your keyboard to select the member. The editor also now recognizes its area size not only based on your browser window (to distinguish mobile, tablet, or desktop) but also where it is embedded. An example of this is the new status update widget: A really useful feature is the ability to select and text in any post and get an option to quote just that text. The new editor is a total rework and we hope you enjoy the new speed, stability, and options. Using the editor is the core function of any community so getting it right is very important. Pages Enhancements Our Pages CMS app not only lets you create basic web pages within your Suite with either drag-and-drop ease of use or, for power users, direct HTML/PHP access but it also allows for Databases and Blocks to greatly enhance what you can do. We have made several enhancements to Pages to make it easier to use and more options. On install, Pages now includes some default content to point out key features to new users to get them started quickly. When creating an actual page, the editor box is larger, there are more tag sections in the sidebar to access advanced features, and you can now configure a custom error page. There are tons of new Blocks in Pages now and create quite an impressive list: Many Blocks have been enhanced. For example: comment/item feed blocks can now have a dat limit, customizable titles, Calendar widget can be restricted to one calendar, and so on. External Block embedding is now available. You can now embed any Block anywhere on the web - not just inside your IPS-powered site. Within the Database system we have an enhanced article-view template, you can now export and share templates with others, and database fields can now either show as "labels" as they do now or as simple text either above or below the body of the entry. We have also added a simple relational database field to cross reference other databases when viewing an entry. The other big addition to Pages is the new Media Manager. The problem we are solving here is access to the file system. There are many situations where you do not have access to FTP or other methods to directly access your server either because of security restrictions or because you are on a cloud/load balanced environment where it is simply not possible. So we now have a Media Manager that allows for direct uploading of things like images, CSS, and JavaScript. All the items get a key tag to be used in any template or page throughout the Suite. The Media Manager is also compatible with designers mode. Terms and Privacy Policy Confirmation A small but important change is the ability to force your members to re-accept your Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy when you edit them. Currently they are only prompted when joining your community but now you can ask them to accept again if you make a change. On their next visit they will see: Gallery Enhancements There are two changes to Gallery that may seem small at a glance but actually make using Gallery much easier and more flexible. There is now a new upload process which makes adding images or videos much easier to understand. You can more easily see the category, album, or album creation options on the screen. Once you actually upload your image you can more easily add descriptions and other data to your images either individually or all at once. This direct change to how your members add images should result in a much more pleasant experience when adding images to Gallery. We also now support reviews on Gallery images in addition to comments. New Upgrade Process Since IPS Community Suite 4.0, you have been able to download "delta updates" (a zip containing just the files you need to upgrade from the version you are running to the latest version) from the Admin CP when a new version is released. On IPS Community Suite 4.1, you no longer need to download the zip and upload the files manually. The system will automatically guide you through a wizard which will apply the update automatically and take you straight to the upgrader. The system will also send you an email as soon as an update is available (you can configure any number of email addresses to receive the notification), and display a dismissible banner to administrators who have permission to run the upgrader so you also no longer need to check the Admin CP or the IPS website for updates. When an update is available, just click "Upgrade Now" in the email or on your community and follow the steps. Special prominence is given in both the email and the banner if the update contains fixes for any security-related issues. Also, the banner cannot be dismissed if an update contains a security fix. Updated Search Interface We have given our search interface a revamp to more effectively use space and be easier to use (especially on mobile): As well as simplifying the way filters appear, we have separated member searching from content searching. This made sense given that the filters available for finding members are entirely different to those you see when finding content, so this visual separation should make that more apparent to users. This new approach to filters also becomes the new Advanced Search view, with results loading dynamically below when submitted. Another change we have made is to adjust the text snippet to show you the context of the result hit. For example, if you search ‘lorem', the results will now show you the text surrounding the first match. This small improvement can greatly improve the perceived quality of results: Finally, another small change has been made to the contextual search box shown in the header on every page. We now default the context to the app you’re currently using, unless you’re on the homepage in which case it’ll search all content. In our testing, we have found this aligns much better with user expectations. Notifications We have introduced two new notification features: instant notifications and HTML5 browser notifications. Both work together to provide a great boost to engagement in IPS 4.1. HTML5 Browser Notifications We have built in support for browser notifications where they are supported (right now, this includes desktop versions of Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera, but not IE, and mobile browser support is patchy). This allows IPS 4.1 to let you know when important things have happened even if you aren’t active in that window at the time. We have enabled browser notifications in three areas. When you upload files using any attachment area, you will be notified when your files have finished uploading; when there are new replies to a topic you have currently viewing; and for instant notifications (more about that below). Instant Notifications Instant notifications has been a long-requested feature, and we are pleased to say they are included in IPS 4.1. We have worked hard to build an approach that is as light on resources as possible. If you are active in the window, instant notifications will show as a standard flash message at the bottom of your screen; if you are not active, and your browser supports them, you will get a desktop notification instead, and a chime will sound to alert you. Clicking the notification box will take you to the new item (or open the notification menu if alert is telling you about multiple items). Ability to limit the number of emails received In IPS 4.1, you can optionally choose to receive just one email notification per content item until you revisit the community, rather than a separate email for each new reply. This is an option that was previously available in IPB 3.x that we have reintroduced based on feedback. Retina Emoticons Our well-loved emoticons have had a facelift (pun intended) and now look great on high-resolution retina screens and dark backgrounds: The emoticon manager in the ACP intelligently handles retina versions of your own emoticons for you - simply upload emoticons with “@2x” appended to the filename, and IPS 4.1 will know it’s a high-res version of an existing emoticon and seamlessly serve it for you. Not Included in 4.1 Areas such as View New Content, My Content, My Followed Content, Status page, and such are replaced by the new Activity Streams. You can easily create the same functionality with admin-created Activity Streams and we ship with several default examples that will serve most communities well. Sphinx is no longer supported as an alternative search engine. We are evaluating alternative search technology for a future release. Obviously we included a lot in version 4.1 so many things were not included. If your specific feature request or feedback was not included it may still come in a future release. Launch Date We invite everyone to check our our public preview and give it a try! Please report bugs in our bug tracker and keep all discussion about 4.1 on the preview site so we can easily review it and make changes. Depending on testing, we do anticipate a release in early October. We hope you enjoy all these changes in 4.1 and that they help your community grow! View the full article

