BuddyPress.org

@fuzzielogix Have you checked if registration works if BP is deactivated? If it still doesn’t work, then you need to resolve the issue with your hosting. It registration works with BP deactivated, then check out how to resolve the issue in the email section at https://codex.buddypress.org/legacy/faq/

Ok so, first delete the image map.

Then in the file header.php in your theme, you can add this code:

<!-- Register/Login links for logged out users -->
<?php if ( !is_user_logged_in() ) : ?>
<div class="header-login">
<a href="<?php echo wp_login_url( $redirect ); ?>" class="button">Login</a>
<?php if ( bp_get_signup_allowed() ) : ?>
<a href="<?php echo bp_get_signup_page(); ?>">Register</a>
<?php endif; ?>
</div>
<?php endif; ?>

Basically it first checks to see if the user is NOT logged in.
If that condition is met (user is logged out) then it displays a link to Login and then a link to Register (if registration is open).

I put the whole thing into a DIV element called .header-login which you can used to style the section via CSS. At first it may not look like much – just two links. You or your developer will need to edit the CSS. Maybe if you get it working correctly but it looks bad, you can come back to the forums here and post again about how to style it.

Two more methods that help. I recently had a crazy spam attack – probably 300 fake signups per day. I implemented these two methods and it dropped to near 0.

1. Change the /register/ slug to something unique. An example would be /create-your-account/, or something of that nature. It just needs to be unique and also make sense in a URL for your user. Spammers targeting BuddyPress look for /register/ as the signup page. It’s all automated so you want to filter them out at the first step.

2. Add this to your functions.php file in your theme or child theme.

It presents a dummy field that humans don’t see. Spambots will fill it out, and if the field captures a value it will reject the signup.

// BuddyPress Honeypot
function add_honeypot() {
    echo '';
}
add_action('bp_after_signup_profile_fields','add_honeypot');
function check_honeypot() {
    if (!empty($_POST['system55'])) {
        global $bp;
        wp_redirect(home_url());
        exit;
    }
}
add_filter('bp_core_validate_user_signup','check_honeypot');

Credits for #2 go to:
http://mattts.net/development-stuff/web-development-stuff/wordpress/buddypress/anti-spam-techniques/registration-honeypot/

I edited it slightly to remove the required redirect. Add that back from his tutorial if you want to. It requires that you make an extra page to send the spammer to, and I personally think that’s not necessary. I actually want them to have no indication their signup failed.

Currently the plugin “good question” is helping me with reducing spam signups more than any other.

I used to rely on si-captcha to help with this, but it started having some issues a few months ago (on my multi-site / BP sites), so that is not in use on my sites any longer.

as buddyboss mentioned above, “bp-registration options” was a good choice for a while, it worked pretty well for me around v 1.5 or 1.6 I think.. but then issues started occurring and it was left without updates for a long time (while the plugin dev was running for an election or something if my memory is serving me today), so axed that one…

Nothing is going to stop the manual spammers, but they are easy to eradicate once you have stopped all the bot signups with one of the QnA type plugins in my humble experience anyhow.

5-10 is OK — When I was handling a job application site every month we received 4000-5000 applicants and and had about 75-200 “bad users” we did have people entering bad email for their job application but it was also sometime the applicant mistype their email AND ending up shooting registration confirmation to the wrong/closed/nonexistent email at Gmail/Yahoo/Hotmail etc (I had to deal with those email providers 1-2 times a year to make sure that my Mail Server is not on the blacklist).

Btw on the Stop Spammers setting add the StopSpamForum API that way it easier for you to check or submit bad user (add Honeypot & Botscout if possible). Also “Check Spam Words” on the setting and add to them if you see a bad username keep popping up with different IPs.

This resource might help: http://premium.wpmudev.org/blog/force-user-registrations-to-your-own-buddypress-registration-page/

@mrk79uk

Have you tried wrapping it in a function and and using an action as suggested in
https://gist.github.com/r-a-y/5578432 ?

Did you find this discussion about the issue:

see other topic: https://buddypress.org/support/topic/disable-the-bp-registration/

I am trying to do the same thing but not really getting anywhere as yet.

I use a wordpress theme called Premiumpress which has its own built in registration. When BP is active it bypasses the premiumpress registration and sits at http://www.mysite.com/register (this is a blank page)

I need it to direct to wp-login.php?action=register

Would this command in the post above disable the BP direction and revert to this?

