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Japan has been regularly playing at the World Cup in recent tournaments. Also, they have been producing some valuable players since they erupted onto the World stage back in 2002, when they co-hosted the World Cup with South Korea. The Asian Island nation, despite having produced respectable players, have not been convincing enough to build a reputation as a feared side. Conveniently enough, it could be said that Japan is the least favourite among their Group H opponents to go into the next rounds of the World Cup. But this statement should not undermine the quality they have in their squad. Japan's team is filled with players who have tremendous amounts of experience, both at the club and international levels. Some of the well-known players have played at the biggest clubs and have always responded positively to their nation. History © Reuters The 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia will be Japan's sixth appearance at the tournament. Back in 1938, they withdrew from entering the world cup, while they were banned for the 1950 edition. It took another 52-years for them to play in their maiden World Cup, and did so on home soil. Since the 2002 version, Japan has participated in each of the tournaments leading to the Russia edition. Their best finish came in the 2002 home tournament as well as in the World Cup held in South Africa in 2010, where they reached the Round of 16 stage, but were eliminated on both occasions. Japan, however, will be hoping not to repeat their display in Brazil at the last World Cup where they managed a meager two-goals in their 270 minutes on the pitch and subsequently eliminated at the group stages itself. Current Form © Reuters Japan's current coach who is also their technical director, Akira Nishino, was only installed 9-weeks ago, replacing Bosnian coach, Vahid Halihodzic. The move came as a shocker after Halohodzic had helped Japan qualify for the Russia World Cup, but there were concerns between the players and the coach, which ultimately cost the latter his job. Such a move will always pose question marks over the team to integrate into the new coach's plans at the big stage. Japan was among those teams that eased through their qualifying rounds to reach Russia. The reason for their fantastic form in the qualifiers was their former coach, whose strict system and rules meant the players followed their responsibilities to significant effect. Japan should stick to their old system and try not to create an experimental one under their new head coach. Such a move could harm their already depleted chances in Russia. Expectations At The World Cup © Reuters First of all, the World Cup is a box full of surprises. No team should be underestimated or be touted as clear favourites to either win the tournament or to go past the group stages. Japan, on the one hand, have the required quality to stun their opponents in Russia; on the other hand, they could be far too reliant on some of their star players like Okazaki, Honda, and Kagawa. From one perspective, it is difficult to see Japan advancing to the knockout phase, especially from a tight place like Group-H. The likes of Poland and Colombia are considered as clear favourites in this group, which also consists of Senegal who could spring up a surprise. For Japan to have a chance to progress from this group, they need to win at least one and draw the other to stand a genuine chance in the World Cup. Squad Goalkeepers: Eiji Kawashima (Metz). Masaaki Higashiguchi (Gamba Osaka), Kosuke Nakamura (Kashiwa Reysol). Defenders: Yuto Nagatomo (Galatasaray), Tomoaki Makino, Wataru Endo (Urawa Reds), Maya Yoshida (Southampton), Hiroki Sakai (Marseille), Gotoku Sakai (Hamburg), Gen Shoji, Naomichi Ueda (Kashima Antlers). Midfielders: Makoto Hasebe (Eintracht Frankfurt), Keisuke Honda (Pachuca), Takashi Inui (Eibar), Shinji Kagawa (Dortmund), Hotaru Yamaguchi (Cerezo Osaka), Genki Haraguchi, Takashi Usami (Fortuna Dusseldorf), Gaku Shibasaki (Getafe), Ryota Oshima (Kawasaki Frontale). Forwards: Yuya Osako (Werder Bremen), Yoshinori Muto (Mainz), Shinji Okazaki (Leicester).

Soccer Football - World Cup - Group E - Brazil vs Switzerland - Rostov Arena, Rostov-on-Don, Russia - June 17, 2018 Brazil's Philippe Coutinho scores their first goal REUTERS/Jason Cairnduff ROSTOV-ON-DON: A second-half header from Steven Zuber...