Much like last month, August has been all about performance and stability. We are happy to report that most clients are telling us things are running well and we are getting caught up on our support volume. It's nice to be back to much better response times to your questions! So nothing too exciting to report for August but really necessary work being done. That's August... but then there's September... We have a whole lot in store for you in September. Behind the boring scenes of bug fixing and stability improvements we have been preparing a whole lot of changes. You might want to follow our Blog here as we will be announcing, over the next few days, some exciting news like improvements to our CiC (Community in the Cloud) service, special renewal promotion for existing clients, and a feature-release (rather than just stability focus) nearing completion. Thanks for sticking around through the quiet summer months of 2015. We were not resting or on vacation and cannot wait to show you all the new things we have in store for IPS Community Suite 4! Keep an eye on our blog here or our Release Notes section. View the full article

I'm a clean freak, I like things tidy and neat, overtime many sites can get filled with many left over files and folders from previous version, and other items you may or may not need anymore. The following guide will show you how to perform a clean upgrade to IPS4 from 3.4.x. 1. Take a backup of the file system and database. 2. Copy the following files and folders from your existing site. (Yes that is all you need normally from the older version, the file structure on IPS4 is all new so this is a good time to "clean up") 3. Make a temp folder name whatever you would like on your FTP, move all other files but the above to that temp directory, this is a temp place to move them, once the upgrade is completed, and you are sure you didn't forget anything you need, you can delete this temp folder and all contents. 4. Next upload the IPS4 files to your site 5. Once they are all uploaded, verify all were written properly. 6. Adjust permissions as needed/if needed on the writable folders. 7. Proceed to http://www.yourdomain.com/admin/upgradeto process the upgrade.

After upgrading to IPS4 from 3.x, there is a rebuild that needs to take place, if you have the server resources available, then you can increase this "amount per cycle" from 50 to 200 or so. applications/core/extensions/core/Queue/RebuildPosts.php line 29 Example improvement: 16Core Machine, 16GB Ram, SSD Drives, went from 50 per cycle, in about 1 second to 200 per cycle in about 2 seconds. I wouldn't go over 200-300 or so.

