[woodwardmatt]

I think that member needs to be blocked – spam *sigh*

[woodwardmatt]

Hey JJJ, I’ve just checked the user_nicename within the database and this is formatted the same i.e. “FirstName LastName” including the space.

This user was created manually initially (and the user profile worked). Since then I have installed a commercial membership plugin that may have had its hand at work here (although it really shouldn’t have).

I’ve done some further testing and have been able to see that the user_nicename formatting is changed when using a update function of the membership plugin. This is obviously the cause of the issue here.

Is there anywhere that the expected formatting of the user_nicename property is detailed so that I can refer the plugin author to it? Seems the fault lies with their coding.

Thanks for your input & help!

[woodwardmatt]

Ahh ok, do you remember any specifics (e.g. files used / changed) – I’ve only really analysed at a high-level so far.

@JJJ – Has this issue had any air time as yet?

[woodwardmatt]

@ebharding – I spotted the same issue also. The site I have been working on is currently using an offset of +9.5hrs so the “Freshness” column is always incorrect. The diff function for “Freshness” must not be taking the GMT offset into account.

[woodwardmatt]

If I understood @enderandrew right, he’s basically trying to prevent the default bbpress css file from being loaded and include his own css file for styling? It’s probably a bit too a specific a query for this thread maybe, but one that would be an excellent one to get a formal response to. I can foresee this will be a common query given the confusion over the bbpress templating already.

@enderandrew – Fancy starting the new thread? Perhaps we can get a approach detailed there that will prevent an additional CSS file being loaded.

[woodwardmatt]

@enderandrew – I can understand the dilemma mate. It’s far from ideal, but aside from editing the core files and having to maintain your changes on every update its about the best I can think of at this point.

That said just stripping out the include for the css file probably wouldn’t big that big a deal, may be worth investigating and weighing up your options.

[woodwardmatt]

@enderandrew – If it helps at all, all I did was leave the default setup in place, having installed the bbpress 2.0 plugin. Then include a new custom css file (in the directory of my wordpress theme) and link to this beneath the call to the wp_head() function in the wordpress theme (e.g. in my header.php) – to ensure the custom css file overrides the css included by bbpress.

I simply them overrode any of the styles that I wanted to change from the default. This is a fairly old-school approach to re-branding, but is perhaps one of the least invasive. This wont allow you to change very much of the layout but will allow you to change some of the styling to more closely match your brand and will give you a certain amount of protection against change as the plugin gets updated.

Hope that helps

[woodwardmatt]

That would make sense. I think the key message is for myself (or anyone else reading this afterwards) is that the templating for bbpress is not intended to follow the same structure / approach as wordpress – that’s definitely where my confusion started to creep in.

For the time being I’m likely to opt for overriding the CSS to provide the branding I require and stick with the current layouts in the default theme until the plugin’s had chance to settle in and some of the examples you mention have had chance to come about. I’d be interested to see more on the “bbPress Pack” approach in good time

Thanks for all the insight, most useful!

[woodwardmatt]

@John

Thanks for the quick response. Can certainly understand your rationale, sounds like one of those difficult choices had to be made and we are where we are. Thanks for clarifying for me (and all the other forum dwellers!)

From a branding point of view I think in my circumstances i’m going to have to jump into the approach you initially outlined at the start of this thread. I think this is probably likely for a lot of people sporting custom designs & brands etc. Otherwise you’d end up with a whole heap of templates in the core I guess.

That said, it would certainly seem sensible to have some key layouts defined in the core and provision for custom css styles as part of the main theme to cater for branding requirements. Was this the approach you were going for? (Just trying to get my head around it!)

[woodwardmatt]

@John – First of all, can I say what an awesome move to having bbpress as a plugin is! For the average user wishing to get forums up and running, you couldn’t ask for better! Nicely done!

On more of a developer level I, the same as many of the guys posting, are probably a little thrown on the templating side of things. Just to clarify, I’ve joyfully created my fair share of wordpress themes and was looking forwarding to getting to grips with bbpress to do similar. At this point I can’t help but feel the templating side of things seems a little crazy (read awkward and unintuitive) unless i’m misunderstanding.

By means of throwing my two pence into the discussion, I’d love to see the same approach for bbpress as was undertaken for wordpress. Namely the opposite of the following:

DO NOT put any custom themes in “/bbpress/bbp-themes/” as they will get wiped out when you update bbPress.

I love that bbpress has picked up the overall theme from wordpress but having the theme for the bbpress UI elements self-contained and separate from the wordpress theme would most likely clear up a fair bit of the confusion / frustrations. I know such a comment is easily made outside of understanding the full intricacies of the platform and that making such a change would no doubt have greater implications. However and to be honest, that was the approach I was expecting – most likely given the approach I was used to with wordpress. I know a similar comment has already been made, I’d just like to tip my hat to it, and raise it again for your consideration.

Request: Custom bbpress themes to reside in “/bbpress/bbp-themes/” without risk of removal upon updates.

Reason: To retain better / cleaner organisation of theme files and reduce complexity of theme development. (The replies / questions above are testimony to this)

Payment: Pizza of your choice!

Once again awesome job, and hugely appreciate all the hard work!