solved Is it possible to automatically display all profiles in a gallery?

There has been little discussion of this issue, as far as I can see.

The major role of social networks is to help people find each other. Like findng books in a library, one of the most effective and pleasurable ways is to browse the shelves.

Here the library will be a photo gallery, and we will need some kind of logical stucture in the shelf arrangements, with a basic set of search options...

First up - switch on the lights, then...

1. Search all profiles in a network gallery for all profles (simple and advanced search options).

2. Order profiles by newest, be alphabetical, by most viewed, etc.

3. Group profiles into sub-galleries according to profile category (as defined by the quotas)... and then apply 1 and 2 above within each gallery.

4. Allow exclusion of selected profile categories (quotas) and individual profiles.

That's just my wish list. Sorry I can't offer a zillion dollars to pay for all the coding. Is anyone out there working on a module or widget for all this?


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 05/09/15 06:18:56AM

That's kind of the intention of the top level of the site. The admin user who setup the community also sets up the top level of the site to showcase the content of the site.

Visitors come to the site and browse the top level for new or show-cased content.

When they find some interesting content they can click on links that take them to the canonical location for that content which is on the users profile.

So its inferred that the onus is on the admin user (the creator of the site) to decide how to showcase the content of the members.

The 'Site Builder' system is the intended structure building system for admin users who prefer not to look at code, but want to create structure on their sites top level.

Yes... but how do we showcase all profiles?

I think in my case the profiles were all there in a default top page (Jamroom default skin) that has somehow disappeared now that I am trying to use Sitebuilder in Ningja to design a top page.

Thanks.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

Profiles have their own showcase page all by itself found at:
YOUR-SITE.com/profile

This is provided by the module itself in the file:
/modules/jrProfile/templates/index.tpl

To over-ride that and have a custom version of it you could copy that to:
/skins/YOUR-SKIN/jrProfile_index.tpl

and start to make customizations to it.

If you wanted to put that in a section of your site, you would first choose the page, then add that code to the page.

To take control of a URL you put a new template in your skin:
/skins/(YOUR SKIN)/helios.tpl

The contents of that page will show when the URL:
YOUR-SITE.com/helios

is visited.

You can get the list of profiles by using the {jrCore_list .....} function with the jrProfile module as its target:

"{jrCore_list}"
https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/documentation/development/89/jrcore-list

The above code will get a list of profiles using the default number of profiles and use the default layout.

See the link to the documentation for how to customize that layout.

--edit--
If your trying to do it with Site Builder, then make sure the Construction Kit is turned on and the embed module is enabled. Site Builder will allow you to do it without looking at code.
updated by @michael: 03/19/15 11:03:22PM

The first option works with my site, which is in ninja skin, with Sitebuilder installed and active.

YOUR-SITE.com/profile

A search box appears, but only allows us to search on the profile names, which is only useful if one is looking for a known person with a known profile name.

Still, it is useful to be able show all the profiles like this, as another starting point for users who wish to explore the network.


Further thoughts...

1. Allowing all visitors or network members to search one or more selected fields within a profile description form will add great power to the social-networking function of a jamroom site.

I hope this can become a standard feature of the Ningja skin, if not all skins... eventually.


2. Profiles at my network consist of two kinds..

a) Single function profiles, each of which occupies a profile category (with its quota)in order to support activities related to a specific service area, such as editing, or tranlating.

b) Personal profiles that represent actual people, who can join as regular members, special members, network volunteers, network staff, and so on.

Eventually I'd like to separate the (a) and (b) profiles and allow them to be set up with different profile descriptions (admin-created in the the first case, and user-created in the second case).


3. Profile searches could then be directed to just the personal profiles using field-specific searches that correspond to fields in a profile form that has to be filled at sign up (or different profile forms if different forms are needed for different profile categories).


I presume that all this can be done (eventually) with the existing coding system, but non-coders such as myself will have to wait until the suggested range of options (more or less) become standard, or we can employ someone to tweak the code of an existing network.

Thanks


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 03/20/15 06:50:59AM

This is the part where you get your hands dirty...:)

I'll try to stick to the real dirt in my rented garden plot. Anyone looking for Spring potatoes in exchange for code?


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 03/20/15 07:56:09AM

Yes, sent me up a bag. Not much space to garden up here.

1.) you can add any additional search fields you would also like covered in the search by adding them to:
ACP -> LISTING -> SEARCH -> GLOBAL CONFIG -> additional Search Fields

2.) sounds like a job for the Quota system, but the use case description makes it hard to give exact instruction. The steps to take to setup a new quota are to first decide which modules will be active on profiles in each quota. Feels like what your after is a bunch of profiles that the admin has created in one quota, then user signups to a second quota. The admin then assigns users to be able to access the first quotas profiles on an individual case. Might need a custom module if you want them to grant themselves access.

3.) You can specify the quota ID as one of the search fields when using the {jrSearch_module_form} function. eg:

That would only search the audio_title,audio_album,audio_genre fields created by users in the quota id '1'

You could put that in any template where you wanted to see the search form.

