What is a rank?
A rank is a little title or image under your username.
They are used for two main purposes. To give people a title based on their post count or to denote specific people in a particular 'group' or with a level of power.
Special ranks are used to denote levels such as administrators and moderators, so you know who is in charge of the forum if you have a problem, but importantly, they have no level of power associated with them. Just because you have a moderator rank does not make you a moderator. That is a permission setting. However, they also have a couple of other useful and fun roles on the forum. As on phpBB.com they can denote people in certain groups, such as the Support Team or Developers. They can be given to particular users who have some significance, such as donators or guild members. They can be also given out for fun, such as Stupid of the Week or Competition Winner etc etc.
Non-special ranks are given to users based on their post count. When you pass a certain post total you get a new rank.
How do you give someone a rank?
The first thing you need to do is get or make your rank image. A simple Google search for 'rank images' will net you a lot of links to look through. You can request ranks in the Styles Development image request thread or you can make them yourself. They can be any size you like but 90x15 and 100x20 pixels are fairly typical for text ranks. Image ones vary quite a bit.
Next you need to upload/FTP the rank image to the server (if you're on a free forum host you will have to ask them if they can upload the ranks for you). A sensible place to put it would be forumfolder/images/ranks. The default installation of phpBB does not contain a ranks folder so just make one in /images.
Upload the graphic (a gif, jpg or png) to the ranks folder.
Now go to the admin control panel and select Ranks (at the very bottom of the admin menu list).
Then click 'Add new rank'.
You will see a screen like this
Rank Title: This is the wording that appears under your username.
Set as Special Rank:
Yes - The rank can only be given to specific users
No - The rank is based on a post count threshold
Minimum Posts: The post count at which the non-special rank will be assigned
Rank Image (Relative to phpBB2 root path): This tells phpBB where the rank image is. The most common mistake here is to put a / at the start of the path. Don't. That will result in you seeing the rank name twice and no image. So.....
image/ranks/admin.gif = right
/image/ranks/admin.gif = wrong
Here is an example of a special moderator rank.
For special ranks then, you do not enter anything in the minimum posts box.
For non-special ranks you will have something like this
In this example, when the user makes their 800th post they will automatically become a 'Major Contributor' and get the rank image in question.
You can set the post count thresholds, rank names and images to whatever you like. It's common to make them relevant to the forum subject in some kind of proportion to rank greatness! For example if your forum was about cars you might have low ranks as cheap models like Kia and high ranks as Lamborghini and Rolls Royce.
If you set a rank as special you will also need to assign it to a specific user or users. You do this in the Administration Control Panel > User Admin > Management.
Look up their username.
At the bottom of their profile page is a drop box for Rank Title.
Select the rank from the list and submit.
Can you have 2 ranks?
There are a couple of ways to do this.
You could add a MOD or there is a simpler way. Why not just make a rank image with two ranks in it?
For example, I have a moderator who happens to be a 'top photographer' too so I just made this rank of the two put together.
Easy!
Can I remove the rank name and just have the image?
Yes. This is a very simple edit.
Open your forumfolder/templates/templatename/viewtopic_body.tpl file
FIND
- Code: Select all
{postrow.POSTER_RANK}
Delete it.
Can I put the rank below the avatar?
Yes, this is also a very simple edit.
Open your forumfolder/templates/templatename/viewtopic_body.tpl file
FIND
- Code: Select all
<td width="150" align="left" valign="top" class="{postrow.ROW_CLASS}"><span class="name"><a name="{postrow.U_POST_ID}"></a><b>{postrow.POSTER_NAME}</b></span><br /><span class="postdetails">{postrow.POSTER_RANK}<br />{postrow.RANK_IMAGE}{postrow.POSTER_AVATAR}<br /><br />{postrow.POSTER_JOINED}<br />{postrow.POSTER_POSTS}<br />{postrow.POSTER_FROM}</span><br /></td>
Here, you can see all the values displayed in the left panel of the post.
{postrow.POSTER_NAME} is their username
{postrow.POSTER_RANK} is their rank name
{postrow.RANK_IMAGE} is their rank image
{postrow.POSTER_AVATAR} is their avatar
{postrow.POSTER_JOINED} is the date they joined
{postrow.POSTER_POSTS} is the number of posts they have
{postrow.POSTER_FROM} is their location
If you want to change the order in which they are displayed, simply change their order in that part of the code.
For example, this code will put the avatar at the top.
- Code: Select all
<td width="150" align="left" valign="top" class="{postrow.ROW_CLASS}"><span class="name"><a name="{postrow.U_POST_ID}"></a>{postrow.POSTER_AVATAR}<br /><b>{postrow.POSTER_NAME}</b></span><br /><span class="postdetails">{postrow.POSTER_RANK}<br />{postrow.RANK_IMAGE}<br />{postrow.POSTER_JOINED}<br />{postrow.POSTER_POSTS}<br />{postrow.POSTER_FROM}</span><br /></td>
My ranks don't show up. I just get a red X.
After checking the path name is correct (as mentioned above), right click the X and choose properties. Copy the image path to the address bar and press return.
See what the error message says.
Common ones are 'file not found' meaning you either haven't uploaded the image correctly or the image name you're asking it to look for doesn't exist. The names are CaSe sensitive. Admin.gif and admin.gif are not the same.
If you get a permission error, make sure the rank folder on the server is readable. It needs to have its CHMOD/permissions/attributes set to 755.