S2Member integration with WP forum plugins

Hello,

I need to install a forum in my website, which will have S2Member enabled (once I buy the licence).
I wanted to know several things:

1) Will S2Member manage the forum’s login or will users have to login twice (once for the website, and then once again for the forum).

2) I’ll have three levels of permissions: free, customer1 and customers2. Free won’t get to see any forum threads, customers1 get to see some forum threads, and customers2 get to see other forum threads (but not those seen by customers1). Is this possible with S2Members or higher levels will get access to content from lower levels?

3) I’m considering different forum plugins: Vanilla Forums, BBPress and Simple:Press. Is there any of these that you recommend better as for its integration with S2Member?

Thanks!

Hi Mary.

1) Will S2Member manage the forum’s login or will users have to login twice (once for the website, and then once again for the forum).

s2Member doesn’t manage login or sessions, that’s done by WordPress. To have a single login, you’ll have to integrate the forum with your WordPress installation.

2) I’ll have three levels of permissions: free, customer1 and customers2. Free won’t get to see any forum threads, customers1 get to see some forum threads, and customers2 get to see other forum threads (but not those seen by customers1). Is this possible with S2Members or higher levels will get access to content from lower levels?

Higher levels get access to content for lower levels, since level access is incremental. To change this behavior, you’d need to hack the WP roles for s2Member levels.

About what you can protect, s2Member’s URI restriction can manage access to forum URLs that are served by WordPress, as in a plugin, not forums that run outside of WordPress. [hilite path]Dashboard -› s2Member® -› Restriction Options -› URI Access Restrictions[/hilite]

3) I’m considering different forum plugins: Vanilla Forums, BBPress and Simple:Press. Is there any of these that you recommend better as for its integration with S2Member?

s2Member has a more specific integration with bbPress. Video » s2Member (bbPress Bridge Integration)

The URI restriction would work with bbPress and Simple:Press but, if I’m not mistaken, Vanilla Press are a separate script not served by WordPress, so that would not be protected.

I hope that helps. :)

Thanks a lot Cristián, it does help. I guess I’ll figure out the rest of it once I install everything and get to see how it works.

I have a sort of a follow up question, but I don’t know if it should be better placed in a new thread, so if that is the case please let me know and I’ll repost it.

A developer is creating a plugin for my site that will load data from a data base in a custom page. The data corresponds to a particular user (each user having their own data in the database, which will be loaded an shown when loading the custom page). My developer wants to know if he can make the plugin communicate with S2Member in order to get the user login info, so the plugin can load the data corresponding to that particular user.

Data flow would look like this:

1) User logs in.
2) S2Member gives user access to the custom page.
3) Custom plugin gets login info.
4) Custom plugin calls and loads custom page showing the data corresponding to that user.

I still don’t know exactly how S2Member works, but as for your answer to my first question above I’m guessing that my custom plugin has to communicate with WordPress and not with S2Member, is that right?

hi mary – i have been debating over gravity forms and formidable forms plugins –
at present i have been able to prefill formidable forms with s2member login info – using s2member shortcodes in the formrmidable forms field set – up….but after three months i have realized that s2members – probably the best membership plugin out there, is still storing custom data in a serialized array…so it is extremely difficult to call s2 custom data into a formidable (or any) form…what is more it is much harder to write to s2member custom fields, but i think the membeship plugin in formidable witll alow you to write to login infields that are prefillable and can be view obnly also….

s2members has been talking about getting rid of the serialized array approach in there database storing of custom fields, thsi would alleviate the problem i and many others are facing and make your goal o so much easier.

it is supposedly a primary focus of s2members lead developers to accomplish this for the next release….

at present i think i would have to have a mix of forms to get what i need – s2memerb forms to sell custom capabilities and levels to user login, and formidable to sell registrations and events etcs to logged in users