It sure speaks a lot about the grit and determination of Serbia, who have been going through some civil and military tensions, to have qualified for the 2018 FIFA World Cup as group winners. And it is important to remember that before this they were not even able to make it to qualifying for three other major European tournaments. In this turmoil, the team's coach Slavoljub Muslin was sacked for being too defensive. HIstory Facing internal strife over the Yugoslavian wars in the 90's, and after the dissolution of Serbia and Montenegro, Serbia has played as an independent nation since 2006. So far they have qualified for the 2010 and 2018 World Cup. Football has been a national passion for the small country and its national team is nicknamed as the Orlovi (the Eagles). While being a part of the erstwhile Yugoslav national teams, it achieved considerable success, finishing fourth at the 1930 and 1962 World Cups respectively. Source: Reuters Interestingly, both FIFA and UEFA have accorded the Serbian national team the standing of a direct and sole successor of the Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro teams. Current Form Showcasing spectacular performance in the Sep 2017 qualifiers, Serbia held on to their lead over the Republic of Ireland when centre-back Nikola Maksimovic was sent off. Again in Oct 2017, after a bitter 3-2 defeat to Austria, just three days later, Serbia rose like a shooting star with the help of Aleksandar Prijovic's goal against Georgia and secured its position in group E. This season, Serbia will clash first against Costa Rica. A face off with Switzerland, and Brazil will follow on the 22nd and 27th of June respectively. The reins of the aggressive Serbian team are presently held by the caretaker coach Mladen Krstajic, aged just 43 years. Stars in their own right Serbia has a strong line-up of players. Dusan Tadic is surely bankable whereas Aleksandar Mitrovic who played only as a reserve at his club side Newcastle, has taken everyone by surprise by scoring six times in the qualifiers. The goalkeeper in the form of Vladimir Stojkovic is a blessing for the side and their captain Branislav Ivanovic is equally promising with his on-ground management. Nemanja Matic provides the assurance in his central position in midfield. Source: Reuters The back four will have to brace to face the attacking teams as they will be without the injured centre-back Matija Nastasic. The Lazio midfielder Sergej Milinkovic-Savic along with Dusan Tadic, can be a lethal combination for Serbia as an attacking force. Expectations Much depends upon the centre forward Aleksandar Mitrovic and there is no clear replacement for him yet. Similarly, the newbie who scored the winning goal against Georgia and Andrija Pavlovic need somebody to look up to. If the defence is taken care of and Dusan Tadic is supported well Serbia can look to surge ahead albeit a tough game with Costa Rica. Going for the knockouts is going to be a daunting challenge indeed. Source: Reuters Serbia World Cup Squad GOALKEEPERS: Vladimir Stojkovic (Partizan Belgrade), Predrag Rajkovic (Maccabi Tel Aviv), Marko Dmitrovic (Eibar). DEFENDERS: Aleksandar Kolarov (AS Roma), Branislav Ivanovic (Zenit St. Petersburg), Dusko Tosic (Guangzhou R&F), Antonio Rukavina (Villarreal), Milos Veljkovic (Werder Bremen), Milan Rodic (Red Star Belgrade), Uros Spajic (Krasnodar), Nikola Milenkovic (Fiorentina). MIDFIELDERS: Nemanja Matic (Manchester United), Luka Milivojevic (Crystal Palace), Sergej Milinkovic-Savic (Lazio), Marko Grujic (Liverpool), Adem Ljajic (Torino), Dusan Tadic (Southampton), Filip Kostic (Hamburg SV), Andrija Zivkovic (Benfica), Nemanja Radonjic (Red Star Belgrade). FORWARDS: Aleksandar Mitrovic (Newcastle United), Aleksandar Prijovic (PAOK Salonika), Luka Jovic (Benfica).

LAHORE: Three people were arrested and items and equipment worth hundreds of thousands of rupees were recovered during a raid carried out Thursday night by the province's food regulators and police officers, Geo News reported.The Punjab Food...

The Saudi Arabian national football team is easily the weakest team on paper in Group A. They haven't been helped by the three managerial changes in the last year and current coach Juan Antonio Pizzi will have to work wonders for the team in the group stages of the 2018 FIFA World Cup. They stand at the 67th place in the FIFA World Rankings. History © Reuters Arriving as the tournament's lowest-ever ranked side, Saudi Arabia may not be the most prolific achievers at the World Cup, but their football history states that they are not just heading to Russia for the sake of showing up. In the 1994 World Cup, the Saudi Arabia team had qualified from their group with wins against Morocco and Belgium to set them up with a last-16 tie against Sweden which they lost 3-1. Saudi Arabia is a three-time AFC Asian Cup champion and is generally considered one of the strongest sides in Asia. This will be Saudi Arabia's fifth World Cup appearance; the last time they qualified for the World Cup was 12 years ago, back in 2006. They've failed to make it out of the group stage in all of those attempts, the exception came in 1994 when they lost to Sweden 3-1 in the Round of 16 in the USA. Current Form © Reuters Saudi Arabia's revolving-door managerial policy has seen six managers come and go in the last five years, including three changes in the months between September-November 2017. Their current manager, Juan Antonio Pizzi, only took charge in November last year after resigning as Chile's manager, after they failed to qualify for the World Cup. The team is top-heavy and mainly relies on their attackers. However, they do have the experience to help them in their defence - something that may come in handy during the tournament. Their players are all based at home, but it's worth noting that nine of the current players in the squad have trained with La Liga sides and did manage to get some game time in Spain this year - thanks to the loan deals. Expectations At The World Cup © Reuters To stand any chance of qualifying from their group, Saudi Arabia must win against Russia in the first game of the tournament. The chances of Uruguay or Egypt losing against them are very slim, but three points against the hosts and a draw against one of the other sides could be enough for them to advance and equal their record finish in the last 16. They might have lost 2-1 in the friendly against Italy, but the Green Falcons showed a lot of heart which confirms that they could prove to be a tricky opponent in Russia. While the group they have been handed is far from difficult, Saudi Arabia's lack of quality and experience in top-class tournaments makes it unlikely for them to reach the knockout stage. But they will at least have the honor of becoming the first Asian nation ever to play in the opening game when they take on Russia in Moscow on 14th June. In their group, Uruguay, undoubtedly, have the best chance to finish the group stage at the top of the table with the other spot is likely to be secured by Egypt, considering Salah's love affair with goals this year. Saudi Arabia will have to rely on miracles if they are to progress further into the competition. Squad Goalkeepers: Mohammed Al-Owais, Yasser Al-Musailem, Abdullah Al-Mayuf. Defenders: Mansoor Al-Harbi, Yasser Al-Shahrani, Mohammed Al-Breik, Motaz Hawsawi, Osama Hawsawi, Omar Hawsawi, Ali Al-Bulaihi. Midfielders: Abdullah Al-Khaibari, Abdulmalek Al-Khaibri, Abdullah Otayf, Taiseer Al-Jassim, Houssain Al-Mogahwi, Salman Al-Faraj, Mohamed Kanno, Hattan Bahebri, Salem Al-Dawsari, Yehya Al-Shehri. Forwards: Fahad Al-Muwallad, Mohammad Al-Sahlawi, Muhannad Assiri.