The thing with Jamroom is that one of the premises its built on is: Keep the core features to a minimum and let the user expand it because its easier to add features than it is to take un-wanted features away.

So unless its going to be wanted in every case, its probably not going to become a core feature.

But thats ok because skin designers are not limited by that premise and they can build custom skins that override/extend core functionality. So while it may not become a core feature, there might be a skin designed containing that feature.

Pls send Michael potatoes- if you saw his garden you would know he is starving

lol. yup, I'll work for potatoes.

RE 1. Yes... I've set up:
- one quota for my admin profile and a network profile,
- one quota for setting up groups with related forums alongside (one of each per profile, along with a timeline, an explanatory FAQ and pages for useful related information (personal profiles will not be set up with this quota),
- one quota for regular members (a default free membership)
- one quota for special members (where some members might like to set up shop selling their services, if I can make it an attractive proposition).

I expect most members to stay with their regular member profile, and then follow any already-established group-and-forum that is relevant for their work.

My experience in the network I have at Ning is that very few people have any interest in setting up new groups or forums, and those that do soon lose interest and make no effort to promote or develop their own creations. That's OK because I really want members to focus on the groups and forums established by Admin, for practical work purposes.


RE 2. Most of my suggestions come from experience as a Ning network creator. In that system, it is super easy to add fields to a signup form, and those fields automatically becoem the frame for advanced search across all profiles. Unfortunately, the profile field labels also become part of what the in house system indexes, so it is difficult to search the profiles without generating spurious results that pickup the field labels, rather than the profile contents only.

Perhaps some day I will master form construction at Jamroom, and be able to design my own search forms.

Still, I think adding further networking-friendly search functions to the Ningja skin might work well for most networks coming from Ning, and the members of those networks who enjoy browsing other member profiles in multiple ways.

Time for me to watch an instruction video...

ps Today we stole weedy horsetail heads from our neighbours and grass for our pet rabbit/living house god, who is not part of the deal, though probably well-suited for an Irish potato stew. I didn't have that thought.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

I don't know what you're asking for here. I hear "Still needs some other stuff". Without a path to follow, that stuff is unlikely to be built.

For specific feature suggestions, throw them in the SUGGESTIONS thread here:

"Jamroom Suggestions"
https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/forum/suggestions

so they don't get lost.

Thanks. Yes, that was a ramble. I put a suggestion for "advanced search" in the suggestions box, and Brian posted a quick answer there which I will have to explore.

At Ning, for a long time, I was pushing for better/more usable search functions as well. In the very early days their indexing was unreliable. That doesn't seem to be an issue with JR.

I introduced Jamroom today to a young researcher, Japanese, who has been helping street muscians in West Africa produce their own music videos. He was very interested.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

I think you can add any field you want to a persons profile information using the form designer.
Examples would be like
*Country
*State or Province
*Gender
*Members who like french fries
pretty much anything you want- then use the datastore fields to call that in a search
Have not tried this yet myself but I have read in places here that it can be done

OK, here's a specific question.

I have a testuser, regular member, who can log in and use the gear icon (settings) to fill out a profile form I created using form design tool.

http://publishsciencenet.jamroomhosting.com/profile/settings/profile_id=5/id=5

The fields to fill in are location, work interests, contact details, and so on. Near the bottom there is a "Profile Privacy" field, and that is set to Global - visible to everyone.

He changes some details, leaving the setting as visible, saves the page, and... vroom! It vanishes.

Now we are back on the original public page, and nothing shows there.

http://publishsciencenet.jamroomhosting.com/testuser-one

Is this how it is meant to work?


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 04/07/15 05:02:36AM

No - I don't think that is how it is supposed to work - when you say "vanishes" do you mean you just get a blank page? If so, check the PHP Error log - that usually indicates a corrupt or invalid template edit.

Or do you mean the changes aren't saved? Do you get an error?

Thanks!


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Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

My ning site members are always searching for other nearby members to contact and get together with to play music or find teachers etc. I think that if one is doing a search on the site's /profile page, it would be great to at least include Location in the search by default (country, city, state).
For example, on ning if I am in the member main page list, and I put simply "VA" in the search box, it displays 201 members who are located in VA (state of Virginia, US). Searching "Boston" pulls up members from Boston MA, the town of New Boston Texas, and member Bill Boston. If I search for "George", it displays all 23 members whose name includes George...and also members who live in a place with George in its title, like Lake George NY.
On ning the Location and member Name are the two search criteria by default...and that's VERY useful indeed right there without even adding further advanced search options.

Members on my site can often find each other based on their interests and their posted content- "fiddle" pops up in video searches, "jazz" pops up in forum or group searches, other stuff shows in the Timeline activities. BUT no one can easily look for each other based on location, so that's a biggie...for my site anyway.


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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015

Location is not a standard Jamroom profile field, but you should just be able to add those custom fields you created into the Search -> Global Config.


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Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

You're right, I should be able to do that.


