How it works
March 21, 2011 in Administration
This site is based on BuddyPress, an extension of WordPress, which creates a community around an issues oriented web site. The tabs above correspond roughly to the features of BuddyPress:
- Activity — Lists various activities of the web site. For example, if you post something to the forum, it’s listed here. When new members join, it should be listed there.
- Members — Essentially a list of everyone who has registered for the site along with links to their profiles.
- Groups — Collections of members. Each member can belong to multiple groups. Forums can be group-based and there are three kinds of groups:
- Public — Everyone can see them
- Private — Activity is visible, but people must request membership
- Hidden — You only see the activity of the group if you are a member
- Forums — A place for discussions. While you can have streams of thought running through group, profile and the main activity streams, the forums are a better place to ask questions and discuss topics. Forums are also tied to groups.
- Blogs — Each member/group can have a blog. Because I have the least experience with this, it’s probably a feature I’ll remove until I get a better handle on how many resources it involves.
Those are the default names of the features, but I’ve found that it helps to establish the correct terminology for a particular community. For example, members could be called voters, groups could be called issues, and forums could be called discussions. Any suggestions there would be most helpful.
This should work as an introduction. Please participate by commenting on this post, starting new forum topics and updating your status messages.