I would be eternally grateful if anyone has any suggestion how I can keep BP enabled yet bypass the registration.

Kind Regards
Mark

I have used Bad Behavior. It’s ok.

I found the best solution so far has been BuddyPress Security Check.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/bp-security-check/

It knocked out the majority of spam for me, and I’ve tested many spam plugins. You’ll still get some spammers, but hopefully less.

Most spammers leave links in forums. BuddyPress could really use a method to block new users who post links pending approval.

This plugin puts users in moderation on signup:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/bp-registration-options/

But that still requires you to manually activate everyone…

What anti-spam plugins are you running and how many spam registration do you average per day?

I’m currently running akismet, pixel jar honeypot, si captcha, and stop spammer by keith graham and I get 3-5 spam registration per day.

Has anyone tried Bad Behavior? How does that work for spam registration?

How about using the following plugins:

1. Stop Spammers by Keith Graham
2. Captcha by BestWebSoft.

FYI: I have no relation with the plugin creators

NOTE: Just make sure you also have access to the FTP in case you you are locked out from the admin. Since I do not know what other plugins you have on your site — Some plugins are not compatible with others (e.g I used different CAPTCHA plugin and it locked me out). If you are locked out from the admin just use the ftp to DELETE or RENAME THE plugin folders to disable THE “bad plugins”

How can I also make it so that the fields on the profile page are to be filled out when you have signed up and not on the registration page?

The fields added into the primary profile field group, named “Base” by default, will get collected on registration. The ones added to other profile field groups do not get collected on registration and are optionally added by users after register. So just make some profile field groups and put the fields you want to collect on registration into the Base profile field group, and the additional fields into another profile field group(s).

Thank you @tolusage, it was very helpful, first I installed “buddypress-xprofile-custom-fields-type.1.5.8.4” plugin then “bp-xprofile-wp-user-sync” as you said. Some works now, except the profile page tabs and Signup module. Registration form all ok there are first name and last name boxes there.
1-But on profile page there are about me and Looking for tabs. Ans I see the same data in both tabs. Looking for has the same info as About me. Basically the name, age, height, weight etc all base info appears in looking for tab too except in quotes in Looking for css design.
2-And signup module doesnt show first and last name boxes
As you know on signup box there are these element boxes:
.User name
.Your full name
.Your email
.Desired password
.Confirm password
So I want to get rid off that “Your full name” and put “First name” and “Last name” boxes there. So what file do I need to modify? And how, with what coding?
3-And on admin panel as admin I want to be able to edit user data, at the moment I can edit only the names, email, password. But I want to be able to edit the age, height, weight, country, city thinks like that I have in the main registration form already exist. But on admin panel I cant see them for users to edit. How can I put them in users edit page?
Could you please help out, thanx @tolusage

Rick, glad that we’re clearing up some confusion. To confirm, yes, messaging is totally different than posts. Please read the codex links provided. Also, if you really want to take buddypress for a test drive, set up a development site either on a live site or right on your own computer using http://www.instantwp.com/ and then add some “fake” users and messages, and data using this plugin: https://wordpress.org/plugins/bp-default-data/

And then jump in there and click around like crazy, edit, message, post, and see what happens! this is the best way to really check things out without doing any damage to your own site. Nothing compares to getting your hands dirty and mucking about (in a safe test environment).

This way you can really understand what messaging is, what private messaging is, broadcasting from admin to all members, etc. You can also add/remove plugins and check out their functionality, all in the comfort of your own computer’s hard drive or a test environment set up at a test domain/host that you control/own.

Also, keep in mind that buddypress has many features but you do not have to enable them! for example, there is a feature for groups. But you don’t have to enable it! you can add a forum (using bbPress) but you don’t have to! you can have private messaging so members can send private messages to each other… but, you guessed it, you don’t have to enable this feature. Also, another powerful feature is that you can give members of your site the ability to start their own blogs! this is called “multisite” but you can choose to enable this or not. Same goes for “friend connections” feature… etc.

My suggestion is to start with a very simple starting point and then as your community grows, add features that they require or need. It is a far too common mistake for new buddypress users to just turn everything on at the start.

If you don’t want to restrict your membership in any way or to collect money online from them then you don’t need anything else other than buddypress and wordpress. But look through the membership plugin links I provided to familiarize yourself with them and their features just in case. A few are completely free and still have tonnes of features.

