Features: A-Z Index

A

Administration Zone

Administration Zone

B

Banners

Banners

C

Calendar

Calendar

Catalogues

Catalogues

Chatrooms and IM

Chatrooms and IM

Community features

Community features

Content Sharing

Content Sharing

Conversr Forums

Conversr Forums

Conversr Topic Polls

Conversr Topic Polls

D

Design without barriers

Design without barriers

Downloads

Downloads

E

Ease of Use

Ease of Use

eCommerce and Subscriptions

eCommerce and Subscriptions

Extendable

Extendable

F

Featured Content

Featured Content

G

Galleries

Galleries

I

Installation

Installation

Integration

Integration

L

Localisation

Localisation

M

Membership

Membership

N

News and Blogs

News and Blogs

Newsletters

Newsletters

P

Parental Controls

Parental Controls

Performance

Performance

Points

Points

Privacy Tools

Privacy Tools

Q

Quizzes and Surveys

Quizzes and Surveys

R

Rich Media

Rich Media

S

Search Engine Optimisation

Search Engine Optimisation

Searching

Searching

Security

Security

Spam Protection

Spam Protection

Stay on Top

Stay on Top

Structure / Navigation

Structure / Navigation

Support Tickets

Support Tickets

T

Template Programming Language

Template Programming Language

Testing tools

Testing tools

Themeing tools

Themeing tools

Third party integration

Third party integration

W

Warnings / Moderation

Warnings / Moderation

Web Pages

Web Pages

Web standards

Web standards

Website Polls

Website Polls

White-labeling (Debranding)

White-labeling (Debranding)

Wiki+

Wiki+

Newest 10 Entries

Question How can I access PHP-Info in Composr?
Answer PHP-Info provides a comprehensive overview of your PHP configuration. You can access it within Composr by navigating to Admin Zone > Tools > PHP-Info / Server Checks.

This page also provides additional useful server information.
Question What is the purpose of the Health Check feature in Composr?
Answer The Health Check feature in Composr proactively identifies potential issues that may affect your website's performance, security, and overall health. It performs various checks and alerts you to problems like:
  • Broken links and forms
  • Security vulnerabilities
  • Outdated software versions
  • Server performance issues
  • Email configuration problems

The Health Check can be run manually or scheduled to run automatically and send e-mail notifications of results.
Question How can I use Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) to enhance my website?
Answer CDNs improve website performance by serving content from geographically distributed servers, reducing latency and server load. You can leverage CDNs for your Composr website by:
  • Configuring the CDN option in Composr with a comma-separated list of CDN domain names.
  • Ensuring your files are mirrored on the CDN servers.
  • Utilizing the CDN_FILTER directive and symbol to control what content is served via CDN.
Question What is rate limiting and how can I enable it in Composr?
Answer Rate limiting prevents server overload by restricting the number of requests allowed from a single IP address within a specific timeframe. To enable Composr's built-in rate limiting, add the following to your _config.php file:

Code (PHP)

$SITE_INFO['rate_limiting'] = '1';
$SITE_INFO['rate_limit_time_window'] = '10';
$SITE_INFO['rate_limit_hits_per_window'] = '5';
 

This configuration limits each IP to 5 requests every 10 seconds. This feature generates soft errors early in the process before Composr fully loads.
Question How can I reduce disk activity to improve performance?
Answer If your hard disk is slow, you can implement the following settings in your _config.php file to minimize disk access:
  • $SITE_INFO['disable_smart_decaching'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_disk_sanity_checks'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['hardcode_common_module_zones'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['prefer_direct_code_call'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['charset'] = 'utf-8';
  • $SITE_INFO['known_suexec'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['dev_mode'] = '0';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_extra_logs'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_extra_bots'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_extra_closed_file'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_installer_checks'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['assume_full_mobile_support'] = '1';
  • $SITE_INFO['no_extra_mobiles'] = '1';

Note: These settings override default behaviors and may have unintended consequences. Use with caution.
Question What is static caching and how do I enable it?
Answer Static caching drastically improves performance by serving pre-generated pages to bots and guests. This works because these users typically don't require dynamic content. To enable it:
  • Go to the Installation Options editor (yourbaseurl/config_editor.php). You will need your maintenance password.
  • Activate the static cache option.

