Yeah, I'm aware of it. There's also FSpamlist.

I've still got plenty to work on with this Mod first, but I might take another look at them in the future (if nobody else does). The only thing that puts me off is having two or three different connections, but I guess that would be up to the admin anyway.

I was planning on making one for Akismet - that seems pretty good - but I think it would only really work if YaBB had some sort of moderation queue for posts.

Derek, I think it would be good, in the future, to add support for the other sites.  The interface wouldn't even have to change much except for adding a drop-down list where one could select one or more of the sites to check.  Obviously, the back-end would require some additional subs, one for each site to do the checking.  You don't need to worry about multiple connections, because you can just check them in serial - if you get a hit on one, you don't need to check any of the rest.  The order of the drop-down list could be settable by the admin so the admin chooses in which order to check the multiple sites.

But, I agree, this is for a future enhancement.

I have to admit that I don't know how keen I am on having all the sites in one Mod. I can't help but think they would be best off separate - there's no reason why they couldn't work together anyway. Or maybe even a totally new Mod for all of them. But I haven't really given it too much though yet.

The only other one I'm really interested in right now is Akismet, but unfortunately I think that will only really work with some sort of post moderation system.

I like the idea of being able to check all the sites, I just don't know if it's something that should be incorporated into this specific Mod.

Maybe it would make a nice new mod/project though. It might even be a lot easier to start it from scratch.

It would save a name change that way too.

I just wondered what you guys thought about this...

In the next version I'm going to make use of the 'last seen' record, so you can have the option to only block spammers who have been active in the last X amount of time. There's less chance of blocking legitimate users by IP then, if they're unfortunate enough to have inherited an IP that a spammer used 3 years ago.

Anyway, right now I have got the times hard coded in with these options in a select box:

Quote:

But now I'm thinking it might be better to have an input field so admins can enter the number of days by themselves. Has anybody got any thoughts or preferences on this?

cepheid wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 2:47am:

I think that's why they must have the 'last seen' there - they don't actually advise blocking based on old records.

cepheid wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 2:47am:

The reason I'm undecided what to do is because I think the drop down field is better for the more novice admin or one that doesn't look into the workings of SFS, but a text field gives more control for the more experienced. I might go for the text field and give it a default value of 365 days.

cepheid wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 2:47am:

Right now, it's one setting and implemented on IP, email and username. I get your point though, and it wouldn't take much to remove a couple of variables if you think that's best? How about usernames?

I've added the 'frequency' record too. If details have only been submitted to the database, say one time, then the chances are that it was a mistake or somebody with a personal vendetta against somebody else, so that should stop potential issues too. This is set for all of the details too right now. Any preferences on that?

Derek Barnstorm wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 3:35am:

I don't advocate blocking on usernames at all (I turn that option off).  Not sure whether you want to implement it for that or not.  For email, I'd say ignore "lastseen," but then again, spammers tend to use one-off or very short-lived emails, so I strongly doubt anyone would even try to register with a year-old address anyway.  Probably doesn't matter if you implement it for them or not.

Derek Barnstorm wrote on Jan 9^th, 2012 at 3:35am:

Not entirely sure.  Personally I think that's such a small likelihood that I'd ignore frequency.  What if the spammer is "new" and only one person has reported him so far?  I'd still want to block them.  For email addresses, it's perfectly possible (if unlikely) that the email could be listed only once, if the spammer is using a one-off service.

That's not to say it shouldn't be implemented, for the more conservative admin... but I'd be perfectly comfortable ignoring it.  I'm also comfortable ignoring "lastseen," though.