+1 for the support group and other group types
Hmm.. I would love to have the group types feature from this site on mine 
Shameless bump: @apeatling I know you guys have better things to do, but it would be fantastic to have some hints (or actual code *drools*) help us generalize and blatantly copy that Plugin Group plugin rating functionality… it is superlatively cool, I can imagine a thousand uses for it, and I haven’t seen anything like it yet in the wild, I don’t think.
@stwc we’re on the same page. This is exactly what I’ve been trying to figure out how to do this morning. I guess we’re supposed to start with “BuddyPress Skeleton Component” and learn how to extend BuddyPress by creating our own plugins to add this kind of functionality. I just wish there was an online resource guide or advanced BP dev book on building BP plugins. For front-end guys like me, it’s easier to see basic working examples than try to look over the code of complex plugins to pick out the relevant code. The BuddyPress Skeleton Component is a good step in that direction, but would love to see basic how-tos.
It seems all we need to tweak from the default groups setup:
* “Home” is a comprehensive page about X instead of an activity stream with additional form fields (i.e. Description, FAQ, etc.)
* Create an “Activity” tab/page for the activity stream
* Create a “Reviews” tab/page for group comments
* Integrate a ratings component
For front-end guys like me, it’s easier to see basic working examples than try to look over the code of complex plugins to pick out the relevant code.
@agrundner Definitely. Like many hobbyist coders, I can take sample code or something and modify it to my needs most of the time, but without the cloud being seeded, so to speak, it’s hard going.
The other thing I’d add to your list is how to split Groups into different kinds, with different functionality hooked to them. On this site, now, User Created Groups can be arbitratrily created, Plugin Groups can be created around an individual plugin, and Support Groups are only creatable by an admin.
That’s precisely the kind of setup I’d be interested in getting running on the site I’m currently working (where ‘plugin’ is another arbitrary class of ‘object’), along with the reviewing functionality for those ‘objects’ and standard forums/activity/album+ images/links etc attached.
any news about a review plugin?
One way to do it would be to attach some groupmeta to the plugin upon group creation. That’s your basic group types right there. Then you write a group extension, that enables review capability depending on the group type. You could probably utilize activity comments for the reviews. That way you wouldn’t need to create any extra database tables.
Here’s a thought — and I say it with respect. Maybe @apeatling should just make all the mods to BuddyPress.org public so members can package them up as BP plugins. Would help other devs from trying to re-create the wheel. So far I’ve seen a lot of interest in BuddyPress.org’s unified search, group types, group/plugin home description, group/plugin reviews + star ratings. CC @r-a-y @boonebgorges @hnla
I’ve been playing with post types and groups with some fun results.
Still no working plugin for different group types?
