BuddyPress.org

more experimentation leads me to this solution:

items from the form are passed through global.js

i found and modified the posted items to include /match my new fields:

/* Default POST values */

var object = ”;

var item_id = j(“#whats-new-post-in”).val();

var content = j(“textarea#whats-new”).val();

var artist = j(“input#artist”).val();

var track = j(“input#track”).val();

/* Set object for non-profile posts */

if ( item_id > 0 ) {

object = j(“#whats-new-post-object”).val();

}

j.post( ajaxurl, {

action: ‘post_update’,

‘cookie’: encodeURIComponent(document.cookie),

‘_wpnonce_post_update’: j(“input#_wpnonce_post_update”).val(),

‘content’: content,

‘artist’: artist,

‘track’: track,

‘object’: object,

‘item_id’: item_id

},

and it worked just fine. _POSTed items are now available in my bp-custom.