Everybody in the gym has a different take on training for hypertrophy aka 'muscle size badana'. Most gym bros do what has been etched in stone by desi gym trainers. They work one muscle group once a week. You might know it as the 'bro split'. This comes down from old school bodybuilding wisdom and is being passed on till date. Just because the pros did it back in the day, we should do it too, right? No, absolutely wrong. First things First, You Aren't A Professional Bodybuilder. Stop Training Like One. © Breakingmuscle While idolizing a professional bodybuilder is all good, trying to mimic his training and nutrition is outright dumb. Why? Firstly, everyone is built differently. Your genetics are not like his. You process food differently than he does. His musculature and bone structure aren't like yours. The human body is like finger prints—nobody is alike. Secondly, most professionals you idolize are on steroids. Once on steroids, the game changes entirely. Your muscle protein synthesis doubles up, nutrition partitioning becomes better and muscle recovery goes through the roof. Sum it all up and you grow bigger and stronger in a very short time. Yes of course, all this comes with side effects that 90% of you will never be able to cope with. Hence, stop mimicking the bodybuilders. How Muscle Growth Works For Natural Guys Building muscle naturally takes time, a long time in fact. You have to be patient. Sometimes you have to bear with looking a little fluffy and spend longer time 'not' training than you would have thought. More work doesn't mean more muscle. 1) Train Each Muscle When It Is Ready To Be Trained. Never Sooner And Never Later. The above line was popularized by world renowned powerlifter and PhD Fred Hatfield. Decipher the line and you will come to a conclusion that different muscle groups recover differently. Now a ton of researches have proven that it takes round about 24-72 hours for every muscle to fully recover. Taking this into account, every natural lifter is ready to train the same muscle group after 24-72 hours. Then why only train a muscle group once a week, when you can reap twice as much benefit by hitting it twice a week? Likewise, if you hammer a muscle group that requires 72 or more hours of rest in less than 24 hours, you are just limiting your progress. Muscle like the abs, forearms and rear deltoids recover rather quickly while, pectorals and hamstrings can take longer. © Thinkstock/Getty Images 2) Nothing Is Set In Stone. Identify Your Recovery Time. Leading from the point above, most natural lifters fail to grow big because they don't recover enough because they don't pay attention to each muscle recovery time. It's all in your hands, pay attention to your training and see how well you recover. You have to find a middle ground as to where you find yourself recovering well while not training too much and training too little. 3) An Understanding That Can Be Drawn Keeping In Mind The Above Points a) You can hit muscle like the biceps, lateral delts, rear delts and the calves at least 4 times a week. b) Keep chest, quads, hamstrings and front deltoids for 2 days a week. c) Back can be hit 3 times a week. Note- This is just a general guideline. Remember, nothing is set in stone. 4) Sample Workout Monday- Chest, Shoulders, Back Tuesday- Off Wednesday- Legs And Arms Thursday- Off Friday- Chest, Shoulder, Back Saturday- Legs And Arms Pro tip- Pick the big lifts in the above workout for every muscle group and focus on progressive overload with correct form.