PIPE DREAMS – but horizon of reality may be coming soon
i am thinking about even just using s2members to register people for their capabilities and formidable for all forms afterward….maybe using s2member to block access to formidable forms unless eligible for that page…the probelm is with events – if a person who is logged in with s2member sees an event formidable registration page (events manager and events espressso are my two options right now) and registers for the event ( i would want this because of the opportunity to work with the info formidable would store in its own databases and thus useful for reports and other forms later on), the paypal api call woul d have to come back to the event manager somehow…….then there is avatars – using user meta pro —
esentially i have a page or mix of pages with user meta plugin (user meta shortcode- not need pro just for avatar), s2member shortcode, formidabkle sbortcode, a paypal button, and event mamanger shortcode…..so i can allow a logged in user with s2member credentials to fill out a formidable form for an event and pay for it with payapl and return to the event manager that the user paid and should get a ticket with their avatar and user info mailed. theni workwith with event results with another formidable form that calls the event registration form info and puts data together in a nice report for results….

in all this due to the serialized arrays in s2members – but maybe not the custom capabilities user meta – i would h maybe have to manually write each members custom capability (true power of s2 members) manually after they fil out a formidable form to increase their leve. or i could just allow users to fill out an s2 member form to give them the custom capability automaitcally but them formidable cannot write to that field and update it later, so that removes user front end editing in formidable which for some fields you only want an adminsitrator anyway to edit it….arggggggh dizzy KISS

i wish s2members, and gravity or formidable (better right now in data management after IMHO), and events espresso or events manager, all get together and come up with something that integrates well….oh an d include user meta for the avatar…

I really want to nkow if there is a projection on the release of the new s2members – the developer of formidable forms just wrote me an hour ago saying that wshe was working on a workoaround to write to s2members custom fields etc when she encountered their support forums serialized array issue and that they are doing away with that set-up in the next release – so she wondered if it was redundant to come up with an alreayd known to be soon obsoleted integration path…..

s2members – save us all some money tell us what the status is on the next release and the end of the serialized array? please – i love everything else about s2members, and think it is a winner hands down for member management – just the integration….please please please?

Hay Jason,

I couldn’t understand all you said because I haven’t used gravity or formidable forms, but I’m still wondering… for what I need, doesn’t my custom plugin just talk to WordPress and ask it who is logged-in? Because if that is the case then I don’t see the need for communication with S2Member (in my case). S2Member will determine if the custom page is accessible for that particular user, and if it is, it will give them access, and then my plugin will load the data in its custom database corresponding to the particular user (after having asked WordPress who is logged in).

Am I confusing things around?

Mary said:
I still don’t know exactly how S2Member works, but as for your answer to my first question above I’m guessing that my custom plugin has to communicate with WordPress and not with S2Member, is that right?

That’s right, your plugin would be talking with WP for the user’s data, although there are functions that s2Member makes available to simplify getting some user info, especially that related to s2Member (e.g. custom profile fields). http://www.s2member.com/codex/stable/s2member/api_functions/package-summary/

I hope that helps. :)

Mary –
sorry if i am not clear – 3 hours sleep repetitively and i am not a coffe drinker – i am just trying to get as much as i can across in hope you 1 get to appreciate how great s2member is and will become, and 2 don’t overlook a few things (expectation management) so you have a good developement deployment plan with your custom work (save $$$ and time)

you have it right in your case – it is a solution that i was going to apply as a workaround – just hide the page using s2member…and you are right all plugins should communicate directly with wordpress data – s2member does this really well for standard fields.

what i understand (correct me if i am wrong) – s2member integrates with wordpress to allow the user to login register etc through s2member interfaces for the wordpress login window…. and s2member gives you the ability to determine content all users have access to.

once logged in (with wordpress) your forum (if it integrates iwth wordpress users, should recognize you are logged in..so you dont need dual logins…..it was my understanding that s2member integrates well with bbpres and buddypress – it even has settings you can specify to synchronize tightly with buddypress (although a lot of other things can have issues with buddypress if not designed with buddypress in mind i.e.themes and other plugins – have noticed a lot of good developers lagging on buddypress integration and support for some reason, and hosting companies saying buddypress presents issues often – why some recommmend simple press – no experience with SP)

Crisitian: wrt

1) Will S2Member manage the forum’s login or will users have to login twice (once for the website, and then once again for the forum).
s2Member doesn’t manage login or sessions, that’s done by WordPress. To have a single login, you’ll have to integrate the forum with your WordPress installation.

To clarify again cristian correct me if i am wrong- s2member doesn’t manage it wordpress does, but s2member allows users to register and login to wordpress using / integrating with the wordpress login, and it even allows you to theme wp-admin login with you logo and thee is a login widget i believe…..

