Instead of having a banned usergroup, perhaps just have a menu in the ACP/MCP to ban a user and enter why they are banned. They will then see the message showing why they are banned when they try to visit the board.

Many large forums I'm sure may have large ban lists. The ban controls should have a note area saying why they're banned. Then that message could show to the banned user. I think in most situations the banned user knows why they're banned.

[quote name='IP.iBaLLiN' date='22 February 2009 - 03:46 AM' timestamp='1235270765' post='1786239']
Instead of having a banned usergroup, perhaps just have a menu in the ACP/MCP to ban a user and enter why they are banned. They will then see the message showing why they are banned when they try to visit the board.


And if no reason is given, show a default 'banned' message...
+1

There is banned group and there is "Suspended". what is the point?

One of them need to be removed.

There is a big difference between 'suspended' and 'banned'. I suspend a user for x days for minor infractions. I ban members which is a full time suspension. Banned members have their groups changed and suspended members just are locked out temporarily with no change to their group.

Ban and suspend are the same thing in IPB3 - you can ban a member right from the warn panel, with a reason. To use the other ban controls, though, like changing their group, banning their email address and/or IP, you still have to go via the ACP as before, to maintain security.

Rikki:

I hope you mean the definitions haven't changed in IPB3. I can also read that they 'are the same' as now are equivalent in 3.0. Kindly clarify.

The suspend feature was always essentially 'banning' in 2.x, but there was confusion about what it was, so we've just changed the terms we use. The features themselves work the same, but in the warning panel suspend is now called ban.

Good to know. Thank you for answering.

I like the distinction between 'suspend' and 'ban'.

Suspend to me is a private/invisible thing [to other members]. The member remains in the same group, but their permissions and post restrictions are temporarily modified.

Banning though means placing a member in a separate 'Banned' group. This group has very few permissions to do anything on the board. It's a conscious, manual effort by an Admin to move a member into the 'Banned' group.

My 2p worth.

@rct2dotcom

I completely concur.

Although the terms have changed, you can still do the same thing, just in case there was confusion.

You have successfully un-confused me!

There are a plethora of ban options in IPB3...

From the warn panel you can "ban" indefinitely, or for a specific time period. This does not change their group - it works identical to IPB2.

From the ACP you can access the ban panel for a user where you can "ban" the account (this sets a flag on the account, banning them from the site, without changing their group or anything else), and add their data to the ban filters (IP address, username and email address). You can also, of course, still move a user to a banned user group should you wish, however it is not necessary (if for instance you didn't want anyone to know the user was banned).

There is a blog entry from middle of last year in our blog on this if you are interested in reading about it more.

Sorry for the bump, but I'd like to continue with my suggestion. Add one more field if there currently isn't any kind of like a "note to user." That note will be displayed to the user when he tries to access the board and sees he is banned. Such as:

You have been banned for %reason%. You have been banned for %bantime% will be unbanned on: %unbandate%. If you have any questions, please click here to contact us. (The contact us link will open up the admin's email mailto: link