Add a new "Show Subforum" option

[MageUK]

Proposing to add a new option so that subforums of a forum can be visible without the topics in the parent forum being visible.

It related to this tracker issue, which is marked as not a bug.

I'm hoping this is a bug as we've found it fairly annoying, but it may not be.

If you want to allow a user access to a subforum, you can't show it unless the user has "Read Topics" access to the parent forum.

Shouldn't they only require "Show Forum" access to the parent forum, and providing they have enough permissions to the subforum, be able to see that? Instead they just get this error:

[#103139] You do not have permission to view this forum.

And they never even get to see that the subforum exists.

You can duplicate by:

- Creating a category

- Creating a forum in the category with only "Show Forum" access for your user group

- Creating a subforum of that forum with full access for your user group

Updating status to: Working as Intended

This is how IPB is designed. If the parent isn't a category, you need to give "read" access to be able to "read" the subforums.

You can post a topic in the suggestions forum if you would like this changed. I don't think we can "change" it, but possibly add a new option to do what you want.

On our forum personally, it would be useful to have an option to make subforums visible while keeping the topics/posts in the parent hidden.

[.Ian]

Forum redirects to URL's also do not show unless you have both show & read permissions which is plain daft.

[MageUK]

Didn't know that actually, that is kind of silly - thanks for the info, I'm sure if this option gets added that could be bundled in with this.

[C. Waffles]

Seconded, I've brought this up before and see others mention it also.

http://community.invisionpower.com/topic/296916-make-subforum-categories-list-subforums/

Not calling this a bug is ridiculous. If both the parent forum and subforum have "Show Forum" permissions checked, and you can only the parent forum shows, its not working as intended.

[mld11]

In the parent forum settings, check off "use as category", or whatever it's actually called, it's near the top.

That will hide all topics in the parent forum, and only show subforums.

[C. Waffles]

In the parent forum settings, check off "use as category", or whatever it's actually called, it's near the top.

That will hide all topics in the parent forum, and only show subforums.

That doesn't fix the original problem, OP doesn't want to hide the parent forum or take away functionality from one to gain functionality in another.

[3DKiwi]

Richard2104 - Can explain better what the problem is as I'm not following. In the link you supplied above I explained how to get around the problem of displaying sub-forums properly. You can check out how I have my sub forums set up by clicking on the link in my signature.

3DKiwi

[C. Waffles]

Richard2104 - Can explain better what the problem is as I'm not following. In the link you supplied above I explained how to get around the problem of displaying sub-forums properly. You can check out how I have my sub forums set up by clicking on the link in my signature.

3DKiwi

At the moment, the only subforums I see on your website (nice site btw) are listed under "The Cafe".
Your solution is to make the parent forum a "category" only forum, this doesn't fix the problem for people who need or want topics within a parent forum, and relevant subforums to add to the parent forum discussion. So your solution finds a suitable workaround for some people, but not all, and doesn't really fix the problem, just subverts it.

[3DKiwi]

Hi

Yup only the Cafe Category has sub forums. Okay so you want topics and sub forums in the Category forum. Sorry I don't know how to achieve that or if it's possible. Perhaps file a support ticket with IPS or file a bug report?

3DKiwi

[Brandon D]

I think that's the point of this topic -- multiple bug reports have been filed regarding this (lack of) functionality and they all have been marked as WAI. I think I even reported it as a bug a long time ago.

While I can see the logic on both sides I think it would be nice if IPB could handle both scenarios (preferably without changing the way IPB works... imagine having some of your subforums suddenly open up to some members after an upgrade). I think the argument IPS has is that a subforum is "owned" by the parent forum, much like it "owns" its topics. If you don't have read permissions on that parent forum then you don't have read permissions to the topics or any subforums, regardless if the permissions are set up to show that parent forum to you.

Theoretically this could be solved by a simple forum structure reorganization. While the functionality would be nice to have, it seems kind of farfetched that you have permissions to read a subforum but not the parent forum.