08-07-2015 We are releasing a patch for IP.Board 3.3.x and 3.4.x to address a potential cross-site scripting (XSS) issue, and we are releasing a patch for IP.Nexus 1.5.9 to address an issue where license keys may be exposed to unauthorized users. The IP.Nexus patch also includes an updated SagePay payment gateway, required for all users that use Sagepay integration as of July 31, 2015, as well as an update to the Stripe payment gateway to use their "v2" javascript integration. It has been brought to our attention that specifically crafted files uploaded as attachments to IP.Board may allow for javascript to execute. It has also been brought to our attention that specifically crafted URLs may allow for exposure of license keys otherwise kept private throughout IP.Nexus. To apply the patch Simply download the attached zip for your IP.Board version and upload the files to your forum server. IP.Nexus 1.5.x: nexus_patch_08072015.zip IP.Board 3.4.x: board34x_patch_08072015.zip IP.Board 3.3.x: board33x_patch_08072015.zip If you are an IPS Community in the Cloud client running IP.Board 3.3 or above, no further action is necessary as we have already automatically patched your account. If you are using a version older than IP.Board 3.3, you should contact support to upgrade. If you install or upgrade to IP.Board 3.4.8 or IP.Nexus 1.5.9 after the date and time of this post, no further action is necessary as we have already updated the main download zips. We would like to thank ESET for reporting the IP.Board XSS issue to us, and we would like to thank user "vekmor" for reporting the IP.Nexus license key exposure issue to us. View the full article

Everyone at IPS has been working hard to continue development on our new IPS Community Suite 4 platform. We have been getting great feedback from clients and are looking forward to implementing your ideas as we keep moving forward. Most of July was spent with a focus on stability of version 4.0. As with any new platform there is a lot to learn and address once it gets out into real world use. Stability realeases are not very exciting and do not make for a fun blog entry but we have fixed hundreds of bugs with each maintenance release and continue to keep that as our focus. Clients are reporting that things are greatly improving and we are happy to hear that! Of course there are always some issues but the majority are running great. So that's really it for July. I know, it's seems like not much but it's actually tons of work from our team to keep getting things better each day. But don't worry! We have some exciting new features in the works that will be introduce in August so do keep watching and keep letting us know you feedback. View the full article

Add the following to your conf_global.php file and save. ini_set('display_errors',1);

