[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 7 months, 2 weeks ago]

For anyone following this thread, version 0.6.5 is now available in the repo. This latest version has full BuddyPress 1.6.x support.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 8 months ago]

There is a link in the dashboard menu:

http://s.wordpress.org/extend/plugins/buddypress-links/screenshot-14.png?r=600229

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

I just pushed some changes to the repo (trunk). See first post for the link.

* DB table install and upgrade now occurs on activation hook
* DB upgrades are attempted on *every* activation, instead of just when db version is bumped
* Lots of string fixes, pot file updated

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

@FIQ It can actually be used for more than one thing. My partner in PressCrew @bowromir has been on my case for 2+ years to do something like you are talking about. I plan to work on this, possibly with him, to have several different display/list template sets to pick from (simple drop down) which lets the site admin have an image gallery, or video gallery, or maybe even something else which pulls all of the images from external sources.

Oddly enough when I have tried to pitch possible financial supporters in the past that 99% of people can’t afford the server set up required to handle tons of images and video streaming, nobody was interested in a purely embed solution. I have always thought this was the future, and I still think its the case. Maybe the stars are finally lining up?

I think BP Media does support importing/displaying external galleries already, but I haven’t played with it much. That plugin is pretty hefty though, and maybe overkill for smaller sites.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

@FIQ No worries, I 100% agree with everything you said. My commitment to it *has* been up and down since i first released it almost 3 years ago, lol. http://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/buddypress-links/tags/0.1

Most of the early BP plugins were ahead of their time. The BP community just wasn’t big enough to support plugin authors financially. I am hopeful that this is no longer the case.

Anyways, your honest feedback is good stuff, and appreciated. Wish more people would say what they are thinking instead of just pumping tires

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

Yeah, its a bit of a chicken/egg situation. Its been premium for about 8 months, and I am now feeling comfortable enough to re-release a free version, so this is a good thing

The tough thing about plugins is they are mini communities within a larger project community. If the developer can’t put in 10s or 100s of hours for free, members of the mini-community have to contribute to the financial health of the project. So its a team effort really, as opposed to the traditional mass marketing model.

There was just a ton of work to bring it up to snuff for 1.5 which was the largest hurdle so far. Hopefully there won’t be such another drastic change to BuddyPress which requires that level of time re-investment.

FWIW, I am involved in the CBox project, and that was a huge motivator to get this plugin to a healthy place because I am a huge fan of education, and I think this plugin could be extremely useful to an academic commons site.

And both versions are FOSS/GPL, so there should be no concerns about the source code disappearing.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

Btw, I haven’t updated the pot file yet!

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

When the Links plugin is de-activated or uninstalled the db version option does not get deleted. I think I need to start bumping that number for every release, even if the tables don’t change. Maybe also remove that option when its deactivated.

I will try to reproduce the category bug.

(I can’t figure out how to get e-mail notifications of new topics, or new posts to plugin forums. Its making me crazy!)

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 9 months ago]

Is it possible that you still have old options from previous versions of links? Check your site options table for the option key ‘bp-links-db-version’ and remove it if you find it.

I will do some testing on a multi-site install as well.

Btw, how did you find this topic? I can’t figure out where plugin forum activity/updates are showing up.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 1 year, 4 months ago]

@johnjamesjacoby

As leader of this project, you have a difficult role. Lots of people have complaints. Many have merit and many don’t. Whether they have merit or not, every complaint is *real* to the complainer.

You have put a huge part of your life into BuddyPress, so its hard not to take complaints personally. At the same time, you have people who develop plugins which they have invested a huge part of their life into, so its hard for them not to take it personally when they feel their complaints are discounted.

This project is a community of human beings all working their asses off. As leader of the community you must be the most tempered, the most humble, the most gracious. I feel that sometimes you react in a bit of a combative way, instead of trying to diffuse things and let a healthy debate ensue. This leads to lots of frustration in the people which the project depends on for its life.

I am thankful for all of the hard work you put into the project, and without you the project would not be where it is today. Don’t tear it all down by alienating people who have made large (or small for that matter) contributions over the past years.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 1 year, 4 months ago]

Hello to all of you die-hard links users…

Due to a huge increase in e-mails requesting me to update this plugin since BP 1.5 was released I have decided to pick it up again. However this time around it is going to be a premium plugin.

