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Am I going mad or are there now avatars next to posts in the Activity stream?

  • @rossagrant

    Participant

    I have just noticed since upgrading to 1.2.6 that in my activity stream next to a notification of a new post there is now a generic avatar??? Is that right or am I going mad and has it always been there? I really don’t remember seeing it though! If it is a new feature of BP where can I change the avatar to something better?
    Thanks :)

Viewing 25 replies - 1 through 25 (of 33 total)
  • @nuprn1

    Participant

    some changes added to the avatars in the activity stream
    https://trac.buddypress.org/ticket/2578

    though i don’t know if related to this problem… what notification? screenshot?

    @rossagrant

    Participant

    @nuprn1
    Hi Rich,
    Here’s a link to the activity stream on a site I am starting to build

    http://www.actonthis.co/activity/

    Notice the avatar next to the updates that mention a new post. There is now a generic avatar next to them???

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    [deleted]

    @rossagrant

    Participant

    @rogercoathup weird isn’t it Roger! Surely we can change them somewhere if they have decided to put them in?

    @nuprn1

    Participant

    you can remove it via the filter bp_get_activity_secondary_avatar

    or even better just remove this filter that is used in the functions.php
    `remove_filter( ‘bp_get_activity_action_pre_meta’, ‘bp_dtheme_activity_secondary_avatars’, 10, 2 );`

    @rogercoathup – no idea… seems if a trac report is submitted the request is made if possible. (maybe not enough discussion is made in the ticket comments to counter – generally speaking for any enhancement)

    @djpaul

    Keymaster

    I don’t think it’s unfair that we revise the theme and any of the bundled widgets with each release. We need to be able to iterate on all areas of the theme (and other presentational elements) in order to continue to improve and add new features to BuddyPress. As Rich says, to remove the secondary avatar, put this into your functions.php:


    remove_filter( 'bp_get_activity_action_pre_meta', 'bp_dtheme_activity_secondary_avatars', 10, 2 );

    @rossagrant

    Participant

    @DJPaul I don’t mind them being there Paul I just wondered if we could change them anywhere to fit with the theme of our sites?

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    @djpaul

    OK, apology in order – my temperature sizzled, and I jumped to the conclusion that they were being added in the core, and not as a filter in the default theme (which is a damn good place for them!).

    Now, if only you could tear half the other activity presentation stuff out of the core – or leastways create some more granular template tags / functions – so that we’re not stuck PHP unlocking those monolithic activity strings. That would be really lovely.

    Apologies again, bit of humble pie for me, and @nuprn1 .. thanks for pointing out the filter

    @djpaul

    Keymaster

    @rogercoathup
    No harm done :) If you, or anyone else who works with BuddyPress themes, have issues like this with the template tags, and would like them done in a different way, I’d love to see an enhancement ticket filed on trac.buddypress.org with an example of what you’d like it to work like. Make up function names, etc.

    It’s much easier to implement something you’d love rather than something we’d love :)

    @hnla

    Participant

    Better that individuals don’t just pile in to trac adding enhancement tickets wily nily for this sort of area. We need a task group set up to tackle this that looks at what is required, and draws up a list of things to tackle, template tags that are needed etc.

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    @djpaul

    Can we happily run the 1.2.5.2 default theme (and children thereof) on the 1.2.6 core? Thereby allowing all our existing child themes to continue to behave the same without any mods at all?

    And, as a corollary to this… is there an install option for 1.2.6 that won’t overwrite the 1.2.5.2 theme (other than copying it somewhere pre-install, and then re-instating)?

    @paulhastings0

    Participant

    I really like that we’re now showing the group avatars in the activity stream updates. But I’ve noticed a “bug” in the Recent Site Wide Posts widget.

    Recent Site Wide Posts widget bug

    As you can see the blogs are just showing random avatars and aren’t showing the users’ avatars like 1.2.5 used to. Any ideas?

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    It’s not a question of whether you like it or not, the problem is that it breaks the design of existing sites – because their themes are using bp-default as a ‘much touted future proof’ parent theme.

    You expect bug and compatibility fixes in a theme upgrade, not presentation and design changes.

    If you’re changing the actual design, you’d expect that in a new theme. Much as you’ll expect WordPress to release 2011, and not simply overwrite 2010 with something different that changes the look of every child theme based on it.

    @paulhastings0

    Participant

    Here’s another discrepancy in the activity stream:

    @nuprn1

    Participant

    the secondary avatar will try and pull something in for ‘groups’ : ‘blogs’ : ‘friends’ (or defaults to user) then uses the item_id/object to find an avatar setup otherwise the generic one is used.

    have a look at the function `bp_get_activity_secondary_avatar` in bp-activity-templatetags.php

    @chouf1

    Participant

    This change is not documented nor annouced in the update post on the BP blog.

    About this “some minor tweaks to the included theme”, nobody knows what to do,exactly to retrieve or edit this gravatar. Except here in this tread, which will be buried in the next 3 days in the deepness of this forum
    I consider this a bit unfair to find such a picture at this strategic place represented by the SWA page without any permission ! This change can also (as already mentionned) compromise some fine tuned template skills. And what to say about breaking long discuted graphical convention ?
    I want at minimum have the possibility to change it, like i can do it for my group avatar for ex.

    In 2009, we could choose to use wavarar, gravatar or monsterID from within the admin.
    Since 1.2.2 or so, Gravatar is gone (silently) from the admin interface. Now he’s back via SWA….

