Help with Akismet mod

[shadowravenhawk]

Ok I fixed the 2 pages that were the trouble and reinstalled stop spammer but i don't know if it is working. How do I tell if it is working?

[Arantor]

You'll know when it works when a spammer tries to sign up.

[shadowravenhawk]

Is there any way I can test it?

[Arantor]

You'd need to try signing up using an email address or name of a known spammer to test it.

[shadowravenhawk]

Thanks for all your help

[shadowravenhawk]

I lost a 1000 members. Where they all spammers? People are posting porn left and right. I guess I have to make the page changes but would this still delete a 1000 members?

Now I have 1700 members. Is this the mod? Did the MessageIndex.php and Display.php that I took the akismet code off of have anything to do with this?

The members were over 2000 this morning and less than an hour later were down to 1700. What is going on?

4 days later the members were 1700 at the start of the day and now 3.5 hours later are up to 2200. Can someone please tell me what is going on?

5 hours later the members are down to 1700.

[shadowravenhawk]

?

[Arantor]

Neither mod should be affecting the existing tables in the database, first up. Akismet doesn't prevent spammers, it just prevents spam posts, while Stop Spammer should be preventing the sign ups in the first place.

Do you have a moderator that is banning accounts for you?

[shadowravenhawk]

There are not moderators

[Bug Slayer]

Had the same slowdown problem. After some Googling I determined that it was caused by the Akismet class in Sources/Akismet.class.php, originally written by Alex Potsides. Alex released an update to this class (v0.4) a few months ago and word was that the update addressed the performance issues. I merged the update into the the code and sure enough, it fixed the problem.

I've attached the merged (fixed) version of Akismet.class.php. Enjoy!

To all those advocating other solutions: It's hard to beat the spam protection value of a service like Akismet.

[Arantor]

Personally I'd prefer spammers to be caught even before posting, rather than after they already have an account, but that's just me.

[Bug Slayer]

By all means, use captcha and other preventative measures, every bit helps, but sooner or later those are going to fail. We installed Akismet because the existing measures were no longer protecting us well enough. One viagra post per week is one viagra post too many IMO. Bayesian spam filters are an indispensable part of spam protection, especially since they adapt automatically as the spam changes.

[Arantor]

Except that it is actually not that hard to fool such filters if you do it correctly. Note that with 2.0 you could even put new members on post moderation to stop it getting publicly visible.

[Bug Slayer]

Well, not point in trolling. We'll have to agree to disagree. I just wanted to share my fix for the speed problem.

[shadowravenhawk]

So what is your fix for the speed problem? How do I correct it?

[Arantor]

The fix is to take the file attached above, Akismet.class.php and use that to replace the class file bundled with the mod itself.

Note that the mod cannot be updated unless the original author does so.

[Bug Slayer]

Use the replacement file I attached in my first post.

[shadowravenhawk]

do I do this after I install the mod on my forum?

[Arantor]

Install the mod, then replace the file with that one.

[shadowravenhawk]

The person who caused the problem with the members changed all the boards to allow guests to post. How did this person get my password and what can I do to stop this person from getting in again?