The freemium model resulted in $50 total donations for hundreds of hours of work. The only way this plugin is going to be maintained long term is if I charge for download and support. I have not worked out the cost yet, but it will be affordable for everyone.

I still plan to release it for free as well, but there will be a delay before new features and fixes find their way into the public repo. I won’t be able to give any free support, but along with the community will do my best to help with installation issues.

I hope to get this launched by the end of the month, or sooner, but no promises

Regards,
Marshall

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years ago]

ok, i better go download some bp templates from the interwebs… can someone halp me find a good devsigner… oh look a piece of candy…

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years ago]

I just think its wrong that a plugin takes over the entire WordPress theme. When you do that its not WordPress anymore its BuddyPress. It adds an additional layer of complexity that is not necessary. Additionally, keeping the theme inside of BuddyPress makes it too easy to couple the functionality of BP to its theme. This cohesion is what makes it so infuriating that your theme has to be “perfect” or it breaks all of the advanced BP functionality achieved with javascript. Separating the two would force BuddyPress to play nicer with WP.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years ago]

I feel very strongly that a big part of what makes BP difficult to theme is the fact that the default theme is located under the plugins/ folder. I would be interested in helping to move it back to themes/

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 4 months ago]

@r-a-y

I am a big fan of Justin’s and have read that particular post several times in the past. I mostly agree with his arguments, but my view is even a bit more extreme, since even when you remove the term “framework” they still box you into an API that is impossible to break out of, which is not developer friendly in the long run.

There are a lot of themes that I think do this on purpose, because it fits their business model

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 4 months ago]

@driz

BuddyPress is already a theme. Look at bp-default. That is a full WP theme that for some reason was bundled with the plugin. There is a huge mess of code devoted to making this setup work. It is nearly impossible to freely modify the templates, even if you roll your own BuddyPress theme, because the javascript is so tightly bound to the ids and classes in the markup.

I don’t think its reasonable anymore to call BP a plugin, since it does not enhance a WP site in the purest sense. It completely takes it over and defines an entirely new set of rules for how to customize the look of your site. That sounds like a theme to me.

If you think about BP as a theme, then the only acceptable ways to solve the issue and stay true to WP is pages or custom post types. This only doesn’t make sense though because BP is made up of many components that should be making their OWN decisions about how they get displayed.

So back to my original point. BP is defining too many rules, and forcing components to adhere to the default theme itself, instead of a theme prototype (which is how WP works). If BP was doing it the “right” way, then this whole issue would be moot, because each component would be deciding how its URL was determined, and the end user could decide if they liked it or not.

I think this is in the scope of the topic because it gets into defining the problem that needs to be solved, which is important before working on a solution.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 4 months ago]

If you really want to take this where the root of the issue is, the underlying problem is that BuddyPress is actually a theme that has been jammed into the plugin directory and then tightly coupled to what should be multiple plugins (aka components) in one massive package.

I am starting to feel like the only way to restore any kind of reasonable extensiblity of the BP interface it to split it into a theme, and the components into plugins which all adhere to a very strict API defined by the THEME, not a “core” plugin.

Of course this would break every existing install. It would have to be an internal fork that was deemed to be the new way forward.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 6 months ago]

There is a way to configure this in trunk and it will be in the next release.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 6 months ago]

Can you please post the steps you took to make Links the home page?

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 6 months ago]

If you look in buddypress-links.php you will see there is a configuration constant to use a select box instead of radios.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 6 months ago]

I would also like to say a HUGE thank you to @leoafarias for financing a large portion of the development that went into this release! This is a great example of how you can invest in your own projects and the community at the same time.

Thanks Leo!

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 7 months ago]

This feature does not exist yet. The categories support is pretty weak at this point.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 7 months ago]

Thank you!

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 7 months ago]

If anyone figures this out and needs some changes to Links to make it work, please LMK.

[MrMazParticipant @mrmaz 2 years, 7 months ago]

Tomorrow. Only bug fixes and compatibility stuff. No new features.