Commenting (plugin for Omeka)

Commenting is a plugin for Omeka that provides a beefier implementation of comments than the earlier Comment plugin. It allows for comments on any record type (in theory, at least), and includes both ReCaptchas and Akismet spam detection.

Commenting also allows for moderation and commenting permissions based on role. Logged-in users are not required to submit recaptchas, if enabled.

Installation

Uncompress files and rename plugin folder "Commenting".

Then install it like any other Omeka plugin and follow the config instructions.

Requirements

The commenting plugin makes use of both ReCaptchas and the Akismet spam-detection service. You will want to get API keys to both of these services and add them to the plugin's configuration.

Configuration

• Threaded Comments: Check to display threaded comments
• ReCaptcha Keys: These keys duplicate the fields found in the Omeka Security settings. ReCaptcha challenges only appear when there is no user logged in.
• Permissions ** Options are available to specify what roles can approve, add, and view comments, and add comments without approval ** If the GuestUser plugin is installaed and activated, the guest role is available in these options ** Allowing Public commenting will override the permissions set for adding and viewing comments -- they will be open to all
• Akismet API key: You should get an API key to the Akismet spam management service if you use public commenting
• Simple antispam: a simple question (addition of two digits) will be added to the form.
• Honey pot: a hidden field will be added to avoid basic spam bots.

See Use Cases below for examples of configuration combinations

Displaying Comments

Commenting will automatically add commenting options to Item and Collection show pages via default public hooks:

fire_plugin_hook('public_items_show', array('view' => $this, 'item' => $item));
```php

or:

```php
fire_plugin_hook('public_collections_show', array('view' => $this, 'collection' => $collection));

For flexibility and to enable commenting on other record types from modules (e.g. SimplePages or ExhibitBuilder), you will have to add the following lines to the appropriate place in the theme script:

fire_plugin_hook('commenting_comments');

or with options:

fire_plugin_hook('commenting_comments', array(
    'view' => $this,
    'display' => array('comments', 'comment_form'),
    'comments' => $comments,
));

For example, to show comments on exhibit sections and pages, the theme file /exhibit-builder/exhibits/show.php could look like:

<?php
echo head(array(
    'title' => metadata('exhibit_page', 'title') . ' &middot; ' . metadata('exhibit', 'title'),
    'bodyclass' => 'exhibits show'));
?>

<nav id="exhibit-pages">
    <?php echo exhibit_builder_page_nav(); ?>
</nav>

<h1><span class="exhibit-page"><?php echo metadata('exhibit_page', 'title'); ?></h1>

<nav id="exhibit-child-pages">
    <?php echo exhibit_builder_child_page_nav(); ?>
</nav>

<?php exhibit_builder_render_exhibit_page(); ?>

<?php fire_plugin_hook('commenting_comments'); ?>

<div id="exhibit-page-navigation">
    <?php if ($prevLink = exhibit_builder_link_to_previous_page()): ?>
    <div id="exhibit-nav-prev">
        <?php echo $prevLink; ?>
    </div>
    <?php endif; ?>
    <?php if ($nextLink = exhibit_builder_link_to_next_page()): ?>
    <div id="exhibit-nav-next">
        <?php echo $nextLink; ?>
    </div>
    <?php endif; ?>
    <div id="exhibit-nav-up">
        <?php echo exhibit_builder_page_trail(); ?>
    </div>
</div>

<?php echo foot(); ?>

The theme files (comment.php, threaded-comments.php and comments.php should be adapted and saved in the common folder of the theme and, for exhibits, in a sub-folder of exhibit-builder.

Keep in mind that updating themes or plugins will clobber your addition of the commenting functions.

The Commenting plugin knows how to work with SimplePages and ExhibitBuilder. Due to variability in how plugins store their data in the database, other record types and views supplied by other plugins might or might not work out of the box. Please ask on the forums or dev list if you would like Commenting to work with other plugins.

Use Cases

Limited, moderated commenting

An institution wants only trusted people to leave comments for anyone to read. It doesn't trust some of them enough to allow comments to be automatically public.

The semi-trusted people could have the Researcher role in Omeka, with commenting configured to allow Researchers to comment. The Admin role is the only role that can moderate comments to approve them, and Public is allowed to view comments.

Open commenting, with registered users getting to submit comments without

approval

Install and configure the GuestUser plugin. Set commenting to Public so that anyone can comment, and give the Guest User role permission to submit comments without approval.

Warning

Use it at your own risk.

It’s always recommended to backup your files and your databases and to check your archives regularly so you can roll back if needed.

Troubleshooting

See online issues on the Commenting issues page on GitHub.

License

This plugin is published under GNU/GPL.

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA.

Contact

Current maintainers:

• Center for History & New Media

Improvements were done by Daniel Berthereau for Mines ParisTech.

Copyright

• Copyright Center for History and New Media, 2011-2013
• Copyright Daniel Berthereau, 2013-2018 Daniel-KM