Finally, keep in mind that spam registrations do happen. There are many guides and tools to mitigate spam membership registrations. Here’s a good start:

Preventing Spammer Registration

Google is your friend for more info on spam fighting.

Hi Philip
Thanx for your reply. Where is your plugin please?
I just need exactly something like this, pls tell me whether your plugin can help me to achieve this, or do I need to modify some files as well, please help I m stuck here, thanx:
On the small signup form and on the registration form I want 2 form boxes, 1. First Name 2. Last name instead of Full name.
And also in admin panel in users page, add new user form needs to be like that too (so admin can create some users with First Names and Last Names too.
And obviously on frontend profile page there should be First Name and Last name boxes should be seperately. Also on search members page there should be option First Name and Last name (obviously on BuddyPress admin page search form elements to choose to there should be first name and last name). Basically in whole site I need First Name and Last name issues. I use the latest WP and BP.
Thanx.

I’m using BP since <1.0 – So for a long time, now.
I also was frustrated from the problem, that I always had to say “Hi Joshua-Felix Mustermann”, but I found several ways to solve this at those places, I just want to say Hi to the first name:

Somehow you’ll have to get the full name and cut it between the names like this:

$fullname = bp_core_get_user_displayname( $user_id );
list($fname, $lname) = explode(' ', $fullname,2);

E.g. I built a Plugin which just takes a look who is logged in, explodes the name and outputs the first name for the short code [name].

So this discussion will never stop and there are easy ways to resolve it. BTW I edited the registration field name to say “Vor- und Nachname” (Pre- and Surname) and it just works perfect.

Best regards,

Philipp

Hi
I have the latest Wp and latest BuddyPress 1.9.2
On the new user registration form it has FULL NAME box
But I need FIRST NAME and LAST NAME boxes. So I can in admin panel and users on frontend can register new users can fill their names with 2 boxes. And on search page users can search other users by first name or last name. And I can hide last names for some users etc.. Its always convenient to have first and last names in separate DB columns. So please help me out, how can I have the BuddyPress plugged site of mine to function like above?
Thanks

Hi
I have the latest Wp and latest BuddyPress 1.9.2
On the new user registration form it has FULL NAME box
But I need FIRST NAME and LAST NAME boxes. So I can in admin panel and users on frontend can register new users can fill their names with 2 boxes. And on search page users can search other users by first name or last name. And I can hide last names for some users etc.. Its always convenient to have first and last names in separate DB columns. So please help me out, how can I have the BuddyPress plugged site of mine to function like above?
Thanks

Hi
I have the latest Wp and latest BuddyPress 1.9.2
On the new user registration form it has FULL NAME box
But I need FIRST NAME and LAST NAME boxes. So I can in admin panel and users on frontend can register new users can fill their names with 2 boxes. And on search page users can search other users by first name or last name. And I can hide last names for some users etc.. Its always convenient to have first and last names in separate DB columns. So please help me out, how can I have the BuddyPress plugged site of mine to function like above?
Thanks

Hi
I have the latest Wp and latest BuddyPress 1.9.2
On the new user registration form it has FULL NAME box
But I need FIRST NAME and LAST NAME boxes. So I can in admin panel and users on frontend can register new users can fill their names with 2 boxes. And on search page users can search other users by first name or last name. And I can hide last names for some users etc.. Its always convenient to have first and last names in separate DB columns. So please help me out, how can I have the BuddyPress plugged site of mine to function like above?
Thanks

Hi truthmedia
I have the latest Wp and latest BuddyPress 1.9.2
On the new user registration form it has FULL NAME box
But I need FIRST NAME and LAST NAME boxes. So I can in admin panel and users on frontend can register new users can fill their names with 2 boxes. And on search page users can search other users by first name or last name. And I can hide last names for some users etc.. Its always convenient to have first and last names in separate DB columns. So please help me out, how can I have the BuddyPress plugged site of mine to function like above?
Thanks

You could use this plugin to create mandatory groups that users can’t leave.

https://wordpress.org/plugins/buddypress-mandatory-groups/

The Group management functionality in the dashboard could help you sort users into the appropriate group.

Something like this would allow you to have users select groups when they are registering

https://wordpress.org/plugins/buddypress-registration-groups-1/

Hi @terraling

Could it be anything to do with the customisations you made to the registration process recently?