This is the first in a series of monthly blogs IPS will be posting to keep you up to date on what is happening. Just in case you missed it! New Web Site We launched our new web site featuring IPS Community Suite 4! Featuring our newest technology has been great for new and old clients alike. Our demo system is now using IPS Community Suite 4 as well so feel free to sign up and give it a try. Release Announcements In the past we would post an announcement for every release we did. With IPS Community Suite 4 that is not really necessary as the new upgrade system notifies you in your AdminCP when an update is available. Not only that but you can easily download a list of only changed files to quickly upgrade your Suite. It is really nice for us to be able to push updates out to you much more quickly and for you to not have to uploads a lot of unnecessary files for a quicker upgrade. Release Notes Be sure to check out our new Release Notes section. Theses notes are also fed into your AdminCP on release time but you can also check here for previews on the next release in production. Even more interesting is our Coming Soon section that shows things coming up in the next month or so. It's a great way to keep track of what is in the immediate future so you can plan your community development. Development Progress Since we released version 4.0.0 we have made 13 releases to add features requested by our clients, fix bugs, and improve performance. It has been a busy and exciting time. We are so happy that the vast majority of our clients are really happy with IPS Community Suite 4.0. It's also great to see clients provide so much feedback so we can continue to improve. One of our key goals is to communicate what is coming up next and our Release Notes section has been a really great way to do this and clients are enjoying the constant updates. For those of you interested in such things: we finally switched from SVN to Git. We started using SVN many years ago when it was the cool thing and have been wanting to switch to Git for our repository for some time. Obviously this is not something that impacts our clients but it's really exciting to the group of nerds that is IPS development staff so they felt I should highlight this! In addition to lots of bug fixes and performance improvements, here are some new additions to IPS Community Suite 4 in the last month: Guest caching feature can now be used with MySQL (previously required a caching engine like memcached) New mobile pagination Max width option for video embeds Legacy PayPal gateway to allow for older PayPal Subscriptions to still be recognised. Attachment Type Restrictions: You can now choose from three options for file attachments in any post content: No files, Images only (this will actually check to make sure an uploaded file is a valid image) or All files (this is default) - If you choose "All files" you have the option to provide a list of allowed file extensions. Merge Concurrent Posts: If a user makes a post or comment and then makes another post or comment on the same item before any other user, the posts will be merged. There is a setting to disable or set the time limit for this to happen. There is a clear, visual indication when a merge happens to avoid confusion to the end user. Moderators can click and hold on topic and other item titles to quickly edit. New setting to optionally set products in Commerce to have a grace period to remain active for a period of time after expiration. New setting to specify domains to exclude from having rel='nofollow' added to links. The "+ Create" menu at the top of the page now has an option to create an announcement. New button to post a status within the status updates widget You can now embed Pages database entries by pasting their link. New widgets for blog entry, gallery images and downloads files feeds. Widgets displaying content feeds can now be given a custom title. The subject lines for emails sent about new content have been changed slightly so email clients can group them better. Announcements now show on every page by default (but can still be removed). New ability to disable but not uninstall an app. In case you missed it: version 4.0.8.1 contained a security update. You would have been alerted both in your AdminCP and on our Release Notes page. Be sure to always stay up to date. What's Next Version 4.0.10 is already in development and our Coming Soon list is well under way: We will be announcing those exciting changes in the next few weeks! Past Updates As this is our first update entry we didn't provide previous updates so here is the list of things added since 4.0.0 original release that were prior to the last month: Pages can now be run under your install directory Support Tools enhancements: You can optionally create an admin account and send that as a hidden field to our support staff. A reminder is set in the AdminCP dashboard for you to remove this account once your support request is done. You can optionally send the last PHP and MySQL error logs (if any are recent) as part of your support request. When a new version of IPS Community Suite 4 is available you will now see release notes. This feature is added in 4.0.2 but will not show until 4.0.3 is available. You can now set a maximum image dimension size. If a user uploads an image larger than that setting it will be resized down and the smaller size saved. Setting to limit the length of content item titles Suite-wide Added new notification setting for Members you Follow. On install and upgrade, this setting is off by default to prevent your users from getting bombarded with notifications for members they follow until they are able to decide their preference. If you enable the "use SSL for logins" setting then this will apply to the entire AdminCP: not just the login form. Setting was renamed to reflect this. You can now specify the default view option for the Commerce store front: grid or list. When you upload files for a new version, the AdminCP login box will now prompt you to run the upgrade system before showing login form. Queue tasks should run faster You can now select multiple locations for an advertisement rather than just one in Advertisement settings. We now support multiple version management. This means that we will no longer release "patch files" for major bugs or security issues but will instead simply release a new version even if that new version may only contain one changed file. No more losing track if you have or have not patched as you will simply make sure you're on latest version. Emoticon sets can now be reordered. You can also now delete entire sets. Bulk email system can now filter based on Commerce packages and information. The support tool in the AdminCP will now do MD5 checksum on all PHP files on the system. This allows the system to detect any modified PHP files which is useful both for support and for security. The master checksum values are fetched remotely from IPS to ensure the list is not tampered with locally. Interface improvements to Gallery Theme comparison tools View the full article

To prevent direct access to your site/server/ip, you can block all other direct traffic that isn't routed through incapsula (assuming you are using it) To do so you can add the following to your htaccess file. order deny,allowdeny from allallow from 199.83.128.0/21allow from 198.143.32.0/19allow from 149.126.72.0/21allow from 103.28.248.0/22allow from 185.11.124.0/22allow from 192.230.64.0/18allow from 45.64.64.0/22 This will still allow all normal traffic that is properly filtered through incapsula, however it will block any direct IP access or misconfigured dns (china firewall hack etc)

