Hi
I seem to be having an all or nothing problem with groups.
this is what I want to happen
What is currently happening
If I set group VIEW privacy to "Only members" There is no way for new members to join the group, if I send them a link - they get to a page that says they don't have permission to view the page
If i set group privacy to 'only members'
No matter what combo I set the group setup to it's either all registered members can see everything in the group - or can't even request membership
I just want the group members to see the content of the group and registered members to be able to request access BEFORE THEY CAN SEE EVERY DETAIL AND EVERY DISCUSSION
what am i missing?
any help would be appreciated
thanks
maria
For my test, if I invite someone to the private group, they can see the group (not the content) and join. They can't find it on the site unless they are invited.
Hi Donna,
I know what your saying for some reason my site isn't working like that, for 1 I can only invite someone who is a 'friend', on my other two SE sites I have the exact same group settings and someone can search for the group, they can see the group name, but not any content, request to join and then once accecpted see everything.
On this new site a member can search and find the group and see everything before they join, or if i turn 'show group in search' off they can't see the group to request to join and if invited, they get an error page saying they don't have permission to join.
So I'm trying to work out why this is happening? any suggestions would be appreciated, the groups need to be private as people are discussing things they don't want the whole site membership to read and we need members to be able to 'find' the group to request to join.
what could be causing this issue do you think?
thanks
Maria
Check member level permissions for the Group plugin. I forgot to check with searching. When posting also please state the full version you are using. I'm testing on 4.9.4p4.
Hi Donna, thanks I have checked member level permissions and they are all ok. I have just upgraded to
Version 4.9.4p2 and didn't have this issue before theni believe this is a bug!
this is a BIG issue, that I really need to get resolved urgently, any further assistance would be appreciated
thanks
Maria
The invite friends is how things work for invitations.
I've tested and it works to invite a friend on 4.9.4p4 on a second testing site. The friend can see the group once they click the notification from the invitation.
Only invited people can see the private group even if a link is sent. This is how it is designed.
For the members that you need to access the group, if you friend them and invite them, it should work. It works for me on 3 different sites now (two demo testing sites and my live site) all on 4.9.4p4.
There are some plugins in the marketplace for advanced groups or pages. You may find different privacy settings and features in those that you need to enhance the functions.
The group does show in search results for members of the group.
Hi Donna
thanks again for your reply. Yes I agree with you your scenario is working that way on my site, but I have another scenario that is working on both my 4.7 sites but NOT on my 4.9.4p2
I don't have any group plugins installed - just Social Engine core group plugin
I would like members to see the various groups that are available and request membership to join those groups, NOT waiting to be invited by a friend. And I want those groups to have their discussions, events and wall hidden from the members unless they are a member of that group. This is how it is for 2 of the other sites I've developed, and how it was on this other site (4.9.4p2) before I upgraded from 4.7.
Do you have this option for your 4.9.4p4 site?
In my experience, you should be able to set the following parameters - and the group will show in search BUT won't show the discussions and events and wall posts of the group.
When people try to join this group, should they be allowed to join immediately, or should they be forced to wait for approval?
Who may see this group?
Who may post on this group's wall?
Who may upload photos to this group?
If I set this in 4.7 it works fine - there are three groups showing in the 'group' tab
and if a 'member' of the site - clicks on any of these (when they aren't a member of the group already and HAVEN'T had an invite from another group member they get the opportunity to request to join
however, on my 4.9.4p2 site, the settings are identical
But the group DOES NOT show up in search so a 'member' of the site can't request to join, we need it to show in search. This is the main issue
any further assistance would be appreciated
thanks and regards
Maria
This may have something to do with how Privacy throughout the modules was changed in recent months to prevent the display of any existence of content if the User doesn't match the Privacy Settings. I'm sure @Donna will chime in to explain this and correct me if I'm wrong.