My developer wants to know if he can make the plugin communicate with S2Member in order to get the user login info, so the plugin can load the data corresponding to that particular user.

Data flow would look like this:

1) User logs in.
2) S2Member gives user access to the custom page.
3) Custom plugin gets login info.
4) Custom plugin calls and loads custom page showing the data corresponding to that user.

i have had success using other plugins like form builders etc (i.e. formidable forms – great support – developer is a wealth of knowledge in this area and could probably tell your developer about her experiences with some of this)) that allow the use of shortcodes in their fields – s2member has shortcodes for the basic user data – so my fields in the other plugin are easily prefilled…so yes withthe right plugin but that is where it stops to a degree –

because of the current way s2member writes the data and especially custom fields, it is very difficult to call info from non standard user fields in s2member and it is hard to write back…

i wanted tighter integration with the fields i was asking the user to fill out – not only use s2member to log someon in and keep their credentials and protect content – but also allow those credentials to be ported to another plugin (which is again possible for standard user fields easily) but that could also write back to s2members custom fields –
so for me custom fields were impotrant and data portability was important….

also say for example my event manager plugin or my forms plugin allows a user to increase their membership level or custom capability (in my case) Iwould need the form or event manager plugin to do that automatically – but it appears like i have to do it manually for now – because i need those custom fields in my form and events plugins, i have to have the user enter it there….so future forms and events can use that info

i.e. client sign on and fills out form…purchases event (which increases credential i.e. training) or using form purchases levl access of custom capability (cannot use s2member if i need that info available for future forms unless again i review all forms and manually up the users custom capaility afterward)
Again it is easier for me to be able to reuse custom data in the form plugin and have to manually update s2member than to try to reuse custom fields from the s2member plugin and mnually update many forms and databases resulting from tose forms who use conditional logic based on those custom capabilities –
i thought of creating a page that has shortcodes for for s2member, formidable forms, an avatar plugin, and maybe using the forms plugin ‘s conditional logic to present the s2 member forms shortcode and or the purchase option for an event…..

4000 active members on one site, to much manual policing for me, i want to set it and forget it,

things are really close right now….i am excited that this might all become easily possible soon with the direction some of the mentioned developers are taking including s2member

so i dont think you can go wrong with s2member with what you are trying to do – just let your developer know for the time being there are a few limitation to s2members “serialized array” set-up but i understand that is changing and i wouldn’t put a lot of expensive developement time into configuring for something that is immently chagning…

regading the serialized array

Jason, thanks a lot, it indeed much clearer.

What I need to do now is simpler than in your case, but as my business scales I’ll probably hit the same wall you’re hitting right now. So thanks, your experience does help.

I’ll pass my developer the info and will ask him to look formidable forms, as you said, it can facilitate development.

Cristián, thanks a lot too, I’ll give my developer that link so he can look it up and see what he can do.

No problem, Mary.

Regarding the custom profile fields in searialized arrays in usermeta, if you want to search users by them, this post may be helpful to your developer: http://www.primothemes.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=15658&p=48878#p48878

Jason, thanks a lot for your good input helping Mary. Yes, the changes that are coming in the new generation of s2Member will make this a lot simpler, and more powerful too. Regarding the serialized arrays, the profile fields will be in their own tables to overcome the serialized array limitation that working the WP way imposes.

Your welcome all:
I am in the quest for a database that registers users and i can read and write to it from other plugins that are well written.

A lot of people frown on separate databases…but if the info is segmented and accessbile and easily called to prefill other forms and be written from other forms cause the field names etc are easy to sync with, and you can pull info from that database together with others to create reports – i.e. userinfo in wp meta, ccap of editor in s2 table, favorite colour this month in formidable form, it would be great to be able to pull a report for that user who who is an editor with a favortie colour of blue, and if you can use a form generator to write to all three that is amazing.

like i said formidable is already doing a lot of this and works as much as any form generator can with shortcodes even.

I hope you s2member guys give formidable forms a serious look over and even contact the developer on her support forum – she is amazingly fast a response and through with her support.

Keep on truckin’

Nice, thanks for the heads up on Formidable Forms. :)

The new tables won’t need a separate database, they’d be in the same WP database. It’ll be simpler to work with the data. Even if what you wanted is not available with a simple function call, you can do your own fancier database query.