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Buddypress integration -how?

edited January 2011 in Vanilla 2.0 - 2.8
I'm preparing a project in Buddypress. The standard forums (bbpress) are horrible. I've started to like a lot Vanilla forums... so I'll want to use them. I know merging Vanilla with WPMU it's easy... but I also need to merge BP's Activity, Profiles...

Comments

  • LincLinc Detroit Admin
    This is kinda crazy. There is a ton of redundancy between BP and Vanilla. I think it would take a tremendous amount of effort to do this and have very little payoff.
  • I have came up with a "solution". Putting Vanilla widgets in my site lets users have the forum integrated but "ordered" from other site activity. I kinda like it.

    My toughts now are with how to put now a "user forums activity" in Buddypress profiles.
  • Bump?-

    How to do a widget for wordpress with user activity?
  • @lincoln @mark @digibomb- I think this would be something worth visiting despite the redundancy. I prefer Vanilla be far over BBpress and am looking to move my existing Vanilla install to support a forum community on a WPMU/BP site. (http://teatra.de)

    Using the WP embed plugin with Proxyconnect I can see this being done. The widgets will help provide that "integrated" feel. If one could live without forum activity being in the BP activity stream then this works well.

    Things I would need for this would be (this is for my use case):
    ~ Profile link in Vanilla would need to redirect to the users BP profile (best scenario would also pull the user's BP avatar)
    ~ Deactivate notifications (while this is a useful feature, linking it across to the BP notifications would be problematic)
    ~ Deactivate/remove Activity link in the menu bar. (It's presence will cause confusion)
    ~ Remove PMs (this might be as simple as removing the Conversations Application)

    -----------------------------
    Even with the redundancy, the current situation for forums on BuddyPress install is poor. The BBPress setup that currently comes with BP is lousy. BBpress is undergoing an overhaul to become a plugin (and the release is continually delayed) and site owners are looking for an integrated forum solution. If they succeed, the BBPress plugin will become the defacto forum software for BuddyPress sites.

    IMO Vanilla is superior to BBPress in many ways, if you guys could maneuver a way to integrate (even if it just means hiding the redundancy in the background) Vanilla into a BuddyPress site then you could compete for that place in the WordPress/BuddyPress world. You might even be able to do it on the back of your WordPress plugin work.

    As it is right now - there is no decent solution for BuddyPress site forums, BBPress is just too clumsy. If Vanilla was first to figure it out and release something that works, you guys would get another step up in the forum world.
  • LincLinc Detroit Admin
    edited April 2011
    Personally, I have no interest in BuddyPress, sorry. Wordpress integration I'm onboard with. I just don't see the value in BuddyPress integration.


    Disclaimer: I'm not employed by Vanilla nor have anything to do with the company's position on this.
  • CheshyrCheshyr New
    edited April 2011
    I'm in the same boat. I want to use BuddyPress for it's large suite of social tools. Vanilla has the far superior forum, and the plugins here are better integrated, but BP has a much larger plugin count. It's getting frustrating trying to find an integrated soltuion that doesn't have some horrible weak link.

    So, yeah. I'm on board with LeafBoxTea on this one. I want to use Vanilla Forum, but have it integrate with the BuddyPress user profiles and authentication, if possible.

    Edit: Aside from the segregated account profiles, ProxyConnect 1.9.3 is working great between WP 3.1.1, BP 1.2.8, and Vanilla 2.0.17.9.

    I can appreciate the loyalty to Vanilla, but until there are plugins for professional looking news posts, more media content support, user-editable event managers, and google map integration, Vanilla doesn't meet my needs for a social website. The embedded forum is pretty nice though, especially with the ProxyConnect working.
  • I subscribe to Cheshyr. I would need that integration in BP too!
  • And here a quote from
    http://www.digital-results.com/blog/development/buddypress-review/
    regarding the same ideas:

    "Buddypress forums are bad. Firstly, there’s no forum for all users to post in; each group has it’s own solitude forum instead. A user has to join a group (assuming there is a public group) and then post in that group’s forum. If there are no public groups, you can’t post anywhere! You’d have to message someone who owns a group, become their friend (required for them to even invite you to the group) and then get your invite. What a ridiculous solution!

    If there’s another way around this, please let me know in the comments, because it put a huge downer on my experience with the BuddyPress plugin! But it doesn’t get much better."
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