BuddyPress.org

Before starting custom work, perhaps give a try to buddypress links plugin.

Is it a recommended idea?

If you mastered the situation and know what you do, almost any idea is “recommanded”. 😉

You can do this by using a multisite install.

BP installed on the main site with his own theme (your-site.com) and another blog on sub-domain (mysub-domain/your-site.com) with another theme.

This is the most easiest install option. But you can also install BP on a secondary blog.

Registering is made on the main site, as it would be the hart of your network, and by consequence, the unique place where user can register.

References:
https://codex.wordpress.org/Before_You_Create_A_Network

https://codex.wordpress.org/Create_A_Network

@jessicana,

if you allow group creation to your members, they can do so by going to group directory.
The “create group” button is in the group header.

Once created, the member see on his profile, a tab named My Groups (or Groups) with a counter. On the tab, the group list created by him.

-> When users are logged out, they have no access to the Toolbar or to the Create Group button on the group directory.

This is so by default. Any other behaviour can be considered as theme related (for ex. if you use a theme specifically designed for BuddyPress). IMHO rare, but can eventually exist.

You can hide the Toolbar to logged out user in the buddypress settings.

About BP/WP jargon:
the Toolbar is the wordpress black toolbar at the top of the site.
the User menu is the menu at the top right corner, under wp’s Howdy
the buddymenu is the bar under the page header and before the page content. Depending the context (page, status), this menu bar has an associated sub menu.

@jessicana,

The field NAME in the field group BASE is required. This group is used for the registration page to work. As you already know, it’s also this group who allows you to show custom fields on the registration page.
The NAME field in BuddyPress is intended to receive first and last name and replace the two original fields (first name, last name) coming with WordPress.

That said, you can hide this field to users, but you can’t give them the choice to show/hide it.

The above snippet will hide the field NAME to all visitors/members, but not to site admin and the concerned profile.

function bpfr_make_name_members_only( $retval ) {	
	//hold all of our info
	global $bp;
	
	// is xprofile component active ?	
	if ( bp_is_active( 'xprofile' ) )
	
    // The user ID of the currently logged in user
    $current_user_id = (int) trim($bp->loggedin_user->id);
	
    // The author that we are currently viewing
    $author_id  = (int) trim($bp->displayed_user->id);
	
	// user can see only his name && admin can see everyone 
	if ($current_user_id !== $author_id && !current_user_can('delete_others_pages') ) {
		$retval['exclude_fields'] = '1';	
	}
	return $retval;	
}
add_filter( 'bp_after_has_profile_parse_args', 'bpfr_make_name_members_only' );

Add this to your child-theme functions.php or to bp-custom.php

It’s best if you open a ticket for this on Trac:

https://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org

@samdobrow
Have you tried:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/bp-force-profile/
It’s been awhile since it was last updated but it should still work.
Good luck!

Glad you got it to work !

FYI: BP Poke comes with his own languages folder who contains po/mo in english. This is wrong, but has no influence if you want to use another language.

The reason is that many authors create a po file instead of a pot file, and when they save the file, poEdit (or similar) automatically creates a mo file.
The correct file name should be bp-poke.pot ! You can remove the original – in english – mo, totally useless: the plugin is coded in english !

To use a translation for this plugin, you add xx_XX.mo to bp-poke/languages/xx_XX.mo

Text domain ref: bp-poke.php:50

You have to test with another theme. And check your site settings.
All this is firstly a worpress installation issue, then a theme setting and finally a buddypress setting.

https://codex.wordpress.org/Debugging_in_WordPress

in case of the case:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/hashbuddy/
https://github.com/hwdsbcommons/buddypress-activity-stream-hashtags

@julia_b,

you can allow your users to be notified by email when they are mentionned (and some other little things).

See Notification Manager plugin.

I just tested Duena and the BP translation is fine.

Recheck your po/mo files. Here what you must have:

duena – leave as is.
buddypress/bp-languages/buddypress.pot
wp-config – if you use english, as it’s default language you have nothing to do
// define(‘WP_LANG’, ” );
wp-content/languages/plugins/buddypress-en_US.mo

Now if you want to modify only some strings, make a copy of the pot file and put it in a folder outside of buddypress.