Add this to your conf_global.php file if needed to temp update memory available. ini_set( 'memory_limit', '128M' );

There are many ways for a site to get compromised however most are the same result, hackers either try to use your site to serve malicious files, or try to redirect your users to infected sites. Here are some things that are common that hackers do that you should look our for. 1. They will always try to leave behind a file or two as aback door into your system, it's a good idea to understand what files are good files and what files are bad. To do this you can compare the file set of your site to a fresh file set from a download. 2. Look for files with odd or random .php extensions, here are some examples, these are not exact names, but examples of a typical naming structure, they will either be short and sweet like sh.php or a random string followed my .php zx.php sh.php 123482379874hjsdf8734.php dsfjklsadjfklasdjfklads.php ipbfirewall.php When inspecting any files and you see any reference to ipbfirewall, this is not a real product or item, it's bad code left behind made to look like it belongs, so you can safely delete it. Example of IPB_Firewall code that IS NOT FROM IPSif ( ! defined( 'IPB_FIREWALL' ) ) { define('IPB_FIREWALL', 1); /** * NOTE: This is a protecting web-firewall module generated by Invision Power * Module includes security patch for high-risks vulnerability CVE-2012-5692 * Do not touch this file for security reasons * Please insert this code to as many php files as possible * * @package IP.Firewall * @version $Revision: 9544 $ * @md5 e66e6cadd6e13efea54ed50c0eb2d32b * @sha1 6966286d64352840245f5b2248545450 * @crc32 5f51554f5445225d293d3d2463732965 */ These are most commonly placed in the root directory, /cache, /public /uploads or other areas. 3. Another thing to look for are odd folder names, you can again compare your folder structure from a fresh download of files to compare them, they will often create odd names directories or try to mimic an existing name as well. Here is what a standard folder/file structure looks like for the forum directory Here is what a typical /cache folder looks like as well 4. If you see any odd files in those folders that do not belong, odds are they do not belong there, you can open the file to inspect the code as well to see if it looks like a legit file or not. Keep in mind if you have third party add ons or other apps installed, these can often also require other files. 5. After you have cleaned up any bad files, the next step is a fresh file upload of the board and all apps that you have installed. You can download these from the client area, upload them via FTP, making sure to over write any and all existing files. 6. After that is done, log into your admincp, and you will see a "Furl cache out of date error" please click the option to "Rebuild Furl Cache" to correct that error. This is normal and due to the new files that were just uploaded. 7. Rebuilding HTML & CSS and Recaching your skins. Often times there will be an infection deep inside of your templates or code left behind, this is done via a direct file edit to your skin files, rebuilding and recaching will often clear this out. To do this select "Look & Feel" from the tabs, then select "Manage Skins and Languages" Then on the left side you want to select "Template Tools You will then see an option to Rebuild Master Skin Data, select HTML & CSS from this and also all of your apps as below. After that is completed, then select the Template tools again and now at the top select "Re-Cache Skin Set's" 8. Often times a offender will also dig into your language files and infect them as well, to correct this, select "Look & Feel" > Manage Languages, on the language pack effected, select the drop down menu to the right and then "Rebuild from XML" This will rebuild your language files for you. If you are using a third party or custom language file, please re-import the language pack to correct any issues. 9. Another common issue that I have seen is offenders modifying your .htaccess, conf_global.php, initdata.phpor index.php files and adding extra code to them for re-directs or other purposes, please inspect all of your .htaccess index.php and conf_global.php files for proper code. Over writing the new file set for the board files will correct the index.php and initdata.php files, however not the .htaccess or conf_global.php 10. The last thing you want to make sure of is that you have changed all of your admins passwords on your forum, your FTP access details, and any control panel access as well. In most cases I even recommend updating your mysql database password too. See your host for details on that if you are not sure how to update the mysql password. 11. Reimporting your hooks is another item that should be done as well, from the admincp > manage hooks > re-import all hooks 12. The last step is to run the tools from the system security area Admincp > System > System > Security Center

add to conf_global.php ini_set( 'memory_limit', '128M' );

