Hi Mari
Thanks for updating this so fast. I thought it might be a while and so I was really glad to see this post.
That bieng said I have run into the following problem.
When creating a new GB my only option for location is ww.mysiite.com/GB. I’m set up for ww.GB.mystie. After creating a GB the Blog page just seem to pull my main sites blog.
I’m using the latest BP and WPMU versions btw.
Any help would appriciated. Thanks.
mad props, Marius. I will put it through it’s paces, gladly
Marius – small mistake: on the create a blog screen, you give the example blog URL (if create your own is chosen) as domain.com/groupblogname whereas it really is domain.com/groups/groupname/blog. For a second there, I thought that would be the address of the blog. Good thing it’s just text. 
@Avi M I have not tested it with sub-domains sadly. I will see if I can get a test environment for that as well. If anyone else can chime in on subdomains issues, feel free.
@Mike Thanks…let me know what could be useful to add. Group activity streams will come, but I’m not sure how exactly yet. Therefore I included a custom groupblog activity loop on the group blog page.
@Mike It is actually correct. The blog path is shown. The url you are referring to is merely a template we show in the group structure and is completely separate from the blog. In that particular template we show some blog activity and posts. It basically is container for what goes on in the blog. Does that make sense?
I can echo Avi’s report as well. I created 3 blogs with 2 diff users (on my dev site, fear not) and the blog pulls in my main site’s posts…oddly at the address i mentioned above eg domain.com/groups/group-name/blog. I suppose the first question would be, what happened to the blog naming rules if /blog is used for the blog name (I’d prefer /blog btw, my main blog lives at domain.com/blog)
This most likely has to do with the option Andy gave to have the main blog or activity stream on the Home page. We then had to create a page (I named ‘blog’) and then set the Readings Settings Post page to ‘Blog’
Hope that helps
@marius I understand, just know that users/admins will think that’s where there blog url is going to be and might panic
additionally, the About and Blog buttons that show up on the Group Blog page point to
domain.com/about and domain.com/blog
is that on purpose? What i the intention of having a button that reads ‘Blog’ on the Group Blog page?
Hi Mari thanks for the prompt reply.
I thought I’d share a work around I came up with. Create a blog the old fashion way for use with the desired group and then simply select it from the existing blogs drop down on the GB set up page.
Excellent! Congrats! This is one of the most essential plugins.
I need to upgrade to from 1.1.3 to 1.2… 
Does the group home now have front end posting? Still struggling with that… I don’t see it on sandbox.ywamcloud.com, but perhaps you have to be logged-in?
@Avi M, @Mike The latest bug fix should possible fix a lot of issues. Basically the code was missing a vital function which prevented blogs to be created for EXISTING groups. That inadvertently also fixed ‘main blog posts’ on the group page.
@Peterverkooijen I will be making a child theme for P2. From there you can set that theme as the default group blog theme, wish will enable frontend posting.
@Mike I’m including a setting in the wp-admin settings to change the behavior of the blog link within the group. By default it loads a template. If deeper blog integration is desired you can set to redirect the blog link to the group blog home page. This is only useful when your theme matches your current buddypress theme. Two child themes will ship with the group blog plugin that will do that. One based on bp-default and one based on the P2 theme.
KudOs Mariusooms !
Looking forward to the latest group blog.
We still have to upgrade to 1.2
and this is a major thing we were holding out for.
As the kids say ‘Mad Props’
– Avatar –
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I will be making a child theme for P2. From there you can set that theme as the default group blog theme, wish will enable frontend posting.
That is not the same as frontend posting on the group home page. You can already use P2 as the group blog theme now.
Also note that in 1.1.3 group blog defaults are overridden by the blog defaults plugin. Haven’t yet tested if that is different in bp-groupblog for 1.2, but for my site I don’t want another category of blogs that looks and behaves different from the other blogs.
For me the groups and blogs serve different purposes; the blogs are for “individual expression”, the groups are for interaction, collaboration, community, etc. I don’t want to mix and confuse those functions.
The group home in my site should become a collaborative space. Front-end posting is a first requirement, so I’ll continue to bang my head against the wall trying to figure that out.
@peterverkooijen I think I understand your structure a bit, however frontend posting will always be tied to a theme that is activated on the blog itself. I don’t think it will be possible to post from the group url. Not until frontend posting develops into a plugin rather than tied deeply into a theme. If all the features P2 offers would be part of a plugin, than it could be activated on any theme and we would be one step closer to post from within the group.
