Having just installed the Activitypub plug-in I hope as the next version of BuddyPress is being developed some consideration is given to added hooks to connect BuddyPress to ActivityPub. It seems to me this would catapult BuddyPress firmly into the future of social media and social internet community.
As someone who started building a community site with BP moved away to use another tool then returned, I am watching this development process with equal parts eagerness and trepidation.
My trepidation comes from the influence of some plug-in developers who sm to be less inclined to support development of a robust BP core in favor of building plugins to sell to extend BP functions.
I have bought and used several external plug-ins and it seems the most efficient way to generate more usage and adoption of BP is to build the essentials for a good community site into the core rather than requiring external plugins.
Case in point BP attachments. Photo/document sharing is an essential element of any modern community site. The alternatives are either overpriced sporadically developed, inefficient or don’t integrate well with BP because they were originally designed for WP general use not a community. Yet adoption of BP attachments suffers from lack of adoptions and best as I understand a limited development team.
I really want to see BP and BP attachments succeed and I was a programmer in the current web development languages I would volunteer. Sadly I can only share a user perspective encourage the developers and volunteer to test. BP is still the best option in my book for building a community site in WP. I have tried all the alternatives and I mean all and I still come to that conclusion.
@earl_d,
I agree with some of what you say, but in many ways I understand the way this is being approached by the BP team, as they are all volunteers. I am guessing that keeping the core plugin compatible with the continual changes in WordPress is enough work in itself, without the added headache of putting extra things into the core that can be provided as plugins, either free, or paid. And I think it would be churlish to make accusations towards those involved for trying to make some money from plugins, even though I don’t feel that is the way they are truly approaching it.
I think once the new BP is fully tested and launched, and has had a few months to bed in, we will start to see more and better free (and paid) plugins because from what I understand, they will be much easier for developers to integrate because of the changes/improvements that have been, are being and will continue to be made. I am hoping more existing but currently non compatible plugins will also be more easy for their developers to adapt as well. I have always found BP to be quirky and inconsistent so I am hoping that is changing. I also hope that BP can walk the thin line between providing the good solid core and adding solid improvements and additions to that slowly but surely.
Thanks @earl_d & @awol for these new feedbacks. We’ll definitely look into the ActivityPub plugin and see how we can bridge with it.
About features, our direction is to shrink BP Core as « short » as possible and to move optional components into distinct Add-on just like the BP Attachments one. But the goal is also to keep the freedom to create as much Add-ons maintained by the BP Core Team as needed to build communities.
We want users to have more choices and choosing this new organization where we treat ourselves equally compared to third party plugin developers will help us get the same freedom they have : build what they thing is nice to have. With a big Core, we somehow restrict our creativity, I believe.
@imath FWIW, back in 2021 there was some discussion regarding the ActivityPub and BuddyPress connectivity/integration (for lack of a better term) which can be found at the following:
Buddypress Integration
Cool! I wasn’t aware of it! Thanks a lot @emaralive