You can now purchase IPS Community Suite 4 or, if you are an existing license holder of IP.Board, you can download the upgrade as part of your license! Be sure to read this important information if you are upgrading from IP.Board 3. IPS Community in the Cloud clients can simply submit a support request when you are ready to upgrade and we will take care of it for you. IPS Community Suite 4 - Now Available You can now purchase IPS Community Suite 4 or, if you are an existing license holder of IP.Board, you can download the upgrade as part of your license! Be sure to read this important information if you are upgrading from IP.Board 3. IPS Community in the Cloud clients can simply submit a support request when you are ready to upgrade and we will take care of it for you. Sign Up Now Existing Clients: Go to Client Area Background Online communities are a huge part of the Internet. Millions of people around the world use online communities to connect with each other about the things that matter to them. At IPS, we've been facilitating this for over 13 years, working with some of the most amazing and interesting sites. Fan communities such as those provided by Warner Music Group and Live Nation for their artists, sports leagues such as the NHL for their fan communities or Bethesda Softworks for their games all use communities to bring fans together. Business like Evernote use communities to reach their customers on a more personal level. And specialist sites like FindLaw use communities to help people find the information they need. Every day new communities are born and we're thrilled at IPS to be involved with this amazing part of the Internet, a part that we feel makes the Internet great. Two years ago we started on an ambitious project. We wanted to make our platform even better. We wanted to bring all of our applications together in a tightly-integrated suite with a modern codebase, gorgeous interface and unrivaled experience for users. Philosophy Being a web developer for a distributed application like the IPS Community Suite is an interesting position. The Internet moves very quickly: what looks good, works well and users will enjoy today might not tomorrow. Web development always needs to be modern, fresh and cutting edge to stay relevant. At the same time, a web developer needs to have understanding and respect for everything that has come before, and know what users expect. It’s no good creating a website that most people won’t understand how to use, or might not even work on some platforms. Over the years, we’ve seen a lot of projects rise and fall in popularity, and the ones that don’t do so well tend to fall into one of these two categories - either they fall behind and start to feel clunky, or overexcited developers get too carried away and create something that nobody wants. At IPS, we don’t do either. We make a platform that is modern and both easy and fun to use and customize. In short, we make the best community platform available. This is the philosophy which underlies IPS Community Suite 4. Features / Technology IPS Community Suite 4 is designed for the modern web. The default theme is designed to be clean and simple both so it’s easy to use and simple for designers to expand upon. The design is also responsive meaning it looks great whether you’re on a desktop or a mobile phone, or anything in between (and we do that the right way: we don’t just remove things on smaller screens) and this is true not only for the front-end but even the administration control panel too. Our editor supports drag-and-drop uploading, automatic media embedding, auto-saving and mentions. Every email the suite sends looks great no matter what client you’re using. These are just a few of the countless features that make IPS Community Suite 4 great. Check out the full feature tour The platform is built on modern, but solid, technology. We use PHP and MySQL because they run on pretty much every web server, but we use modern coding techniques within them like the namespacing, late static binding and closures provided by PHP 5.4, and we use HTML5 features like local storage and geolocation. And it’s coded well with meticulous care; things like valid HTML markup which doesn’t really matter to the average user, matters deeply to us. Finally, it’s ready for communities of any size. You can use Amazon S3 for file storage. You can leverage caching technology, including memcached to page output caching for guests which can even mean most requests never even establish a connection to your database. And that’s without mentioning all of the features which have always made IPS stand out, like the spam monitoring service, monetization, Sphinx integration and so on. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Expansion Potential But not only is IPS Community Suite great out of the box, its potential for expansion is huge, and there’s a great community of third party designers and developers working with us. Tools for developers The framework that IPS Community Suite runs on is powerful, but flexible and developers can get started with ease. It is possible to override any class anywhere in the entire framework using a technique called monkey patching, allowing customization of any aspect of the suite. Whole new applications can be created easily, using central classes for common concepts like content handling. And the framework is designed to be safe at low levels: output escaping for XSS protection (note, not input escaping, which is the wrong way round to do it) and prepared statements for SQL injection protection are handled at a low level, global basis, and customizations are sandboxed so an error in a customization cannot bring down the community. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video Tools for designers Designers also benefit from a powerful designer mode that allows customization of HTML, CSS and other theme resources using local files so they can use their own code editors and tools. Designers can even create theme settings allowing end-users to customize even further. We also provide tools to allow designers to see the changes made to templates between versions so themes can be updated for new versions. Of course, for the less technically inclined, there is a powerful “easy mode” for creating themes allowing anyone to customize the look easily. Tools for translators Translators too can translate the IPS Community Suite easily. A “quick translation” tool allows any word or phrase to be translated just by clicking and holding to bring up a textbox, or an extensive list of all words and phrases can be browsed. Furthermore, we have been meticulously careful to use phrases throughout the entire suite that can be translated into any language with understanding of the differences many languages have with English such as grammar structure and pluralization. All of these customizations can be exported with one click and distributed as a single file. To install an application, plugin, theme or language, users only need to upload a single file in the administrator control panel. No more uploading dozens of files with FTP. Rapid Development Perhaps though, the most significant thing about IPS Community Suite 4 is what comes next. We now have a solid platform for future development. With the new modern framework, new features and improvements can be written much quicker than ever before. In addition, we have been using new tools and techniques within our development team for faster development, testing and deployment of new releases. For when a new release is ready, IPS Community Suite 4 includes a powerful delta upgrade system: no matter what version you are on, you can download an upgrade package for the latest version - this includes only the files you need, so upgrading is quick and painless. With these three significant improvements (to the framework, to our development processes and to the upgrade process for users) we have been able to adopt a much more rapid release cycle. A more streamlined process also allows us to be much more open about our future plans. The benefits of this have already been seen: since releasing IPS Community Suite 4, we have already added several new features. And this is just the beginning. Conclusion IPS Community Suite 4 has been a huge project. It’s an amazing experience to see the communities that have already upgraded - the countless hours of planning, discussions, whiteboard drawings and thousands of lines of code come that have come together in this incredible platform already spawning online communities of all genres. We’re hugely excited to see the many more to come. View the full article