You could potentially still do what you wish, nut it would require each blog to set up two front pages as described here:
https://codex.wordpress.org/Creating_a_Static_Front_Page
You could then use one front page to be loaded inside the group structure and style it as the group by attaching a unique stylesheet. Your other front page would be the main blog front page and could look entirely different.
That is probably as close as you will get, until someone comes up with a clever frontend posting plugin.
@peterverkooijen We actually use the same code as blog defaults from Deanna Schneider. Except her code probably fires later. We can look into that…could be useful for the groupblog settings to take priority.
Thanks for the suggestions Marius Ooms. P2 also has is_page() etc. in the code, but haven’t figured out what to do with it. If I can get P2 to work on a /sub/subpage I should be able to get it to work on a group home page, right? I’ll look into that as soon as I have time.
Don’t know
In any case we are looking to support the P2 theme closely. It will be a start to get a child theme going. From there it could develop in a lot more. At least we are looking to integrate with P2 as time permits off course.
@mari Excellent fix. All is working as expected now. All I had to do was disable then re-enable the blogs I did previously and they reset. Looks like individual post pages are set at
domain.com/group-blog-slug/post-uri
Is it possible to have them remina directed as the blog itself at
domain.com/groups/group-slug/blog/post-sulg?
I am trying to keep group members inside the group page itself, wether they are looking at a list of posts or single post. (Admittedly, I have not explored how you’ve done this. I know you can’t get around the subdir blog setup in this case. fyi, I have the new redirect option un-selected for this very reason.
expanding on @peter’s view. My personal objective is merely to give a more deliberate, extensive posting mechanism to Groups. Forums are great but they are for raising and issues and starting a discussion. Sort of a quicker, more crude method when compared to a full length blog-type post (in fact, I am tiring of the over-use of the word ‘blog’ here are my users don’t need that term confusing everything)
So all group members, according to their admin set permissions, will be able to do rich postings in the group (keeping things topically relevant) Group members will be able to comment, etc.
To that end, front-end posting will be a big boon as most members will appreciate the simplicity and non-confusing interface. I plan on making it yet antother template view within the group structure…as if you never left.
Finally, I will make use of either categories and/or tags to allow grouop members to browse and find postings that are important to them.
Keep up the good work, this is a “most excellent start, coder dude” (paraphrasing Bill & Ted!!)
Is there a template tag you can use to put a link back to the group home page in the group blog’s theme?
Cheers Mariusooms and co… good work!
No questions or comments so far as I don’t have time to test today but wanted to say thanks.
I am having a problem, wonder if someone can help?
My first group creation process was successful and the blog got created, etc.
My second group creation appears successful, but the blog is not being created. I am receiving this error in the groups_groupmeta table under the groupblog_blog_id field:
O:8:”WP_Error”:2:{s:6:”errors”;a:1:{s:10:”blog_taken”;a:1:{i:0;s:20:”Blog already exists.”;}}s:10:”error_data”;a:0:{}}
I am running on Windows 2k8, IIS7, PHP5.2.13, MySQL 5.0.51a. Any suggestions?
Great plugin, BTW!
Their was a terrible bug in 1.4.3 Please update to 1.4.4. Please read this post at the WP forum and see if that helps you. Otherwise you can contact me through BP and we can figure it out. In future version we make sure to avoid creating havoc.
https://wordpress.org/support/topic/371370?replies=4#post-1427856
Regards,
Marius
@marius
I just installed and activated v1.4.4 but, when I get to the Group Blog settings page to activate the group blog, there are no text fields to enter the name & url. The field labels are there, but no way to enter any info. Obviously, no blog can be created. However, clicking “Save Changes” triggers a “Group details were successfully updated” message.
Any ideas?
It behaves correct…since the blog is based on the group, we take the group slug and use that as the blog url. Like wise we use the Group Title as Blog Title. These fields can not be entered by you. So the blog gets created, or is already created in your case. Once the blog is created it can no longer be released. This is because the blog makes a strong bond with the group.
We thought about an option to leave this open, but it could lead to people snatching blog names from groups that could need their blog name later on if they did not activate their blog yet. For example a group Apple might not have a blog yet. Someone likes Apple and creates a group Oranges, but uses the name Apple as a blog name. Now Apple does decide to activate their blog. However, that blogname is now already registered to a group that is not even named Apple. Does that make sense at all?
Off course this does not apply to every community, but it seemed more stable solution for know. For similair reason we thought it not very effective for groups to release blogs. It could get messy very very fast. If anything only a site admin could possible release the bind between group and blog if desired.
I hope that makes sense.
BTW…P2 integration and lots more excellent features are coming very soon.
