BuddyPress.org

It’s funny because when I first found out about WPMU is was indeed wildy confused about what it meant exactly. Already familiar with single WordPress I installed WPMU because I wanted to use BuddyPress and thought it was some kind of special version of WordPress (not realizing the Network of blogs/sites kinda thing).

After I got BuddyPress up and running and started a blog I got launched into another admin panel which suddently missed all kinds of menu options and had a different name.. “WTF is going on here” was my initial response..

Until I realised that WPMU actually allowed me to setup multiple blogs from one panel and would allow me to create a network of sites!

This name change is a good thing and much easier to grasp. It does make me think; should I call new blogs on my network “sites” or “blogs”.

1) https://codex.buddypress.org/how-to-guides/customizing-labels-messages-and-urls/

2) Go to your wp-admin area, in the BuddyPress menu go to “Component Setup”. This lets you disable/enable each component of BuddyPress. If you disable, they are removed from menus. If you want the component active but not on your menu, you will need to create a child theme: https://codex.buddypress.org/how-to-guides/building-a-buddypress-child-theme/

How to work with both customized and translation .mo files?

1. I’ve uplaoded an id_ID translation (mo) file and using the multilingual plugin, it’s works.

2. I’ve made a bp-custom.php to change ‘wire’ slug into ‘memo’. It’s working on my translation pages, but not with the default english contents (‘memo’ URL’s are fine, but not with menus and ‘wire’ related texts).

3. I’ve made a customized PO file (english) to fix this and load the MO language file with bp-custom.php. Now the english language is working (URL’s and contents), but those changes made some of my id_ID translation turns back into english (some ‘memo’ related translation) but the rest translation is fine…

Did i made any mistake with those steps?

Is it allright using both customized and translation .mo files?

please help, thanks!

I haven’t had time to update the plugin (nor my community), but running BuddyPress 1.0.3 and WordPress MU 2.8.1, it shows up below the profile field settings in the BuddyPress secion of the menu.

Perhaps something has changed which breaks the plugin, causing it to not show up at all. If so, perhaps an URL like this will help: http://yourwebsite.tld/wp-admin/admin.php?page=buddypress_stats_wrap

@gaz: Yes, with the default theme you get a main navigation bar that focuses on BuddyPress features (Members, Groups, Forums). So in that sense, BuddyPress “takes over”. But there’s also the “Blog” link which links to your WPMU main blog. WPMU is nothing more than Posts and Pages. So it’s all still there.

But yes, the main navigation is BuddyPress-focused when using the default theme. However, that is easily changed. Simply create a child theme with a custom header.php file. Your navigation could then be… Blog, About, Products, Contact, Customer Care… whatever you wish. Perhaps those BuddyPress links (Members, Groups, Forums) would be either in a separate navigation bar (like the bottom bar on Facebook) or maybe subsections of a “Community” menu. Or what have you. It’s all very do-able.

Unfortunately… you are also correct that there are very few custom themes right now. And no purpose-specific themes. BuddyPress is too new. So your choices are to either a) roll up your sleeves and be prepared to do a ton of learning and research or b) hire someone.

And Site Architecture is critical of course. It seems like you have a good idea of what you want to do but you’ve started out by taking a default BuddyPress install and working backwards from there. A good sanity check (if you haven’t already done so) is to sit down and sketch out exactly what you want… what sections… what navigation bars… what functionality… etc. Draw it all out (again, if you haven’t already). Then work from there.

I think you’ve made the right choice. It’ll just require some work. WordPress and BuddyPress are so much more flexible and better supported than the other open source alternatives. It’s worth the effort.

All I can share from personal experience is this: It’s real easy to get lost in all the gloss. About two years ago when I was hunting down low-cost, self-hosted, white label social networking software, I narrowed it down to two choices, Elgg and Dolphin. What I loved about Dolphin was how intuitive and pretty the whole backend was — you could easy drag/drop/rearrange different menu items and easily swap out your pages/columns/widgets. You could even change the sizes of certain page elements with just a few mouse clicks. It was almost like a Square Spaces for social networks. But then came more research. And upon that research, I found that Dolphin has some of the ugliest code ever written. On top of breaking tons of add-ons during upgrades, there also wasn’t (and probably still isn’t) an active support group available — more like a commune of helpless, p/o’ed customers who were all experiencing the same bugs. That’s not to say that it’s useless. I’m sure it works fine for a good handful of users who dumped a lot of money into development. But it became apparent that I needed to look into Elgg instead.

Now, Elgg does everything it says right out of the box 100% and we had instant love affair — http://www.michaelkuhlmann.com/category/elgg-vs-buddypress/. The whole installation took me about 10 minutes and there wasn’t a single problem… until I tried to re-design it. It was virtually impossible creating an entirely different layout. In fact, I have yet to see an Elgg-powered site that looks completely custom-made like the BuddyPress-powered VW TDI Truth & Dare site. Again, I’m sure Elgg fulfills the needs of many of its users – and probably a lot more so than Dolphin – but when it came to theming the software, it just fell a bit short. Although I could see how it could seem *ahead of the game* with its ease of use and drag’n’drop capabilities, it really isn’t compared to BP.

