BuddyPress.org

So, instead of modifying the bp_has_broups query in the template, I figured I needed to do an if / else to check if the user has not set the sort option yet. To do that, in bp-custom.php I hooked in to the bp_ajax_querystring filter:

add_filter( 'bp_ajax_querystring', 'mediclique_bp_ajax_querystring', 32, 2 );
function mediclique_bp_ajax_querystring( $query_string, $object ) {

	if ( 'groups' == $object ) {
	
		$query_args = wp_parse_args( $query_string, array() );
	
		if ( empty( $query_args['type'] ) ) {
		
			$query_args['type'] = 'alphabetical';		
			$query_string = http_build_query( $query_args );
		}
	}

	return $query_string;
}