BuddyPress.org

Why not do the following (as we have) …

1. username

2. 1st name

3. last name

4. display name (the bp required field)

Because it’s not necessary. The goal should be to keep the registration form as short and simple as possible and not annoy new users.

Look at the registration process on Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. Most have:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

Password:

I use a javascript trick generate the username from the fullname in a hidden field – I can use email as username thanks to this plugin. Since BP has a built-in fullname field I’m stuck with splitting that out in firstname and lastname.

I have considered using fullname for firstname and creating a field_2 for lastname, but that causes all kinds of other issues.

Unfortunately there is no check/validation on what’s entered in the fullname field. The input is also not cleaned up to get capitals on the first letters and small caps on the rest. So the input could be anything, often just a first name or even ladiesman269.

Which undermines any reason of having that required fullname/display field in the first place…

All you have to do is create a function that writes the xprofile field values for 1st and Last name over to the WP table, in addition to setting the “display name value accordingly.

You have to do that straight from the registration form, to make sure that the data is there where/when you need it. That is basically what my function does. If you can get it to work. Apparently it doesn’t for Dan Butcher.

Now, with the (lame) fact that WP user table is actually different (not sure why it wasn’t co-opted for BP purposes)

That had mystified me since last Spring, but here’s Andy’s reason.