The 2018 FIFA World Cup is just around the corner and despite all the pre-tournament noise, football's gala event barely explodes to life in the initial stages. That said, the group stages of the World Cup still catch the fancy of the footballing world, despite a whole host of mismatches and the spectacle in Russia will be no different. While pre-tournament favourites like Germany, Spain and Brazil are expected to breeze through their relatively straightforward groups, there will, nevertheless, be quite a few interesting matchups in the first round. From games having star names lining up against each other to ties where both teams are equally fancied, here is a list of the most anticipated clashes of the group stages: Egypt vs Uruguay (15th June) © Reuters This will be a clash between Liverpool's former favourite and current favourite. Egypt's Mohamed Salah is a doubt to feature in the game but Uruguay's Luis Suarez will be chomping at the bit to help his side gain an early advantage in what looks to be a ridiculously understrength Group A. Portugal vs Spain (15th June) © Reuters Cristiano Ronaldo coming up against his Real Madrid teammates of Spain will be a battle worth watching. The Euro 2016 champions Portugal will have their task cut out against what is a well-drilled Spanish unit but it could also turn out to be a personal battle between Ronaldo and La Roja goalie David de Gea. Portugal vs Morocco (20th June) © Reuters Although a mismatch on paper, Morocco are a collection of some fine young talents from Europe and could be more than a match for what is an ageing Portugal side. Morocco's talented playmaker Hakim Ziyech is a shot monster and could pose quite a few problems for the lumbering Portuguese defence led by the 35-year-old Pepe. Argentina vs Croatia (21st June) © Reuters Argentina have some of the most fearsome attackers on the planet led by the talismanic Leo Messi but their other areas look unsurprisingly weak. This Group D game will pit the lopsided Albiceleste against Croatia's midfield geniuses of Luka Modric, Ivan Rakitic, Mateo Kovacic and Ivan Perisic hence will be an intriguing battle. Nigeria vs Iceland (22nd June) © Reuters This game has very narrow odds considering the strength of the two teams. Nigeria are unpredictable as ever while the pluck of Iceland will be their main asset going into what could be the most decisive game in Group D, as the other two teams – Argentina and Croatia – lock horns 21 hours earlier. Serbia vs Switzerland (22nd June) © Reuters Group E already has the look of Brazil topping it, therefore this clash between two mid-level European teams could go a long way in deciding who follows the South Americans into the knockout stages. Both Serbia and Switzerland have equal odds heading into this game and a fascinating clash of differing European footballing styles awaits. Mexico vs Sweden (27th June) © Reuters Germany are the clear favourites in Group F, hence this clash looks to be a virtual decider of who finishes behind die Mannschaft in the group. Mexico, the CONCACAF heavyweights who have never set a World Cup alight despite the plethora of talent at their disposal, will face a highly disciplined Swedish unit who will be without the retired Zlatan Ibrahimovic. England vs Belgium (28th June) © Reuters The final day of the group stages brings about the highly-anticipated Group G clash between England and Belgium. 11 of Belgium's 23-man squad ply their trade in England's Premier League, hence the Red Devils will be no strangers to their opponents but England – with their youthful squad – will have nothing to fear against one of the favourites. A pulsating clash is on the cards which could well decide who ends up as group winners.

Traders work at the Citadel Securities post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, US-Photo: FileSAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK: Volatility could well be in the cards for Wall Street again early this fall, but not for the same...

Don't you just hate it when you're added into your family Whatsapp group? There are so many cringeworthy people who you just don't want to have to deal with. Here are some of the people on our family Whatsapp groups.

Are you a member of a busy Facebook Group? Do you find it overwhelming trying to sort through all the posts to find something posted the day before? Are you now missing new posts and only seeing them a few days later? Facebook Groups are tempting to use as they are free to set up but is this the best decision for the future of your business? At the beginning with just a handful of members, things may fun fine. But fast forward to where your group becomes busy with thousands of members posting and reading. Your group becomes overwhelming. You find it hard to locate posts made on previous days and search is of no use. It is getting harder to keep on top of troublesome and spamming members. Worse still, Facebook's changing algorithms mean that your members are not seeing every post you make. You do as Facebook asks and link your page to your group to find that you must now boost posts to reach your members. This is getting to be a very common scenario. Even more worrying are rumours that Facebook is bringing advertising to groups. Will this allow your competitors to target your hard won membership? Will Facebook roll out the "Discover" tab across all continents? This alone has destroyed organic reach for many brands. What would you do if Facebook blocked your account for a week? Would your sales suffer? There is a way to take back control of your membership and secure your business' future. Building your business on your own land is a powerful way of retaining complete control over your community regardless of what happens to Facebook longer term. Created in 2002, Invision Community has always adapted to the changing habits of the internet. Our latest product is clean, modern, mobile ready and equipped to integrate with social media. It can power your conversations, website and shopping cart. It features single click Facebook sign in and tools to promote scheduled content to your Facebook page. We recently wrote why you shouldn't settle for a Facebook Group when building a community. The benefits of an owned Invision Community are: You own your own data. Your data is not mined for Facebook's benefit. Make it yours by branding it your way You're no longer boxed in by the Facebook format Seamless integration to your shopping cart for more monetization opportunities Set up permission levels to better control what your members can see Lets dig in a look at some of the tools you can leverage to make the migration easier. Mobile Ready Invision Community works great on your mobile. It resizes the page perfectly to match whichever device you are using. You don't need to install special apps or mess with themes. It just works out of the box. Facebook Sign In The first thing you'll want to do is turn on Facebook Sign In. This adds the familiar Facebook button right on the sign in page and register form. Clicking this logs them into your new community with their Facebook account. It even imports their profile photo so they are familiar with other members. Make use of embeds A great way to keep incorporating content from your Facebook Group or Page is to use embeds. Post a link to your content on Facebook and it transforms into a rich media snippet. Social Promotions Share your community content with your Facebook Page. Click the "Promote" button on any content item and you can customize the text and images shared. The promotion system offers a full scheduling system much like Buffer or Hootsuite. This is all built in at no extra cost. Find Your Content Unlike a Facebook Group, your Invision Community makes it easy to find older content. A powerful feature is activity streams. These are customizable "feeds" much like the Facebook News Feed but completely editable to you and your members needs. You can even make this the first page your members see for easy content discovery. Use Clubs Clubs allow sub-communities to run inside your main community. Let's look at a real world example. A FitPro has several different fitness products for sale. Each product is a Facebook Group. She posts daily workouts and answers member's questions. Using many groups can be very time consuming to manage. Clubs puts these sub-communities right on the page making it easy to drop in and update. These Clubs can be private and members invited to join allowing full privacy. This is like a closed Facebook group. We're only scratching the surface of what Invision Community can offer you. You can take back control of your membership and be free from the fear that Facebook will change something that will impact your sales. We're experts in this field with 16 years of experience. We've helped grow thousands of communities from the very biggest brands to the smallest of niches. We'd love to talk to you about your needs.