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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015

In my case, I have used the form design tool to create fields for location, interests etc. in a "profile form" and can save the changes and see the form when logged in as admin or as profile owner, but the form is not publicly visible to other logged in users or to general visitors to the site.... despite being saved as a "globally visible" form.

The form "vanishes" when it is saved because the view switches to the profile public page, where the form is not shown (against my expectation).

The data are all there because when I go back to the settings tool and look at the profile, the data are all present and correct.

I do not get any error message.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 04/07/15 06:32:54PM

[quote="michael"]
1.) you can add any additional search fields you would also like covered in the search by adding them to:
ACP -> LISTING -> SEARCH -> GLOBAL CONFIG -> additional Search Fields
[quote]If you would like to have additional DataStore fields available for search, enter the DataStore field name, one per line.
[/quote]

When I go to my global config in my Search module to add the location field, I get this message on a bright yellow banner:

Full Text Indexing is currently in progress
Wait for this message to disappear before making additional changes

...This message has been sitting there for over an hour now. Is it fer real, and do I just keep waiting?


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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015

If you had alot of content on your site it will take a while to index yes.

Are there any examples of Jamroom sites where the profile forms ARE displayed for public view, and are also used as the base for profile searching?

Also, I am still not clear whether the sign-up form can be turned into a profile form that becomes the public profile.

If not, then we need to keep the sign-up form simple, and let new members fill out the full form later. This has the disadvantage of not letting us see who the person is until we have already approved them so that they can complete the full form.

But I jump ahead. At this stage, I just need to see how a profile form can be made public, whether or not it is the sign-up form or something filled in later.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

To display additional profile fields on the profile you have to edit the code on the profiles to output these. At this point there is no other way as far as I know to get additional fields to show on a profile.

Form Designer gets stuff into the datastore.

Templates get stuff out of the datstore.

Just adding a new field to a form is only half the job.


Here on jamroom.net perhaps, you can search here for profiles:
https://www.jamroom.net/profile

If your wanting to add other fields other than the default ones to be searched, the template controlling that page is found at:
ACP -> PROFILES -> USER PROFILES -> TEMPLATES -> index.tpl -> MODIFY

You'll see this line:

The fields are the fields that are searched.

If your not using that module specific search, but rather the site-wide one, then you can add in Additional Search Fields into:
ACP -> LISTING -> SEARCH -> GLOBAL CONFIG -> Additional Search Fields



If your talking about the form then there is nowhere. The profile form (the input location where people type stuff in and submit it) is only shown to someone who has a profile. You can only see forms that belong to your profile.

If your talking about displaying some information that was collected via a profile form out to the screen, that can be done in a template in the skin.

The simplest version would be a file created at:
/skins/(YOUR SKIN)/some-name.tpl

That would appear in the browser to anyone who visited the url:
your-site.com/some-name

The would see a list of profiles formatted in the default layout. The default layout is provided by the item_list.tpl file from the module.

so in the case of a profile thats:
/modules/jrProfile/templates/item_list.tpl

That is a naming convention, there are others.
item_detail.tpl = the main details page found on the profile
item_list.tpl = the formatting of the item in a list
item_action.tpl = the way it looks in the activity timeline
index.tpl = the main module list found at the base module url, eg your-site.com/profile

To over-ride any of those templates at skin level, you can copy it from:
/modules/jrProfile/templates/item_list.tpl
to
/skins/(YOUR SKIN)/jrProfile_item_list.tpl

and it will be over-ridden in all locations.

"Altering a Module's Template"
https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/documentation/development/1051/altering-a-modules-template

Alternatively if you dont want to over-ride all locations with a new custom layout for the list template, you can provide one for just that particular location.

eg:
(call it whatever you like)
To get a base structure for that template layout, its a good idea to copy the default one from:
/modules/jrProfile/templates/item_list.tpl

to
/skins/(YOUR SKIN)/custom-row-template.tpl

Then make alterations. Any alterations will then ONLY effect that location that asks to use the template "custom-row-template.tpl".

If you want to know what variables you have available to you to use other than the ones that are listed in the default version of item_list.tpl, then you put in {debug} into that template and you can use any of the variables that are in there.

"{debug}"
https://www.jamroom.net/the-jamroom-network/documentation/development/1477/debug

The way the values for those variables get to being available in that {debug} dialog is because they got entered in via the Form Designer.
updated by @michael: 04/07/15 11:54:53PM

Thanks for all that. I just have to get this fixed in my head. And then see if I can fix the site. I will call this thread solved for the moment.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)

My Search module indexing message is there there this morning, after all night long. So...maybe something not quite right? I'm afraid to make any tweaks to the module settings with that warning there. See screenshot.
Should I maybe reload the module? I already tried cache/integrity.





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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015
updated by @strumelia: 04/08/15 07:34:28AM

Mine completely very quickly has I have very little content being in development but since you ning users imported GB's of data it will take longer, how much I cant gauge, maybe Brian will weigh in on this.

Ok thanks Gary! My non-live site has about 32 GB of stuff. If it's still there tonight and no new posts here, I'll start a separate thread to ask.


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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015