Composr intelligently determines what to cache, and you can further control this via options within the Installation Options. Be aware that enabling static caching may disable eCommerce features for guests unless specifically configured.
Question What are Composr caches and how do they improve website performance?
Answer Composr utilizes various types of caches to enhance performance by storing pre-calculated results and reducing repetitive tasks. These caches include:
  • Language cache: Eliminates the need to parse language files on each page load.
  • Template cache: Avoids reparsing template files repeatedly.
  • Comcode page cache & Comcode cache: Reduces the need to parse Comcode pages and general Comcode usage.
  • Block cache: Caches blocks based on their parameters, minimizing execution.
  • Theme image cache: Prevents redundant searches for theme images.
  • Values caches: Stores calculated values like member post counts.
  • Persistent cache: Keeps frequently used data in memory for faster access.
  • Advanced admin cache: Allows admins to view cached pages while the server generates updates.
  • Static cache: Serves static pages to bots and guests, bypassing much of the framework.
  • Self learning cache: Optimizes resource loading by learning which resources each page requires.
Question How can I troubleshoot notification problems?
Answer If you're having issues with notifications, here are some troubleshooting steps:
  • Check Email Logs: View the email log (Admin Zone > Audit > E-mail queue/log) to see what notifications have been sent.
  • Use the SU Feature: Impersonate a member using the SU feature (described in the "Testing access and privileges" tutorial) to view their notification settings and confirm they are set up correctly.
  • Enable Carbon-copy Email: Configure a "Carbon-copy e-mail address" in the configuration settings to receive copies of all outgoing emails, including notifications. This helps you monitor email delivery.
  • Verify System Scheduler: Ensure the system scheduler is configured correctly if members are not receiving digest emails.
  • Check Digest Settings: Confirm that "Enable digest notifications" is enabled in the Messages configuration settings.
  • Review "Safety listing limit": If a notification has too many categories, members might not see the full selection tree. Adjust the "Safety listing limit" in the configuration settings if necessary.
Question Can I control which notifications members receive?
Answer Yes, you can control notification settings through two mechanisms:
  • Notification Defaults: You can set default notification preferences for all members. You can enable or disable specific notifications and choose the delivery method (Admin Zone > Setup > Notification defaults).
  • Notification Lock-down: You can force members to receive or prevent them from receiving certain notifications (Admin Zone > Setup > Notification lock-down). This allows you to enforce specific notification policies and manage email volume.
Question What notification options are available to members?
Answer Members can choose from a wide range of notifications, including:
  • Content Updates: Notifications for new or updated content, such as news articles, forum posts, and gallery images.
  • Private Messages: Alerts for new private messages received.
  • Friend Requests: Notifications for new friend requests.
  • Administrative Actions: Alerts for actions taken by site administrators, such as account approvals or content moderation decisions.

Members can choose to receive notifications via:
  • Email: Notifications sent directly to their email address.
  • Digest Email: Combined summaries of activity sent in batched emails. This requires the system scheduler and the digest e-mails configuration option to be enabled.
  • Private Topics: Notifications delivered as private forum topics.
  • SMS: Notifications sent as text messages (requires configuration and incurs costs).
  • Web Notifications: Real-time alerts displayed within the Composr interface.

Top 10 Entries

Title Spam Protection
Icon Image
Description

Configurable word filters

Investigation: Investigate activity by member ID, username, IP address, or e-mail. Ban troublesome IP addresses.

CAPTCHA: Include CAPTCHA on forms for guests and new members. Enable CSS and/or JavaScript CAPTCHA to make detection by bots much harder. Enable an audio version for the visually impaired.

Integrate with known-spammer blacklists: Multiple configurable levels of enforcement.

Honeypots and blackholes: Find and ban bots via automated traps that humans would never see or fill out.

Heuristics: Clever ways to detect and block spammers based on behaviour.

Published e-mail addresses will be protected from spammers

Protection from spammers trying to use your website for their own SEO

Title Template Programming Language
Icon Image
Description

Also known as Tempcode.

Perform computations: Run loops, manipulate logic, numbers, and text.

Handy effects: Easily create design effects like “Zebra striping” and tooltips – and much more.

Branching and filtering: Tailor output according to permissions and usergroups, as well as user options such as language selection.

Include other templates, blocks, or pages, within a template

Create and use standard boxes: Avoid having to copy and paste complex segments of XHTML5.

Easy web browser sniffing: Present different markup to different web browsers, detect whether JavaScript is enabled, detect bots, and detect PDAs/Smartphones.

Randomisation features

Pull up member details with ease: For example, show the current users avatar or point count.

Easily pull different banner rotations into your templates

Escaping: Easily escape parameters and strings to avoid JavaScript or HTML syntax errors and XSS vulnerabilities.

Create your own Tempcode symbols through hooks

Title Testing tools
Icon Image
Description

Switch users: Masquerade as any user using your admin login

Change theme images inline with just a few clicks

Easily find and edit the templates used to construct any screen

Error monitoring: Get informed by e-mail if errors happen on your site.

Make inline changes to content titles

Easy text changes: Easily change the language strings used to build up any screen.