From this copy you remove anything you don’t want and keep only the 2 lines or 4 lines (if plural form) who belong to the string you want to change. You keep only the string you want to change.
Once done, save and rename it buddypress-en_US.po and open it with a text editor (not poEdit), as we’re going to modify the header.

msgid ""
msgstr ""
"PO-Revision-Date: 2014-09-12 00:05+0100\n"
"MIME-Version: 1.0\n"
"Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8\n"
"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit\n"
"Plural-Forms: nplurals=2; plural=n > 1;\n"
"X-Generator: Poedit 1.5.7\n"
"Project-Id-Version: BuddyPress 2.0.2\n"
"POT-Creation-Date: \n"
"Last-Translator: \n"
"Language-Team: \n"
"Language: en\n"
"X-Poedit-SourceCharset: UTF-8\n"
"X-Poedit-Basepath: .\n"
"X-Poedit-KeywordsList: __;_e;__ngettext:1,2;_n:1,2;__ngettext_noop:1,2;"
"_n_noop:1,2;_x:1,2c;_nx:4c,1,2;_nx_noop:4c,1,2;_ex:1,2c;esc_attr__;"
"esc_attr_e;esc_attr_x:1,2c;esc_html__;esc_html_e;esc_html_x:1,2c\n"
"X-Poedit-SearchPath-0: ..\n"

The rest of the file looks like this:

msgid "Friendships"
msgstr ""  <strong><- replacement goes here</strong>

#: bp-friends/bp-friends-template.php:588
msgid "%s friend"
msgid_plural "%s friends"
msgstr[0] ""
msgstr[1] ""

Save in text format utf8 without BOM. (important)

Now you can open this po file with poEdit, do your translation and save so that poEdit generate a mo file (see poEdit settings first to get this automatically each time you save a file).

Copy the mo file in the appropriate folder and, normally, you’re done.

References
https://codex.wordpress.org/Translating_WordPress
https://make.wordpress.org/polyglots/handbook/translating/basics/
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-disable-automatic-updates-in-wordpress/

The definitive guide to disabling auto updates in WordPress 3.7

@seeingblues2 seems to be fixed:
see https://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/5868#comment:8

@durkk

you seem to be affraid by the term “legacy”… ?
Read here some explanation about legacy

Like BuddyPress, bbPress is only a plugin.
Generally when you need a theme, you search a theme for wordpress, not for a plugin.

Of course some a better than other, or better tailored to do something than other, but in anyway, no theme can be perfect for anything.

And in some case, ready to use is not synonym of adaptable ready.
If you search forum themes, see first what other forum software have to propose. One of the most popular, phpbb, is desperatly identical from one site to another in 90% of case.

When you have 1 000 of WP theme and you add a bbpress or a buddypress group forum, you have potentially 1 000 different forum look.

Basically it’s a grid, so it’s a bit difficult to present a forum in a very original maner. And finally too much work for many users or considered as out of rentability (100 hours to get a nice forum and 3 topics after 2 mounth….search the error ! )

@arximughal You only need to activate one WP theme. So if you’re already using the7 theme, you don’t need the Status child theme anymore. As for the BP Default theme, it’s been phased out http://bpdevel.wordpress.com/2013/11/13/the-future-of-the-bp-default-theme/

FYI here some related topics
https://buddypress.org/support/topic/how-to-remove-xprofile-names-and-replace-with-username/
https://buddypress.org/support/topic/sort-user-list-by-last-name/

About your first post, why don’t you show the site activity by using the topic filter instead of the default “all activities” ?
https://buddypress.org/support/topic/changing-the-default-activity-filter/

Or you can try buddypress-wall plugin
https://wordpress.org/plugins/buddypress-wall/

In the last screenshot, if you take a look under the IP address it reads: @ Julia Buckley

Regarding the roadmap, 2.1 is due any time soon. See https://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org/roadmap