Guide on interfacing with JForum

[Migrated From Jforum.net]

I've recently tried to have my own Java web app interface with JForum, eg. programmatically make posts, edit posts, delete posts.
After finding only bits and pieces of info on this forum for how to do this, but nothing comprehensive, I would like to share with you a hopefully more complete set of steps for achieving this.

I used commons http-client http://jakarta.apache.org/commons/httpclient/ to simulate a http client.

[CREATING TOPIC]

You can create a new topic in JForum by entering a URL similar to this:
http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?module=posts&action=insertSave&forum_id=1&subject=new topic subject&message=This is is a new subject

You can put that URL in the browser and it will automatically create a topic in the forum with forum_id = 1, and subject = "new topic subject",
and message = "This is is a new subject".

To achieve this in a java application using Commons Http-Client, you can use the following code:

	
		
HttpClient client = new HttpClient();

login(client); // log in as admin, see code in [LOG IN AS ADMIN]

String url = "http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?module=posts&action=insertSave&forum_id=1&subject=new topic subject&message=This is is a new subject";
url = url.replaceAll("\\s", "%20"); // replace all space with %20

PostMethod method = new PostMethod(url);
try {
	int status = client.executeMethod(method);

	// Post has been successfully created, the following code allows you
	// to read the response to get back the topic_id and post_id JForum
	// assigned to it.

	// JForum will redirect to a new URL after posting a new thread:
	String redirectLocation;
	Header locationHeader = method.getResponseHeader("location");
	// redirect URL is stored in "location"
	if (locationHeader != null) {
		redirectLocation = locationHeader.getValue();
		HttpMethod redirectMethod = new GetMethod(redirectLocation);
		client.executeMethod(redirectMethod);
		redirectResponseBody = redirectMethod.getResponseBodyAsString();

		// The redirectResponseBody will contain a line similar to: <a
		// href="/jforum/posts/list/52.page#53">
		// this contains the information on the post that was just
		// created:
		// the 52.page indicates the topic_id is 52,
		// and #53 indicates the post_id is 53.
		// You can use regex to search for this in the
		// redirectResponseBody

	}

} catch (Exception e) {
	e.printStackTrace();
} finally {
	method.releaseConnection();
}

[EDITING POST]

Say you wanted to edit a post with post_id = 8 in forum with forum_id = 1, the following URL when put into the browser will do it:

http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?module=posts&action=editSave&post_id=8&forum_id=1&topic_type=0&message=A NEW CONTENT&subject=A NEW SUBJECT

To do this in java:

		
HttpClient client = new HttpClient();

login(client);

String url = "http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?module=posts&action=editSave&post_id=8&forum_id=1&topic_type=0&message=A NEW CONTENT&subject=A NEW SUBJECT";
url = url.replaceAll("\\s", "%20"); // replace all space with %20

PostMethod method = new PostMethod(url);
try {
	int status = client.executeMethod(method);
} catch (Exception e) {
	e.printStackTrace();
} finally {
	method.releaseConnection();
}

[DELETE TOPIC]

The following url will delete a topic with the topic_id = 5, forum_id = 1.

http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?action=doModeration&module=moderation&forum_id=1&topic_id=5&topicRemove=1&returnUrl=/jforum

To do this in java:

HttpClient client = new HttpClient();

login(client);

String url = "http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?action=doModeration&module=moderation&forum_id=1&topic_id=5&topicRemove=1&returnUrl=/jforum";
url = url.replaceAll("\\s", "%20");    // replace all space with %20

PostMethod method = new PostMethod(url);
try {
	int status = client.executeMethod(method);
}
catch (Exception e)
{
       e.printStackTrace();
}
finally
{
       method.releaseConnection();
}

[LOG IN AS ADMIN]

This method will log you in as the default admin (u: Admin, p: admin):

private void login(HttpClient client) {
	String url = "http://localhost:8080/jforum/jforum.page?module=user&action=validateLogin&username=Admin&password=admin&redirect=&login=Login";

	PostMethod method = new PostMethod(url);
	try {
		int status = client.executeMethod(method);
	} catch (Exception e) {
		e.printStackTrace();
	} finally {
		method.releaseConnection();
	}
}

####################################

I hope this post is useful to somebody. I also hope the code works as I had to extract bits and pieces from my files so it hasnt been through a compiler.

This may not be the best or the only way to programmatically interface with JForum, but it has worked for me.

I learnt a lot about how to communicate with JForum using Firefox's Live Http Headers (http://livehttpheaders.mozdev.org/), which shows you the headers in requests.

[originally posted on jforum.net by gambit_asdf]