Group Collaboration

[Ocean West]

had a few questions, sorry can't test right now have other project deadlines and IPS uber support staff are working on an issue with permissions on my site so I can't add any third party products just yet..

these questions been tossing about the grey matter.

• copy from forums to GC only copies structures not content. = true / false
• move to GC moves structure and content? = true / false
• when it moves do all the links to existing forums or posts get a new url or is that static to the original ID's
• is it possible to restrict forums or apps in the GC to a particular language or is that still user defined?

 

 

[Kevin Carwile]

had a few questions, sorry can't test right now have other project deadlines and IPS uber support staff are working on an issue with permissions on my site so I can't add any third party products just yet..

these questions been tossing about the grey matter.

1. copy from forums to GC only copies structures not content. = true / false
2. move to GC moves structure and content? = true / false
3. when it moves do all the links to existing forums or posts get a new url or is that static to the original ID's
4. is it possible to restrict forums or apps in the GC to a particular language or is that still user defined?

1. ​True. Copy makes a clone of the structure, and not the content.
2. True. The structure is re-allocated to the collaboration and therefore the content goes with it.
3. For a move, no ID's are changed. In fact, you're not really moving anything except authority over the content.
4. No. GC exercises no control over the language selection options for users.

[Wayne B]

Hi @Kevin Carwile

How would you suggest is best to provide a sidebar widget or an output etc of topics/posts from within a particular group collaboration category, not all categories. The sidebar widgets would be useful but they don't seem to cover a thread feed from collaborations?

Just wondering what the best way of implementing this is? I know I could probably do some cool stuff with Rules to create a news article in Pages perhaps every time a new topic is created and I could then use those news items created to form an RSS feed but it wouldn't link direct to the thread ... Im hoping it will be something fairly simple ....

Thanks

[Wayne B]

Hi @Kevin Carwile could I also ask for a layout change to show a Post total column on the category overview screen to show total number of posts within that specific collaboration;

[Wayne B]

Hi @Kevin Carwile - Appreciate this is my third request in a row but hopefully it will allow you to answer them all in one go ... :-) 

We have launched this now on our site and our members are loving it, the thing they are asking for is for a way for them to identify if there is new content in a particular collaboration. I appreciate they can use the Global View New Content but things are difficult to identify in there if you are trying to filter down to a collaboration as thats not an option.

Is there a way to highlight which have new content, does view new content only show content for collaborations that they have 'joined' or all if they have view access to them all? Is there anyway that this could be improved to make it easier?

Previously we had all of the collaborations as individual sub forums under a main category displayed on the board index and if new content appeared in one of those areas then the forum would be highlighted bold on the board index. Because collaborations are now not controlled as individual forums that are available for display on the board index we have replaced this with a series of re-directs straight into the collaborations but because they are re-directs none of them show if new content is available by going bold. That will hopefully give some context as to what our members are effectively used to.

Thanks

Wayne

[wohali]

@Police Community I feel your pain. As much as I've tried to lead our community away from the "main forum index" as the single page to look for new content, they still expect that to be the place that everything is collected. It's rather frustrating, but there it is.

And since almost every community on our site is read-public, in the global "View New Content" page people have to wade thru new posts in subject areas they don't care about.

A quick way to fix it might be a category that says "My Collaborations" on the New Content page. This way you can limit the view to just what you care about, and join/leave collaborations to affect whether they appear there. You'll still have the global setting if you want to read everything (like I do).

[Kevin Carwile]

Hi @Kevin Carwile

How would you suggest is best to provide a sidebar widget or an output etc of topics/posts from within a particular group collaboration category, not all categories. The sidebar widgets would be useful but they don't seem to cover a thread feed from collaborations?

Just wondering what the best way of implementing this is? I know I could probably do some cool stuff with Rules to create a news article in Pages perhaps every time a new topic is created and I could then use those news items created to form an RSS feed but it wouldn't link direct to the thread ... Im hoping it will be something fairly simple ....

Thanks

​I will build some API methods into the application that you can use to query content from a specific collab.

[Kevin Carwile]

Hi @Kevin Carwile could I also ask for a layout change to show a Post total column on the category overview screen to show total number of posts within that specific collaboration;

​That may be feasable. I'll have to look into it.

[Kevin Carwile]

Is there a way to highlight which have new content, does view new content only show content for collaborations that they have 'joined' or all if they have view access to them all? Is there anyway that this could be improved to make it easier?

​The VNC filters that GC adds filters out only content that the user does not have permission to view. So if they aren't a part of a collab, but they still have permission to view the content, then it will be included in the VNC list.

A quick way to fix it might be a category that says "My Collaborations" on the New Content page. This way you can limit the view to just what you care about, and join/leave collaborations to affect whether they appear there. You'll still have the global setting if you want to read everything (like I do).

​Agreed. This thought has crossed my mind as well. I believe this may help relieve some of the VNC frustrations outlined by @Police Community also.

[Ocean West]

Ok just getting started to setting things up.

Created first group. and Moved a Forum and two forum Links to the GC.

However the Group Administration Header is appears too far down the chain and does not appear on the group Home Page.

