Randem Systems Support Board

For more information see Uninstalling BotBanish

It is recommended that BotBanish is run with "Record Only Mode" (which will be renamed to "Redirect Only Mode") checked in the settings. This is the default in version 7.1.06. Running without it checked will result in all users using the same IP address to be locked out if one user using that IP address violates the BotBanish Rules. This can lock out whole companies or households. In some cases this is needed, like running on a private in house website. You can list another company's IP address to be whitelisted or blacklisted allowing limited access to services.

If you attempt to use some admin function and get redirected to Google, it is most likely one or more of these reasons.

• The IP of the device your are using is not listed in the whitelist table. Go to BotBanish->Settings-Whitelist->IP to place your IP in the table.
  
  
• The IP of your device is listed in the blacklist table. Go to BotBanish->Settings-Blacklist->IP to place your IP in the table.
  
  
• Cache on the server as well as the computer must be cleared. On the computer hold the Control key and Press F5 three times. If running a cache system such as NGINX, you need to clear the cache of the account you are using. If not the the cache system will remember your device being sent to Google and will continue to do so. A quick and dirty solution would be to add ? and some random characters after the redirected query to override the cached response. Ex. https://yourdomain.com?asd this will override a cached redirected query of https://yourdomain.com
  
  
• You may need to access the BotBanish Session table in phpMyAdmin to search for your IP and remove it.
  
  
• You may need to access the BotBanish IP_Bad table in phpMyAdmin to search for your IP and remove it.
  
  

There are some instances when BotBanish will not uninstall or you cannot access the forum because it redirects to Google. This can be handled in two ways.

• Empty the session table. Then delete in the bad_url table the entry in "url_part" for ".js". Then uninstall.
  
• Download the BotBanishCleanup script and read the ReadMe.txt file for instruction on how to automatically remove all BotBanish tables, folders and files.
  Download from here

Due to the change in  the BotBanish naming nomenclature, the update feature of WordPress will get confused and hang the system. The only way to get back in is to manually delete the BotBanish folder from the plugin directory, login and install BotBanish version 7.1.04. Versions prior to 7.1.04 need to be deactivated and deleted in the WordPress Dashboard, then Version 7.1.04 can be installed and activated. Future version will be able to be updated via the WordPress dashboard.

If you cannot log into your SMF forum after installing BotBanish. To solve this issue, access the database via phpMyAdmin to delete the following data from the SMF Settings table.

Search for the variables then remove the associated values then save:

variable	value
integrate_register	BotBanish_SMF_CheckUserRegistration
integrate_login	BotBanishClient_UserLoggedIn

You will now be able to log into the forum as normal.
This will be corrected in BotBanish version 7.1.04.

These values can also be deleted with no significant loss of functionality:

variable	value
integrate_preview_post	BotBanish_SMF_CheckUser
integrate_post_start	BotBanish_SMF_CheckUser
integrate_pre_log_stats	BotBanish_SMF_CheckUser

NOTE: We also have a script that can totally uninstall BotBanish if you should run into trouble.

Ok, make sure he knows NOT to re-install SMF. Only regain access to the site from the hosting company.

It's sorted. Just spoke to my friend on the phone, he's taking care of it. He wasn't angry.
He might join the thread. The guy is a genius.
He programs online banking for various banks and is a very good musician.

No, not restart the forum, the VPS server. That is where the issue lies. The forum is fine. access to the server is blocked. The VPS server is blocking access to the forum. You do have a VPS server yes? It could just be an SSL issue. Your hosting company will know why it is blocking access to the forum.

I can't do that because I don't know anything about it, but I'll ask the friend who installed the SMF forum for me to restart the forum. I was hoping I could avoid that because he's a busy person and he'll scold me for installing the mod. The forum was working great before.
Now I can see the advantages of the MyBB forum software.
MODs are independent modules that do not change the structure of the forum. If something does not work as desired, you can simply delete the plugin.
SMF has more convenient admin functions, while MyBB is quite complicated to use and doesn't have a package manager. You have to upload files laboriously via FTP or SFTP.

Thank you for your efforts and support.