Invision Power Board had already implemented the code into their system but somewhere along the lines the code got broken and before long you needed a plugin to fix it. This fix however is really simple and doesnt require any plugins, it fixes the userlink formatting pretty much all over the website. Step 1: Go to the theme you want to implement the fix to, and select the HTML Template "userLink" its found under core > front > global Step 2: Replace the entire code in "userLink" with the following below {{if $member->member_id AND \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->canAccessModule( \IPS\Application\Module::get( 'core', 'members' ) ) }}<a href='{{if $warningRef}}{$member->url()->setQueryString( 'wr', $warningRef )}{{else}}{$member->url()}{{endif}}' data-ipsHover data-ipsHover-target='{$member->url()->setQueryString( array( 'do' => 'hovercard', 'wr' => $warningRef, 'referrer' => urlencode( \IPS\Request::i()->url() ) ) )}' title="{lang="view_user_profile" sprintf="$member->name"}" class="ipsType_break">{$member->group['prefix']|raw}{$member->name}{$member->group['suffix']|raw}</a>{{endif}} and your done just reload your forum and you will see the difference

Whether you run an existing community or are taking tentative first steps into setting up an online community forum around your brand, an important choice you need to make is between social networks like Facebook or having a community you own and control. Let's take a look at the benefits of an owned community versus a Facebook group - as well as how you can still use Facebook (and other social media platforms) to your advantage. You own your data The biggest point to consider when using Facebook groups is that you do not own your own data. Facebook owns it and does not even allow you direct access to it. If you decide later to move to a different platform, need to run reports to extract meaningful insights, or otherwise work with your community data: you are out of luck. In contrast, with an Invision Community, your data is your data. You can use it in any way that makes sense for your goals; be it analyzing trends, sending promotions to users, or generating reports and statistics. We never hold your data hostage and there's no fee to get it. Beyond owning the data, you also control how it's used and presented. Facebook is notorious for changing algorithms for when (or even if) people see your posts. When you run your own community the experience for your and your users is in your control. Branding opportunities This is a big one. An owned community gives you the tools you need to make your community a seamless part of your user's interaction with your business. This naturally includes your brand styles (your logo, colors, site navigation and so on) but also your community web address (URL). With an owned community, your URL will be easy to find - customers normally opt for something like forum.yourname.com or community.yourname.com. Users will have more confidence that they're in the right place, and more closely associate your community and your message with your brand. Emails sent out by your owned community can also carry your branding, consistently reinforcing that connection between your business and your community. And, of course, when users share content from your community to Facebook and other social networks, they're sending users directly to your website where you have the opportunity to lead with your most important call to actions. More control over user experience All Facebook groups are, essentially, the same experience and yet your business needs almost certainly aren't the same as every other. One size doesn't necessarily fit all when it comes to community! When you control your own community, you have the ability to control your user's experience. Need to show specific types of data in specific places? You can do that (and more) with Invision Community's easy to use Blocks feature. Need to create a custom community application to serve as a resource center for product support? You can do that too. Another huge benefit of this control is that, unlike a Facebook Group, users won't be seeing ads and 'recommended content' from competing businesses and communities. With user attention being pulled in so many directions these days, the last thing your community needs is for users to leave because Facebook has suggested a competitor! No barriers to monetization Not all communities require a monetization strategy. In many cases, the community is part of a larger customer relationship strategy rather than a revenue-generating destination in its own right. But for those communities that do plan to monetize, options with a Facebook group are at best difficult to act upon, and at worst practically non-existent. In contrast, Invision Community gives you the opportunity to explore monetization strategies that work for you. These might include paid subscription plans (a particularly attractive option for fan club communities), traditional advertising through Google AdSense and other networks, or sponsorship deals with other businesses that might be relevant to your members. Invision Community has tools for each of these approaches built in, allowing you to start monetizing with minimum fuss. Fine-grained permission controls Facebook groups struggle to reflect the real-world roles that staff members play in your organization, limiting your choices to 'administrator' or 'moderator'. And the same is true of users, too - your options for recognizing different levels of user (such as VIPs, or brand ambassadors) are limited. Invision Community is different. Since you are creating and configuring each member group, you can precisely control who can see what, and how they are recognized within the community. You can even sync these roles via Single Sign-On (SSO) making setup and assigning users to groups painless. For staff groups, you can limit access to key community functions based on roles or responsibilities, ensuring access is granted on an as-needed basis only. For users, you can get creative and find a group structure that works best for your specific needs. For example, support communities often find that recognizing the most knowledgeable and helpful members with a new member group (complete with elevated permissions) is a great way of engaging users. And finally, with this control over access, it's very easy to create restricted areas of the community. Whether you want to create a private subforum that staff can use to coordinate tasks or a file repository that's only available to subscribers, Invision Community can achieve it. You can still reap the Facebook benefits Setting up your community within Facebook's walls might not be the best approach for you. That doesn't mean you should ignore Facebook, however. On the contrary, it's an influential platform and there's a very good chance your users are already using it. Invision Community offers a number of tools that allow you to benefit from Facebook while avoiding the drawbacks we discussed. We'll go into more detail on utilizing social media in a future article, but to summarize: Invision Community features social sign-in options, enabling users to register and log in using their existing social media accounts, substantially reducing onboarding friction. Content can promoted by staff back to your social network pages, automatically and on a schedule you decide. Invision Community supports automatic embedding of a wide number of social networks (and other services), allowing users to share their favorite Facebook and Twitter posts and spark a whole new conversation - but this time in your community. Summary When you are creating an online community for your business or hobby it is important to think about your goals and future growth by choosing a platform that is there to work for your needs. When you establish your community on Facebook, you're helping to grow someone else's business (including, potentially, your competitors!) and hoping that some of those spoils fall to you. With an owned community, the rewards of your hard work belong to you and your business alone. Invision Community has been enabling users and businesses to communicate online since 2002, and we're proud of our reputation as a platform that puts control in your hands. Contact us if you'd like to discuss how we can help you too.

