I have a standard WPMU + BP install going on a dev server, but I’m thinking of changing things around….

What I’m considering doing is having one root domain + multiple sub-domains with their own BP installs. Basically, each sub-domain will be treated like its own island. I haven’t tried it yet, but I’m pretty sure I can share the user table in a database and give each sub-domain install its own db prefix to keep things separate.

Example:
petlovers.com
— dogs.petlovers.com
— cats.petlovers.com
— birds.petlovers.com
— fish.petlovers.com

You can see from the above example that most people would probably only want to see things relevant to their pet type and not be overwhelmed by all the other animal group activities.

Pros
* Once a member registers he won’t have to re-register when visiting a sister sub-domain — though he will have to login again in order to get the site’s cookie. Is there a workaround for this?

Cons
* Members will have to fill in their profile details for each site. I believe that’s the case… unless that can be shared, too?
* A member’s Friends and Activity will only be logged for that sub-domain and won’t aggregate itself sitewide (good and bad)
* Each sub-domain would have to be upgraded separately. (Drupal has a way of using a single code base for multiple domains and sub-domains. Is that even possible with WPMU + BP?)

I’m open to your thoughts and advice on this setup or a different strategy to accomplish the same thing.

[@mercime Participant 16 years ago]

Caught in the first part of your post: “one root domain + multiple sub-domains with their own BP installs”
Not possible yet, It’s been discussed before and again here https://buddypress.org/community/groups/requests-feedback/forum/topic/multiple-budypress-networks-one-install/
Who knows, possibly after WP 3.0 /BP 1.3, there’ll be a plugin to do so.

[@vee_bee Participant 16 years ago]

There are parts of this theory that sound very feasible.

Even the cookie could be no issue, as I used a similar technique once (several years ago – like more than 5), to hook together a CMS called Nuke [remember that one], and satellite installs of osCommerce – is a shopping mall type arrangement.
Didscussions need to go to the other thread though…

[@agrundner Member 16 years ago]

Thanks @mercime @vee_bee! I’m now following the the thread Andrea_r posted related to this:
https://buddypress.org/community/groups/requests-feedback/forum/topic/multiple-budypress-networks-one-install/

Any solution that comes from the discussion there should fit the bill nicely.

[@agrundner Member 16 years ago]

Aside: This morning I came up with the idea to create a server script that would update all the multiple wpmu installs to match the root’s files/folders/plugins whenever there’s an upgrade. Of course, the script would ignore the uploads folder and wp-config.php file. It’s an option, but I want to see what Andrea_r and friends comes up with.