Contents
Introduction
Summary
Configuration
Templates
Example 1 : A Personal Page
Example 2 : A Blog
Example 3 : Include an 'About Me'
Example 4 : My Last Article
Options
Requirements
Notes
Pricing
This plug-in is an addition to Gossamer Threads GLinks product. The system creates a second version of the links/article in order to laeve a live version available. Personal Page & Blog plug-in will allow you to display user specific information and can be adapted to various situations. Any user data can be displayed and user specific settings can be checked to display what they want to display. If you take a look below you will be able to see several examples of how the plug-in can be used, for example to create a user’s page with an introduction and photo of the user, what the user likes dislikes and the user’s last post. Another example is how to use it to create a blog where the page displays the user’s last posts and the last comments posted about the user’s posts.
The plug-in allows the admin:
- to define user specific globals,
- to define the names and values of the user specific globals
- to allow the user to activate their personal page, blog etc.
- to use specific user fields to define for example a style_sheet, font, header etc.
You need to add globals through your admin panel specifically in : Build > Template Globals
There is one global below that you can use and as you can see it uses the value $mh to allow you define how many comments will be display and a list can be added in the
When you will click on "Manage Globals" you will see a table that may look like this:
| Global Name | Used in Personalized page? | Description | Maximum hits drop down (one per line) |
| my_last_comments |
This table allows you to activate a global to include it in the preferences.
The first column is the name of the global.
The second column allows you to activate or not the global in every user’s personal page and the personal page preferences.
In the third column you will see that you can describe the global and this description will appear in the preferences page in order to help a user understand what he will obtain should he/she choose to use it.
The fourth column allows the admin to define what values will appear in the drop list a user will see for maximum hits to display.
Below the "Manage Globals" link you will see a second link to "Edit Options" that allows you to define the name of the script for the personal page as well as the fields that will be user from the database in the user table.
This an example of what it looks like :
| Plugin Options | |
| The filename of the mypage script. | |
| script_name | |
| The user options from the Users table, separated by comma. | |
| user_options | |
There are two templates that are copied to your template folder called mypage.html and mypage_preferences.html. The first template concerns the actual user page and the second, the preferences page, provides the user with the ability to modify the appearance and the content that appears on the user page.
Example 1: A Personal Page
User Page (blue)
Below is a screenshot of a site using the personal page plug-in to allow members to introduce themselves photo, about me text, like, dislike, flickr badge followed by lists of the users' last comments and last articles.
User Page (green)
The same example as above without the personal introduction and the user has chosen a green styled page. There is also all last comments and all last articles lists placed before the lists of the users' last comments and articles.
Preferences Page
Each member can modify different things in this example.
- Activate the page
- Display 'My Bookmarks', position, maximum number of bookmarks
- Display 'My Last Articles', position, maximum number of articles
- Display 'My Last Comments', position, maximum number of comments
- Display 'Last Articles', position, maximum number of articles
- Display 'Last Comments', position, maximum number of comments
- Activate 'My Introduction'
- Activate 'Show My Last Article'
- Update 'My Introduction' photo, text, like, dislike, flickr, home page url
- Activate 'flickr' badge
- Define font style (examples shown)
- Define page header
(examples shown)
- Define page CSS style (examples shown)
- Address (URL) of Personal Page provided
Example 2: Blog
User's Blog (blue)
The user selects to activate the blog and automatically the users' last posts are displayed last one first and then displayed in reversed chronological order. Note that the search in the top left allows visitors to search only articles/posts from this user.
User's Blog (green)
This is the same example where the user has chosen the green type style for his blog page
Preferences Page
The preferences page is very similar to the above personal page preferences and allows a user to activate or not the blog.
Example 3: Include an 'About Me'
A user can be provided with a way to talk about themselves like in this example where the user types up a short text to introduce him/her-self. The user can also be allowed to upload a photo of themselves or even several photos of themselves or other types of photo. It is possible to allow the user to provide extra information like what they like, dislike but the list is unlimited of what personal information the user can provide. As the personal page plug-in allows admins to create as many fields as they want it is possible to allow users to provide details like flickr account details. In the example below you can see that a user can then have a flickr badge with random images pulled from flickr.
Example 4: 'My Last Article'
The personal page plug-in allows an admin to personalise globals. For example a global found on the forum that displays the last article posted can be modified to display the last article a user has posted.
Options
The plug-in has the option of admin profile validation. This means that an admin/editor can make sure that only content that he/she validates is published. You are notified by email when anyone creates or updates a profile. Users are alerted to approved creation/updates by email also. Some sites will rather make sure that they know what is being published and intervene beforehand in the case of illicit or problematic content, instead of finding out too late leaving themselves liable.
Requirements
Gossamer Links 3.x.x (has also been tested with Links SQL 2.1+ but CSS is recommended for implementing user specific styles etc.)
The user profile validation plug-in can be used in conjunction with Gossamer Community.
Notes
The Personal Page & Blog plug-in has a default setting tag that allows you to see whether a person has already modified their preferences or not. This allows you to display a message on the index page that explains how it works and how to get to the preferences page to start modifying the settings.
As explained in the above personal page preferences example you can see there are endless possibilities to offer site members, your imagination will be the only barrier to providing novel and interesting services to your members.
Basically any user fields/data can be displayed or user specific settings can be checked to display the content they desire.
The design and layout in the examples are not provided since they are part of that sites overall design : the templates provided will inherit your own template set design. You will most probably need to apply your own CSS design to the templates.
Pricing
- Personal Page Plug-in: 350 US dollars.
- Personal Page Plug-in with admin validation of profiles: 500 US dollars.
- Customization, additional functions and further specific user based globals can be made/added, please contact me or GT for a quote.
Ready to purchase? Click here to go straight to the order form on GT's site.
(Choose 'Custom Work' and enter either the 350 or 500 dollar for price depending on the version you need, in the comments field please indicate that it is for the Personal Page plug-in)
Copyright © 2006 John Garner. Contact Me