Primary Group in Staff Page This will display the primary group of the user instead of the member title on the forum team page Go to: ACP > Customization > Themes > YourTheme (Edit HTML/CSS) - find: core > front > staffdirectory > layout_blocks and click for edit REPLACE ALL CONTENT WITH: {{$count=0;}} {{foreach $users as $user}} {{if $count%4 == 0}} <div class='ipsGrid ipsGrid_collapsePhone cStaffDirectory_blocks'> {{endif}} <div class='ipsGrid_span3 ipsType_center ipsAreaBackground_light ipsPad'> {template="userPhoto" app="core" group="global" params="$user->member(), 'small'"} <h3 class='ipsType_sectionHead'> {{if \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->language()->checkKeyExists( "core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" ) }} {{if member.canAccessModule( \IPS\Application\Module::get( 'core', 'members' ) )}} <a href='{$user->member()->url()}'>{lang="core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" escape="true"}</a> {{else}} {lang="core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" escape="true"} {{endif}} {{else}} {$user->member()->link()|raw} {{endif}} </h3> <p class='ipsType_reset ipsType_normal ipsType_light'> {{if \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->language()->checkKeyExists( "core_staff_directory_title_{$user->id}" )}} {lang="core_staff_directory_title_{$user->id}" escape="true"} {{else}} {expression="\IPS\Member\Group::load( $user->member()->member_group_id )->formattedName" raw="true"} {{endif}} </p> {{if !member.members_disable_pm AND !$user->member()->members_disable_pm AND \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->member_id AND \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->canAccessModule( \IPS\Application\Module::get( 'core', 'messaging' ) )}} <br> <a href='{url="app=core&module=messaging&controller=messenger&do=compose&to={$user->member()->member_id}" seoTemplate="messenger_compose"}' data-ipsDialog data-ipsDialog-title='{lang="compose_new"}' data-ipsDialog-forceReload data-ipsDialog-remoteSubmit data-ipsDialog-flashMessage="{lang="message_sent"}"><i class='fa fa-envelope'></i> {lang="message_send"}</a> {{endif}} </div> {{$count++;}} {{if $count%4 == 0}} </div> <br> {{endif}} {{endforeach}} {{if $count%4 != 0}} </div> <br> {{endif}} results: GROUP ICON IMAGE ON STAFF PAGE This will show the group's image / icon (if any), defined in ACP> Members> Groups> GroupName> Group Icon GO TO: ACP > Customization > Themes > YourTheme (Edit HTML/CSS) - find core > front > staffdirectory > layout_blocks REPLACE ALL CONTENT WITH: {{$count=0;}} {{foreach $users as $user}} {{if $count%4 == 0}} <div class='ipsGrid ipsGrid_collapsePhone cStaffDirectory_blocks'> {{endif}} <div class='ipsGrid_span3 ipsType_center ipsAreaBackground_light ipsPad'> {template="userPhoto" app="core" group="global" params="$user->member(), 'small'"} <h3 class='ipsType_sectionHead'> {{if \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->language()->checkKeyExists( "core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" ) }} {{if member.canAccessModule( \IPS\Application\Module::get( 'core', 'members' ) )}} <a href='{$user->member()->url()}'>{lang="core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" escape="true"}</a> {{else}} {lang="core_staff_directory_name_{$user->id}" escape="true"} {{endif}} {{else}} {$user->member()->link()|raw} {{endif}} </h3> <p class='ipsType_reset ipsType_normal ipsType_light'> {{if \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->language()->checkKeyExists( "core_staff_directory_title_{$user->id}" )}} {lang="core_staff_directory_title_{$user->id}" escape="true"} {{else}} {expression="\IPS\Member\Group::load( $user->member()->member_group_id )->formattedName" raw="true"} {{if \IPS\Member\Group::load( $user->member()->member_group_id )->g_icon }} <li style="list-style:none" class='ipsResponsive_hidePhone'><img src='{file="$user->member()->group['g_icon']" extension="core_Theme"}' alt='' class='cAuthorGroupIcon'></li> {{endif}} {{endif}} </p> {{if !member.members_disable_pm AND !$user->member()->members_disable_pm AND \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->member_id AND \IPS\Member::loggedIn()->canAccessModule( \IPS\Application\Module::get( 'core', 'messaging' ) )}} <br> <a href='{url="app=core&module=messaging&controller=messenger&do=compose&to={$user->member()->member_id}" seoTemplate="messenger_compose"}' data-ipsDialog data-ipsDialog-title='{lang="compose_new"}' data-ipsDialog-forceReload data-ipsDialog-remoteSubmit data-ipsDialog-flashMessage="{lang="message_sent"}"><i class='fa fa-envelope'></i> {lang="message_send"}</a> {{endif}} </div> {{$count++;}} {{if $count%4 == 0}} </div> <br> {{endif}} {{endforeach}} {{if $count%4 != 0}} </div> <br> {{endif}} RESULTS: In spoiler, is the code for the other layouts of the directory staff. (You can choose 3 layouts in ACP settings and all have to be changed for group primary to be displayed)

This is an entry about our IPS Community Suite 4.2 release. The ability to automatically promote users from one group to another based on set parameters has been a staple of community software for some time. Traditionally, the most common determination of promotion has been post count. Additionally, the 4.x Community Suite supports promoting members automatically based on the time elapsed since the user joined the site and based on their total reputation count. With 4.2, we have completely overhauled and enhanced the group promotion feature bringing many new options to administrators looking to promote members through different group levels. To start with, the group promotion options have been removed from the groups configuration pages into their own area. Group promotion rules overview page You will notice that rules are no longer strictly tied to a single group, and that rules can be sorted however you desire. When you create and edit rules, you can choose which groups the rule applies to, what parameters the user needs to meet in order for the rule to be activated, and then finally, which primary and secondary groups the user will be moved in to. You can also configure the rule to remove specified