So BP came right along just as I finished *theming* — I should actually just say “colorizing” – my Elgg installation. Immediately, I dumped Elgg and switched to BP. I had seen what Andy did with ChickSpeak several months before the BP/Automattic venture was announced, so it looked quite promising. Then, the first release came out. First, I had trouble installing WPMU. Next, I had trouble installing BP. Following that, I couldn’t figure out how to get forums up and running. I sounded just like Mythailife – frustrated to the core. But I also remembered what an amazing difference a few months of development did to WordPress going from version 2.3 to 2.7, so I decided to stick around.

Up until now, I can easily say that BP has made strides in development. Out of the dozens of forums that I’ve visited, BP has *consistently* given the most support to its users in a timely fashion – FOR FREE. I have to stress the complimentary tech support part, because a lot of people tend to demand an answer to every single question immediately after they’ve posted their question, which is ridiculous. And if that speaks to you, here’s what you are getting – again – FOR FREE:

– A social networking system built on top of one of the best open source publishing systems, which means you’re also inheriting tons of great functionalities like WordTube/MapPress/eCommerce/Facebook Connect

– Loads of documentation including WordPress for Dummies and the upcoming book BuddyPress for Dummies (books are not free, of course, but they do count towards documentation)

– Support forums, development roadmaps and overall project transparency

– Ability to customize/theme BP exactly the way you want it to appear

– Dozens of available plugins

– Did I mention that this is built on WordPress?

If you don’t have the luxury of time to wait for support-related questions or still feel like this project is lagging AND you have deep pockets, there’s always Crowdfusion and Anahita. Otherwise, don’t get lost in the gloss, because BuddyPress is the next-best-thing to come out of the Automattic vault.

What you are truly asking is, “How can I customize the BuddyPress slugs?” Well, there is a BP blog article that answers that question!

https://buddypress.org/blog/how-to/customizable-slugs-in-buddypress/

I would recommend you create a child theme (see https://codex.buddypress.org/how-to-guides/building-a-buddypress-child-theme/), copy header.php into it and make your change there.

You can go into the header.php file in your template and do it in there

<li<?php if ( bp_is_page( BP_MEMBERS_SLUG ) ) : ?> class="selected"<?php endif; ?>><a href="<?php echo get_option('home') ?>/<?php echo BP_MEMBERS_SLUG ?>" title="<?php _e( 'Members', 'buddypress' ) ?>"><?php _e( 'Members', 'buddypress' ) ?></a></li>

You can change _e( 'Members', 'buddypress' ) ?>"><?php _e( 'Members', 'buddypress' )

to _e( 'Analyists', 'buddypress' ) ?>"><?php _e( 'Analysts', 'buddypress' )

I’m having the same problem. I will provide as MUCH information as I can per the list.

Website here: http://test.risdarchitecture.net

I’ve moved the BP themes to the wp-content/themes directory.

This is the third clean install of WPMU and BP (including new SQL database, etc).

I host with 1and1, so I’ve had to add a .htaccess file to the root directory to change to php5.

1. Which version of WPMU are you running? WordPress MU 2.8.4

2. Did you install WPMU as a directory or subdomain install? Directory

3. If a directory install, is it in root or in a subdirectory? It is in the root, however the root URL itself is a subdirectory.

4. Did you upgraded from a previous version of WPMU? If so, from which version? No.

5. Was WPMU functioning properly before installing/upgrading BuddyPress? Yes.

6. Which version of BuddyPress (BP) are you running? Version 1.1.2

7. Did you upgraded from a previous version of BP? If so, from which version? No.

8. Do you have any plugins other than BuddyPress installed and activated? No.

9. Are you using the standard BuddyPress themes or customized themes? Yes.

10. Have you modified the core files in any way? No.

11. Do you have any custom functions in bp-custom.php? No.

12. If running bbPress, which version? Or did your BuddyPress install come with a copy of bbPress built-in? BP came with an install of bbPress installed (I think).

13. Please provide a list of any errors in your server’s log files. My site is hosted by 1and1. I don’t think they provide log files.

Please help! I’ve read and read this forum and there doesn’t seem to be a definitive solution anywhere.

Sounds interesting to me, but the only add you made is the “favorites” on the bar, other than that you can already use that plugin (global header).

I’m personally working towards removing the blogs fully and just give each member 1 blog on their normal profile page, that way you just have everything of a member on one page, without the option of themes and making more than 1 blog. Basicly the same as any social community works (facebook for example). I’m also looking for a way for members to change the look and feel of their profile page, so that they can differentiate a little from the rest (background, colors etc.). But that’s just me rambling..