Easily diagnose permission configuration problems: Log permission checks, or interactively display them in Firefox.

Testing platform: Use our testing_platform non-bundled addon when developing with Composr to ensure nothing has been broken.

Profiler: Use the documented profiling tool to monitor intensive logic and their time / memory consumption.

Health check: Use the bundled health check to routinely run site checks and report any issues or failures detected.

Title Rich Media
Icon Image
Description

Comcode: Powerful but simple content-enrichment language.

Media embedding: Easily integrate/attach common video and image formats, as well as embeds for common sites such as YouTube (just by pasting in the URL).

Easily create cool effects: Create scrolling, rolling, randomisation, and hiding effects. Put content in boxes, split content across subpages. Create XHTML5 overlays. Place tooltips.

Customise your content for different usergroups

Create count-downs and hit counters

Automatic table of contents creation for your documents

Custom Comcode tags: Set up your own tags, to make it easy to maintain a sophisticated and consistent design as your site grows.

Embed pages within other pages

Title Design without barriers
Icon Image
Description

Full control of your vision: Control hundreds of settings. Strip Composr down. Reshape features as needed.

Full templating support: Reskin features to look however you want them to.

No navigation assumptions: Replace default page and structures as required.

No layout assumptions: Shift content between templates, totally breaking down any default layout assumptions.

Embed content entries of any type on your pages

Title Themeing tools
Icon Image
Description

Theme Wizard: Recolour your CSS and theme images in just a few clicks (Composr picks the perfect complementary palette and automatically makes 100's of CSS and image changes)

Logo Wizard: Generate a basic logo for use on your site

Built-in template and CSS editing tools

Interactive CSS editor: Quickly identify what to change and preview.

Title Administration Zone
Icon Image
Description

Dashboard: View a checklist of things that need done, software upgrade information, latest Composr news, posts in the staff forum, staff notes, useful links, and more.

Audit: View logs and statistics of just about anything with the site and Composr system.

Site statistics: View comprehensive graphs and statistics across a wide range of metrics. Set your own KPIs and get notified when they are reached.

Security: Control site access (including IP bans), privileges, members / usergroups, and word filters.

Structure: Manage and upgrade addons, define zones, configure chatrooms and forums, manage menus, create redirects, and edit the sitemap.

Style: Whitelist the software, manage emoticons, manage themes / run the theme wizard, run the logo wizard, and translate / rephrase the software.

Setup: Set a wide variety of options for your site depending on what addons you have installed.

Tools: Run full or incremental backups, scan for broken URLs, clear the cache or run optimisation tools, edit the code, run Commandr, run the upgrader, run health checks, import content from another site, make and send newsletters, run server checks and view PHP info, run privacy purging or downloading, send an e-mail through the software, and view Composr contributors

Content: Manage all of your content for your site

Help: Search across the site or the tutorials for something

Conflict detection: Detect when multiple staff are trying to change the same thing at the same time.

Examine action logs: See exactly who has done what and when

Commandr: Optional use of a powerful command-line environment (for Unix geeks). Use unix-like tools to explore and manage your database as it if was a filesystem, and perform general maintenance tasks.

Aggregate content types: Design complex content relationships, cloning out large structures in a single operation.

Content versioning: See revisions of certain content

Title Website Polls
Icon Image
Description

Integrate polls into your website: Gauge visitor opinion.

Community involvement: Users can submit polls and comment and rate them.

Multiple polls: Showcase different polls on different areas of your website.

Archive the data from unlimited polls

Title Community features
Icon Image
Description

User content submission: Allow users to submit to any area of your site. Optionally enable validation so staff must approve the content before it goes live.

Public awards: Give public awards to your choice of “best content”

Per-usergroup privileges: Give special members access to extra features, like file storage

Recommend: Visitors can recommend your website or a page to other visitors. Control who can specify their own custom message and those who must use the default (spam prevention).

Members can report content to you for review via "Report This" links (which creates a Support Ticket with a copy of the content at the time of reporting). You can also turn validation off for content to hide it after a certain number of reports.

Title Chatrooms and IM
Icon Image
Description

Make unlimited chatrooms each with your choice of access restrictions.

Moderation: Moderate messages and ban troublesome users.

Integrate shout-boxes into your website

Instant messaging: Members may have IM conversations with each other, or in groups. Members receive an archive of the conversation in Private Topics once closed.

Site-wide IM: Give your members the ability to pick up conversations anywhere on your site.

Sound effects: Members may configure or upload their own.

Download chatroom logs

Blocking: Choose to appear offline to certain members.

Allow members in certain usergroups to make their own chatrooms, and control when they expire based on inactivity time.