secondary groups, which can be useful if one rule adds a secondary group for users, and then the next rule should change them to be part of a different secondary group (i.e. add a new secondary group, but also remove the previously awarded secondary group). The system uses the same member filters available when configuring bulk mail, and we have made some updates to the member filters area (and have introduced some new filters) in this release as well. For example, you can create a rule that only applies to members who have won the daily leaderboard at least once, or members who have created a blog. Some of the group promotion filters, which are also available when sending bulk mails Any time a member account is updated for any reason (a new visit, editing the member, the member makes a new post, etc.), the software will loop through all configured rules and the last rule in the list that matches the member will be applied. This approach allows you to create promotion levels, for instance when a member reaches 100 posted content items they will be promoted to a new group, and when they reach 1000 posted content items they will be promoted to yet a different new group. Groups can be wholly excluded from any promotion rules, which is useful when you have administrator and/or moderator groups and you want to ensure that they are never moved to a different group. These groups will be disabled from selection when configuring group promotion rules, and these groups will be ignored if "any group" is selected for a promotion rule. Finally, if a user is moved to a new primary group by Commerce because they have purchased a product which moves them to a new group, they will also be excluded from group promotion rules (however, Commerce purchases that only adjust secondary groups will not exclude users from being checked by group promotion rules). Developer note: You can add your own filters for group promotion rules (and bulk mails) by adding MemberFilter extensions in 4.2, available in the Developer Center for your application. View the full article

Group Formatting is a great way to apply flare and personality to a usergroup, by making their names so fancy they become the envy of anyone who see's them, and there is quite a lot you can do with it. A little understanding in CSS/HTML goes a long way with these. You can really get creative and tinker away like crazy with these once you get into it (I personally find it fun, xD). Before getting into it (for the benefit for anyone literally just stepping into this the makeup for your usergroup is configured in the form of prefix code and suffix code. Prefix code controls what comes before the code, and how the group name is formatted, and the suffix code closes off the prefix code and if you want anything like an image to appear after the username, then it's added into the suffix code. For IPB when you go to the edit screen for a group the group formatting part is just: Group Formatting [ ] Group Name [ ] FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> So! The above code is where it all starts! Just drop the prefix part into the first box, and the suffix part into the second box. All the code you add to fab-up your usergroup will go between the apostrophes ( ' ' ) and if you are using multiple elements in your formatting you must make sure to put a space after the semicolon ( ; ). If you are unsure, don't worry I show examples of how to do this later on down the guide. FORMAT When we think of text format we mainly think of it's use in posts and comments. It comes in many flavours bold, italic, underline and strikethrough but all of these can be applied to group formatting too. An example of this is where staff groups have their names in bold to make them standout more, or someone who is banned has a line through their name, and I suppose some people can be weird and find uses for italic and underline in group formatting, that's cool too! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-weight:bold;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-style:italic;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='text-decoration:underline;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='text-decoration:line-through;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Buuuut... There is a simpler way of doing text style, of which I'll show below... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <b><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></b> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <i><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></i> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <u><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></u> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <strike><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></strike> COLOUR More than often people first think of colour when it comes to customizing the makeup of a group, and I'm not joking, an almost infinite well of possibility is with colour! You can use the HEX code of any colour you want and if you aren't into that there is still a lot of options for people that wish to specify their colour by name. Just remember if you're using HEX to include the hashtag ( # ), and if you put in a colours name and it doesn't work, then use it's HEX instead. If you wish to browse the infinate well of colours I will leave two sources for your viewing pleasure. Colour Names: http://www.html-color-names.com/ or http://www.computerhope.com/htmcolor.htm FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='color:red;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='color:#ff0000;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> FONT In terms of adding uniqueness to your group name, giving it it's own font is really up there! It's not that common seen either (in my experience anyway) which is a darn shame because in my opinion it's the top way to add personality to your group, and allows you to really create a unique style look between your groups. A list of fonts below! Arial Comic Sans MS Courier New Georgia Lucida Sans Unicode Tahoma Times New Roman Trebuchet MS Verdana Now for how we actually use 'em! