How to ban a member but keep their posts?

[jjd1]

Hi, a long time ago before I had spam protection in I got nailed with a ton of spam posts from a user, and when I banned him it left his posts and I had to delete them all one by one which took me hours.

But something changed in the recent versions (I am on 1.1.12), I just had to ban a jerk (not spam related, just jerk) and this time when I did it took all his posts with him.  But unfortunately his posts were integral to a big part of the discussion, and so I want to ban him but leave his posts up.

Can anyone help me get his posts back, and how do I choose next time I ban someone whether their posts stay or get deleted?

Thanks!

[Paul_Pauline]

If you have deleted the posts, the only way to retrieve them is to import a database backup made after the time they were posted.

This also means you will lose anything posted after the backup was created.

If you banned someone from the admin panel, you should have seen an option to delete the posts at the same time or leave them intact.

It's not a good idea to ban someone on the spur of the moment and delete their posts, and later wish you hadn't when you cool off 

[JimM]

Are you sure you just banned the member?  When you ban an account that does not delete the member or any of the post.  When you delete an account from the members profile, you get an option to delete all the post and topics as well.  If you are seeing something else, you may have changed something with a mod.  What mods do you have installed?

If you don't have a recycle board set up, and you don't have a backup of the database, the topics that you deleted are pretty much gone.

[jjd1]

Its not that I deleted then cooled off later, the whole time I was banning him I was looking for a way to keep the posts, but was never offered one that I saw.  So I figured they would just remain.

Definitely never deleted the user that I know of.  The way I banned him was to click on the member while logged in as Admin, from there it took me to the member's profile and on the lower left was the link to "Ban this User."  I clicked that and it takes me straight to the "Add new ban", where my choices are:

Ban name - this was preloaded with his user name
Expiration - I chose never
Reason - I entered 'Violation of forum rules and ignoring previous warnings'
Notes - I left blank
Restriction - I chose Full Ban
Triggers - I chose ban on username and email address

Once I hit Add all his posts were gone except one that I had modified, his last post I had hit modify and then deleted the junk he wrote and replaced with the text "Post Deleted / User Banned" in red, then right after done the ban.  That post still shows and his user name shows up still, just with one post in his post count instead of however many he had before.

I still don't see in my list where I choose to delete all of his posts, unless I am supposed to do a partial ban?  But from the way it is worded I don't think that is it.

Here are my mods:

1. SMF 1.0.20 / 1.1.12 Update 1.0   [ Uninstall ] [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 
2. Hide "Logged" and IP Image 1.0   [ Uninstall ] [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 
3. Reply Button in All Posts 1.1   [ Uninstall ] [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 
4. SimplePortal 2.3.2  [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 
5. Anti-Spam Verification Questions 1.02   [ Uninstall ] [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 
6. SimplePortal 2.3.3   [ Uninstall ] [ List Files ] [ Delete ] 

And I am using the mavidusler Theme.  I love this theme, but there has been one other weird thing with this theme where I have tried to add the Advanced Contact Form mod but with the skin applied I never see the Contact tab in the menu, but if I go back to default it shows up.  So maybe the skin is hiding the way to keep posts too?

Hate asking this too Jim but I am a noob on this and just trying to learn, what's a recycle board?

[Illori]

a recycle board is a board that holds all deleted posted until admin deletes them.
you can find it in the boards section of admin Boards

[jjd1]

Thanks Illori, just set up a hidden board to be my recycle board.  You're extremely helpful here, you fixed my 1.1.12 upgrade problem last week too, huge thanks!  Glad I know that trick, wish I knew it before.

Still need to know how I control whether posts stay or delete when you ban someone or how I choose which of those occurs, or if I screwed that up somehow?  Thanks.

[Illori]

by default when you ban someone their posts do not get deleted so I am not sure what went wrong on your forum that caused the posts to be lost.

[Aleksi "Lex" Kilpinen]

Actually, if you ban someone - It should NEVER affect that members posts. It is only when you delete that members account, that you are given the choice to delete posts as well. So, what type of ban was this? Are you sure the member didn't delete the posts himself?