Currently it is only visible when looking at at the initial "forum"  

I would think it should only appear on the Group Home Page?

[ Image / header section / Manage ] 

[Forums]
[Blogs]
[Gallery]

 

Also i am really struggling why the "Forums" section needs to have a "category" 
I would much prefer to have a "Forums" section and Blogs/Gallery/Downloads sections as these don't require a "category"

I was able to move forums to the top level and then it does create a "Forum" area - however you then can't create new forums with no parent, as only category can have no parent. 

 

 

[Kevin Carwile]

What about the administration header? I'm confused at what you're describing.

Also I'm really struggling why the "Forums" section needs to have a "category" 
I would much prefer to have a "Forums" section and Blogs/Gallery/Downloads sections as these don't require a "category"

I was able to move forums to the top level and then it does create a "Forum" area - however you then can't create new forums with no parent, as only category can have no parent. 

I agree. However this behavior is not a function of the GC app, its built into the Forums app. I'lI see if there is anything I can do here to relieve some tension but generally speaking, GC does not modify the inner workings of apps... it just controls access.

[Ocean West]

it was a cache issue i think - after resetting cache it seems to work - before it was randomly appearing on some pages not all pages. - now the header is on every page.

now wondering if it should be on every page of the collab? (creates an very tall header )

[Angeels]

I understand if this would be out of the scope of the project, but one thing that would be exceptionally useful to my community is when they joined a specific collab, their user group was then assigned to another group, of course ignoring certain groups that have higher perm sets. Or is this something that your rules app is capable of doing on a per-collab basis?

[Kevin Carwile]

one thing that would be exceptionally useful to my community is when they joined a specific collab, their user group was then assigned to another group, of course ignoring certain groups that have higher perm sets.

Like you said.

This sounds like a job for...  

da tada da ta da... Rules! 

But I havent added the ECA's into GC yet. So there will be a short wait on that. But its coming for sure.

[Angeels]

Awesome - look forward to it then.

[Ocean West]

Grid View forums?  is this default in GC or is this picked by the individual category / forums setting?

I have all the forums set up as "default" which is not a grid view - but the forums display as grid.

[Kevin Carwile]

Grid View forums?  is this default in GC or is this picked by the individual category / forums setting?

I have all the forums set up as "default" which is not a grid view - but the forums display as grid.

Its actually built into the collab homepage display template. If there are more than 2 forums, it switches to grid layout to display forums.

[Ocean West]

Thanks Kevin, 

would love to have an option to let them choose. 

Also is there a way to prevent GLOBAL ads from showing in the GC? its hard if Company A's ads are showing up on Company B's pages. or vice versa.
i would like these to be their own islands - perhaps a way to, eventually allow GC Authors to perhaps some how add their own ads.

[Ocean West]

on reflection I decided to abandon GLOBAL header ads all together - there were just to many pages that i felt that it was annoying to have ads on and took the approach to create a block that holds a custom ad location. And spent the time and when thru each apps hierarchy to decide if that page should have a banner or not.

 

 

[Wayne B]

Feature Request

It would be great to get some sidebar widgets for group collaboration to extend the two of latest and featured that focus on the content, latest topic on specific collaboration, latest posts on specific collaboration. Another would be current members of this collaboration.

Many Thanks

Edited May 13, 2015 by Police Community
Add additional request.

[JEFF MACK]

I am on version 4.0.5.1, is everything solid with this module to work with the latest version?  I am interested in adding this to my site, just want to make sure that all these file depot changes will not cause issues with this.

Edited May 18, 2015 by JEFF MACK

[Kevin Carwile]

I am on version 4.0.5.1, is everything solid with this module to work with the latest version?  I am interested in adding this to my site, just want to make sure that all these file depot changes will not cause issues with this.

Its as solid as hard foam dipped in laminate and then put in the oven for 10 minutes. You'll be ok with installing it.

BTW, what is a file depot change?

[JEFF MACK]

Its as solid as hard foam dipped in laminate and then put in the oven for 10 minutes. You'll be ok with installing it.

BTW, what is a file depot change?

​Yes, I am very impressed with it. It is working great.  I have a few things on some widgets that were created for me to not show the content in the feeds unless  you are a member of the group, but that is my thing to work on.

All I meant by this was the way they were pointing urls to smileys and images. I know they changed the way it was done in 4.0.5, just wanted to make sure that whatever this big update was did not effect your app.  I have no idea why i used the term depot.

I may have found a bug though on post count in the groups.  Here is an image where you can see for yourself

 

 

You can in their profile (and I can see it in the regular forum), that their post count is 268, but in the group, it is saying that they only have 1 or in this case was 0 when they tried posting.

[Kevin Carwile]

The 1 post is in reference to their post count within the group. The 268 is a reference to their primary site post count.

[JEFF MACK]

The 1 post is in reference to their post count within the group. The 268 is a reference to their primary site post count.

​So I have a restriction of 3 posts need to be approved.  All of these people will need to have 3 posts approved again in the groups? Some of these people have thousands of posts, it's not really fair to have them be approved again.  Is there a way around this?

Edited May 19, 2015 by JEFF MACK