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:arial;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:comic sans ms;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:courier new;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:lucida sans unicode;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:tahoma;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:times new roman;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:trebuchet ms;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:verdana;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> SHADOW One thing I see being askws commonly in communities like this is "How do I add shadows to usernames?" and in honesty it's easy, buuut... If you are wanting to tinker with the shadow you can change the colour and pixel ( px ) values until you get a result you are happy with. Oh! I almost forget! With the right amount of tinkering you can also make the shadow act like an outline.. Which is also! VERY COOL! So! The shadow! Though a quick heads up, text shadow often looks like a glowing effect, but trust me.. It's still awesome! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='text-shadow: 2px 2px 5px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Now for code for making your text shadow act like an outline! I've used this quite a bit myself, and do think it looks really good! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='text-shadow: -1px 0 black, 0 1px black, 1px 0 black, 0 -1px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> COMBINING ELEMENTS Now you've got all these elements to choose from, it's time to start combining what we wanna use and create something awesome and unique! ...And good news! It's easy! At the start of the guide that I'd provide examples of combining the elements, so! Let's go! Verdana Blue FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-family:verdana; color:blue;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Red Italic Shadow (Glow) FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='color: red; font-style:italic; text-shadow: 2px 2px 5px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <i><span style='color: red; text-shadow: 2px 2px 5px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></i> Underline Indigo Comic Sans MS Shadow (Outline) FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='test-decoration:underline; color:indigo; font-family:comic sans ms; text-shadow: -1px 0 black, 0 1px black, 1px 0 black, 0 -1px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <u><span style='color:indigo; font-family:comic sans ms; text-shadow: -1px 0 black, 0 1px black, 1px 0 black, 0 -1px black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span></u> ADDING IMAGE TO THE FORMATTING Another great way to really make your groups look unique is to put little images before or after the names them. Remember if you want the image to be before the username then you put the code in the prefix box, and if you want it to come after the username then you put the code in the suffix box. just take extra care to remember that the code either goes before your code in the prefix box, or after your code in the suffix box! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <img src="" width="" height=""><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span><img src="" width="" height=""> Not in order to get the image to show you'll need a direct link to the image so it can be grabbed, if you are worried about your image being taken down or anything you can host it in your own webspace, or through a imaging website like imgur ( www.imgur.com ). As long as you are using the direct link to the image, it'll work. Oh! Also, don't forget to fill in the width and height numbers so the code knows what dimensions you want the image to be. Example for reference... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <img src="http://i.imgur.com/QeM3VxE.png" width="20" height="20"><span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Or... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style=''> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span><img src="http://i.imgur.com/QeM3VxE.png" width="20" height="20"> FUN EXTRAS Now! While we've explored many ways to make your group unique and fancy through formatting, there is plenty otherwise to go about it too! Here are just a few more bits of code to tinker with your group formatting! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='font-variant:small-caps;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> And... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='text-decoration:overline;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> And... FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <span style='background-color:black;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> Have fun with it! Tinker around and see what dastardly level of cool, super and awesome you can come up with! Here is one you can try if you want! FIRST BOX (PREFIX): <img src="http://i.imgur.com/QeM3VxE.png" width="20" height="20"><span style='font-weight:bold; font-family:lucida sans unicode; color:red; background-color:black; text-decoration:overline;'> SECOND BOX (SUFFIX): </span> THANKS FOR READING!!! Annnnnd... There we go! I sincerely hope from the bottom of my lil; tinkers heart that you enjoyed this guide and I do hope it's helped you out, even if just a little! I welcome feedback, and if you require assistance or support don't hesitate to drop it in a comment and we'll see what we can do to help! Oh! ...And if you want to learn more about this stuff for yourself I recommend going to http://www.w3schools.com and exploring, there is a lot of goodies there to make the heart of any tinker flutter and explode! BEST OF LUCK!!! & HAVE OODLES OF FUN TINKERIN'!!! ( P.S: Special thanks to the songs for keeping me sane during the time I was writing this! xD : Led Zeppelin - Whole Lotta Love, Flogging Molly - Seven Deadly Sins, Ram Jam - Black Betty, Muse - Panic Station, Shinedown - Sound Of Madness, Hollywood Undead - Bullet and Queen & David Bowie - Under Pressure )