    What do we do(and think) tomorrow, if suddenly Gravatar.com send us an advertising icon instead of a graphic abstract as actually ?
    What the sense of all those thousands of millions of icons flying around the web ?
    Only to have pretty links or to organize some juicy statistics and server consumption ? The non GPL part of the trick i guess…. ;-)

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    @chouf1

    It’s a baffling decision by the core team – I don’t know why they thought it was reasonable to break the design of every child theme that’s been based on the bp-default parent.

    bp-default was not a standalone theme, it was a parent to hundreds of child themes. There was a responsibility to keep it delivering what those child themes had been built to expect.

    As @chouf1 says, if this couldn’t be done – the upgrade should have been clearly labelled with a strong unequivocal warning.

    It wouldn’t be too late, if they fixed this immediately, and upgraded bp-default so it maintains it’s existing behaviour. If they want to add new features, put them where they belong – in a new theme – don’t change the behaviour of the existing one.

    @johnjamesjacoby

    @r-a-y

    Keymaster

    The whole point of having a child theme is inheriting all the cool, new features of the parent theme; I think we shouldn’t be making comments after the fact BP 1.2.6 was released. The core team asked many times for testers to the 1.2 branch; some did test, but many did not.

    Like it’s been stated, secondary avatars can be removed by getting rid of the filter. I do agree that blog avatars shouldn’t be used since you can’t even declare a blog avatar yet. However, you can get rid of that quite easily by duplicating the secondary avatar function and removing the “blogs” case.

    The following code will work in your theme’s functions.php:

    `function ray_secondary_avatar_fix() {
    remove_filter( ‘bp_get_activity_action_pre_meta’, ‘bp_dtheme_activity_secondary_avatars’, 10, 2 );

    // add the following if you still want secondary avatars, but omitting the blog one
    function my_bp_dtheme_activity_secondary_avatars( $action, $activity ) {
    switch ( $activity->component ) {
    case ‘groups’ :
    case ‘friends’ :
    // Only insert avatar if one exists
    if ( $secondary_avatar = bp_get_activity_secondary_avatar() ) {
    $reverse_content = strrev( $action );
    $position = strpos( $reverse_content, ‘a<' );
    $action = substr_replace( $action, $secondary_avatar, -$position – 2, 0 );
    }
    break;
    }

    return $action;
    }
    add_filter( ‘bp_get_activity_action_pre_meta’, ‘my_bp_dtheme_activity_secondary_avatars’, 10, 2 );
    }
    add_action( ‘init’, ‘ray_secondary_avatar_fix’, 9 );`

    I do agree that there should be a better changelog for changes made to bp-default. Maybe in the codex?
    [ EDIT: changelog created here – https://codex.buddypress.org/extending-buddypress/bp-default-theme-changelog/ ]

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    @r-a-y – sure, we can get rid of them with some additional work on sites in development, but what about the installed sites – who’s going to schedule, manage and pay for their modifications?

    As you know, BuddyPress has real world 3rd party implementations – it’s not just in the realm of coders, who only maintain and support their own site.

    If the client hits the upgrade button (which the admin system will be encouraging them to do), they will be left with a site that doesn’t look like they want (and in some cases, will have multiple buttons and areas that simply don’t work anymore).

    Surely, the whole point about a child theme is the exact opposite – it’s not expecting things to change – it’s expecting the parent to stay working as expected when the core is upgraded – to provide us with a safe consistent level of abstraction.

    The client has paid for a site they want, designed the way they want – not to have it change on the arbitrary design whims of a 3rd party they’ve never met.

    What will happen when WordPress bring out a new design for their default theme? Will they overwrite 2010 and thereby change the look / behaviour of every child based on it? Of course not, they will they introduce it as a new theme, and 2010 will happily continue to function.

    @r-a-y

    Keymaster

    Wordpress will most likely build on top of 2010. They will not make a theme called 2011, unless the design is radically different.
    Much like Kubrick to 2010 was a totally different design.

    For example, P2 adds features on top of their theme all the time and I think a lot of people appreciate that.

    Maybe new features should be a theme option…

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    I do hope you’re wrong re: 2010! [Although standard WP does have the benefit of not forcing so much presentation / content on your design – most of it being dealt with in the theme]

    We have two clients for whom the layout / content of the activity stream is absolutely critical – we’ve been through many many design revisions (down to the pixel level!) to get it right for them. These things are important.

    WP also gives a clear warning over functions being deprecated, with advice well in advance as to alternatives to use.

    @rogercoathup

    Participant

    @r-a-y :

    p.s. I do agree with you on a number of things here –

    yes: new features as theme options (opt-ins, not outs), and yes: it’s probably part of a wider jigsaw – a well developed Codex would have helped, as would a much clearer / better signposted buddypress.org (invitations to test 1.2. and how to, were only obvious to a knowledgable few – which may explain the small uptake).

    @gwu123

    Participant

    @r-a-y : the code you have given above works except for ajax refresh. When we go to say activity / All Members yo do not see the secondary avatar. Now when you click activity / My groups these secondary avatars becomes visible and when you go back to activity / All Members you again see these avatars. However, refresh the page and the disappear again.

    Any fix for this?

    @r-a-y

    Keymaster

    @gwu123 – code snippet has been revised; forgot to set priority so it runs earlier.

    @gwu123

    Participant

    wrks thanks.

Viewing 25 replies - 1 through 25 (of 33 total)
  • The topic ‘Am I going mad or are there now avatars next to posts in the Activity stream?’ is closed to new replies.
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