http://www.google.com Testing

http://www.google.comtest url

IP.Board 3.4.8 is now available in the client area This is a maintenance release to consolidate security updates released since 3.4.7, release additional security updates, and fix some minor bugs impacting many clients. We recommend you upgrade to ensure you have all security updates in place. You can download in the client area and upgrade as normal. Support Notes IPS will no longer provide upgrade services for self-hosted licenses on the 3.x series. You can do the upgrade yourself (it's very easy) but our support will only do upgrades for you to IPS Community Suite 4. If you are a IPS Cloud client we will still do the upgrades for you. IP.Board 3.3.x and related apps will no longer receive any support or security updates after 1 January 2016. IP.Board 3.4.x and related apps will no longer receive security updates after 1 April 2017. View the full article

By default OSX finder will hide any .xxx files, to change this from the following from terminal or your ssh app. defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles YES

AWS S3 Permissions as follows "s3:GetBucketLocation", "s3:GetObject", "s3:DeleteObject", "s3:GetObjectAcl", "s3:ListBucket", "s3:ListBucketVersions", "s3:ListMultipartUploadParts", "s3:PutBucketNotification", "s3:PutObject", "s3:PutObjectAcl", "s3:PutObjectVersionAcl", "s3:RestoreObject"

04-30-2015 We are releasing a patch for IP.Board 3.3.x and 3.4.x to address three cross-site scripting (XSS) issues. It has been brought to our attention that specifically crafted URLs may allow an attacker to adjust another user's ignored user preferences and private message options. To apply the patch Simply download the attached zip for your IP.Board version and upload the files to your forum server. IP.Board 3.4.x: patch_34x_04272015.zip IP.Board 3.3.x: patch_33x_04272015.zip If you are an IPS Community in the Cloud client running IP.Board 3.3 or above, no further action is necessary as we have already automatically patched your account. If you are using a version older than IP.Board 3.3, you should contact support to upgrade. If you install or upgrade to IP.Board 3.4.7 after the date and time of this post, no further action is necessary as we have already updated the main download zips. We would like to thank rack911labs.com for bringing the private message to our attention. View the full article