BuddyPress — even on the most recent, cutting-edge “trunk” versions — is not built and has not been tested against WordPress 3.0-alpha. I am not Andy but I would guess that it is not going to be tested against WP 3.0 until it gets to a release candidate version.
So in the interim, YMMV.
“- What is the best way to populate a ‘live’ (on a public server) site, view/test it online, but keep it hidden/private for non-admins (to prevent copycats, leaking, Google indexing etc)? The ‘privacy settings do no offer this choice? do I need a plugin for that?”
The simply brilliant way: edit your computer’s hosts file.
Slap MU up wherever, even on an IP address, but change your own host file to show the old domain at the new location. Proceed as usual. You & your computer is the only person to see the site “live”.
(oo bad construct there – computers aren’t people. yet.)
You won’t need any google-fu or the more privacy plugin. When the time comes, all you need to do is remove your own hosts file edit, update the DNS to the new server, and wait.
“- Which way to Chenge the Site url is working best (see https://codex.wordpress.org/Changing_The_Site_URL ), are the 2 ‘defines’ enough currently?”
in MU? Oh heck no. Nowhere near enough. The url is saved in a multitude of places. That’s why I suggested the hosts file way.
Yes, you have to keep editing it to go back to the live site, but it’s way less painful.
Put it up on the wordpress repo with the appropriate tags 
I was thinking of making a plugin that would create forums in ways that don’t require group creation/membership…perhaps this is something that shares similar functions to your plugin.
We did not write the WordPress FB Connect plugin. You need to talk to the author. I’ve marked this thread as not a support issue as it is not to do with BuddyPress.
I’ve marked this as not a support issue because it clearly isn’t.
That IS the plan – the 1.2 version out now are release candidates. They go out here for testing and feedback, and when they are official, THEN they go in the repo.
This way, the bugs get worked out by users who *choose* to upgrade knowing they may find issues. If all these changes were in the repo, you would have had upgrade notices 3 times in the last couple weeks.
@andrea-r,
sorry to be a little out of topic, but if you speak about future, i would ask what about code optimization and php memory ?
When reading on the codex, nothing is said that WP need by default 32 mo php RAM.
And the wp-health plugin is still under alpha dev…
And sure there is a problem with php memory.
On most shared host, this php memory is set to 16 Mo max… and no way to give more (even throught htaccess, wp-settings, wp-config tricks..)
This mean that WP/Mu can’t work with more than 4 or 5 plugins in best case.
And since 2.8, the memory consumption is growing a lot.
I’ve installed the Carrington theme/plugin site-wide on this site, but I don’t have a smartphone yet, so I don’t even know how to test it. If you have a chance to take a look on your mobile, let me know…
I guess it’s not detected in online emulators, not this one anyway. Are there other/better emulators I could try?
The Carrington theme is only WordPress of course. I’m curious if it at least works on the blog parts, including member blogs, or not at all. Perhaps it is possible to expand that theme.
I imagine that will be the plan. But since this plugin hasn’t been released yet for public consumption it has to be downloaded or updated via svn.
I was confused so I started over and configure up to my previous set up.
Install wordpress2.9.1 (configure permalink)
install buddypress12rc2 (select default theme – no other install or changes)
then …
install buddypress1.2.rc3 over buddypress12rc2.
Produced the same error.
A tutorial for this will be put up, it’s not a priority until after 1.2 is released.
I’m also pretty new to WordPress and did not know the history that surrounded Premium plugins and the conflicts which occured in the past. I’m used to paying for plugins/3rd party extensions for software so I was kinda suprised by how the WP community sees this. I’m still not sure if it’s a good or a bad thing, but it’s one of the things that makes WP special.. I haven’t felt more at home then in the BP community so it says something about the general atmosphere around here
You don’t have to do anything.. Just install BuddyPress on a single WordPress install and all your users are contributors by default.. This means they can submit posts easily. You can make the process much easier by using a plugin like TD Midi Forms which allows your users to submit posts from the front end and even allow them to edit their own posts. A good tutorial:
http://thedeadone.net/blog/tutorial-video-for-tdo-mini-forms/
Good luck
One of the things I would like to cover on the new BP-Tricks site, is how to do this.. Maybe with a videotutorial or atleast a few written tuts. This will be a matter of time, don’t forget how much is changing everyday for BP, there are only a handfull of people who have done this 
@Scotum
I fully agree with you on all points. I would love to make Buddypress part of my existing website.
I would expect someone who really knows how this thing works, will create a set of theme files to drop into an existing website, in order to allow the buddypress plugin to work properly. It just might be we are here a month to early.
Today another release candidate came out. They are hoping to have the final version early next week; so it is written. I have a feeling the whole team is focused on getting 1.2 finalized and will deal with theming issues soon after.
This has all been extremely useful information and very informative. I would also like to thank those people that have taken the time to PM me with additional info (you know who you are)
I (probably naively) didn’t realise that this was such a hot topic of debate in the community – it’s interesting to get all this background information, especially as someone that until recently hadn’t released a wordpress plugin.
“and the themes are likely to have uncompatibilty issues. “
I can count on one hand the number of WordPress themes that don’t work right in MU. Most of them are fine.
BuddyPress themes are different.
The merge is done in trunk. Seriously, the work has been done already. People have announced this merge since last May-ish. We’re just about at feature freeze, so from here on out will be bug fixes only (plus some UI work on the MU menus).
While I think it;s quite possible to downgrade MU to single WP, the reverse isn’t true and it would be much better to wait until 3.0. You’ll upgrade as usual, and there will be instructions on how to turn off the network and go back to a single blog. (probably cuz I’ll write them… 
)
@25knots
I’m aware of both threads but as you know they’re pretty old and do not address 1.2.
Am I the only one who finds it strange the idea of using existing WP themes with BP should be more of a priority (at least a detailed tutorial or blog post explaining How), versus creating child themes from the parent?
I see the benefits for the latter, obviously, but I can envision many WordPress users who wish to implement BuddyPress without switching away from their existing theme, etc. Is this not creating a significant barrier to entry?
Hum, actually Chouf is close to the truth… with the latest 3.0_ bleeding trunks *(testing ground), the MU of wordpress is completely merged, but the officiel 2.9.1 is not yet…
the merge of both projects will be announced soon, but the date of early april would be correct based on the rumors…
