BuddyPress.org

Yes, by using the Extended Profile fields this idea can already be implemented. But perhaps I’m missing something. Whereas multiple href tags are placed within single posts everyday in the blogosphere, it is a lot harder to extract (parse) that data–each individual link–for other purposes.

In this particular instance, placing a member’s outbound homepage links, each in their own individual record, makes it a lot more useful. In other words, a 1:N relationship between a member and his or her chosen online homesites. They could add as many as they like and each would appear in a nicely formatted table, one row for each link, each record. This would provide a more flexible and easy to manipulate subset of profile data for plugin developers to utilize.

However, such relational design in this case may be over engineering the data schema and might be of limited use for the vast majority of developers. It could also make the management of the profile fields more complex–from a coding standpoint.

But, this general concept of offering a way for plugin developers or site admins to place multi-record fields (model 1:N type data) within profiles would be very powerful. Currently, most social network platforms do not provide that type of relational complexity within their users’ profiles. True 1:N relationships are simply listed within a single field. For instance, members of a musicians network list their albums or songs within each album in a list within a large text field.

You get the idea. Maybe this is not too useful for most. But I think providing the option could help BP become an even more sophisticated platform.