In the past, some data still appeared even if the User didn't meet the Privacy criteria, but after selecting the content the Private Page msg appeared. For a lot of content, this wasn't good enough (think photos or video thumbnails and titles that everyone can see, but you don't want everyone to see). Basically before, the 'Show On..' setting controlled what was displayed in certain pages and widgets regardless of the Privacy setting, then the Privacy kicked in when you tried to access the content. Now 'Show On ...' = Yes means Show On... IF User meets Privacy Setting, rather than show to everyone. So this is more of a Pre-filter. So now Privacy is more rigid than it used to be (or should I say it's now not as lax as it used to be).
Another Client recently posted a similar issue with the catch-22 of forcing all Member Profiles to Friends only, which then prevents Users from seeing those Users in order to initiate a Friend Request.
At least that is my understanding, and I could obviously be wrong so hopefully @Donna will chime in (and even delete my post if it is wrong, do as to not cause more confusion).
thanks @gs I appreciate your reply. Sorry but where do I find "Show on" = yes? am i missing another setting somewhere?
Essentially if i have the option to "Yes include group in search results" - I would have thought that group would "Show up in Search results", Sorry but where do I find "Show on" = yes? am i missing another setting somewhere? Or are you talking about the same setting? I have it set to Show in Search in the group details section, but as I mentioned above - it's NOT showing.
Hopefully @Donna will be able to shine some more light.
Donna said:
The invite friends is how things work for invitations.
I've tested and it works to invite a friend on 4.9.4p4 on a second testing site. The friend can see the group once they click the notification from the invitation.
Only invited people can see the private group even if a link is sent. This is how it is designed.
For the members that you need to access the group, if you friend them and invite them, it should work. It works for me on 3 different sites now (two demo testing sites and my live site) all on 4.9.4p4.
There are some plugins in the marketplace for advanced groups or pages. You may find different privacy settings and features in those that you need to enhance the functions.
The group does show in search results for members of the group.
It works as the above. Due to the privacy fixes.
thanks Donna, I understand about the 'invite' but what is the 'show in search results' option for ? if you can't see the group in search? what am I missing?
Donna said:
Donna said:
The group does show in search results for members of the group.
It is so members of the group can find it if they have a lot of groups they are a member of.
I am sure a third party expert can make a customization for you or one of the plugins available at the marketplace can probably do what you need.
Here's the issue relayed by other clients, including on my own site. I can use my own site as an example here so as not to divulge any client site details.
On my site we have authors. I allow any genre on the site as it's for all authors, readers, agents, etc. We can have fans of children's book authors on the site - that means kids and their parents.
We can have erotica authors (and do) on the site. They make their content private in order for none of the images and text to spill into the "family" friendly main areas.
Imagine their groups with adult images were shown in the search. Someone searching for a children's book group may accidentally find one of the erotica groups if they showed in the search and they could see adult images as the group main avatar shows and some of those group names are also erotic in nature as that's what they cater to.
As we had to quickly fix the privacy in all areas of the site (as everything was messed up before that), this is how we fixed it in order to resolve those situations. We did plan on looking at better methods in the future but it might require an overhaul of the search and privacy modules so it needs research into what would be best for all involved.
Long explanation but it's how we had to do it for now. Sorry it's not what you need. It's so hard to please all when there are so many ways people can use our script and we do try very hard to please as many as we can.
thanks Donna I really do appreciate your detailed response. I guess I was confused as two of my sites allow me to do what I want to do and this one won't so I thought it must be a setting I was missing or a bug. I understand now, thanks so much for the clarifications
kind regards
Maria
You're welcome. If you would like, you could add a detailed feature request for how you would like privacy addressed. If you have more than one thing you want (privacy, search, etc) please put those in separate requests. There's a detailed explanation in the feature request section (stickied post there) mentioning what information we need and you can copy and paste the stuff we mention to make it easier.
==>"Sorry but where do I find "Show on" = yes? am i missing another setting somewhere? Essentially if i have the option to "Yes include group in search results"
My apologies - it's a similar setting available in many of the 3PD Plugins I have, but it's basically the same thing. They too had to change their privacy funcionality to mimic what SE was doing. @Donna's example is a further example of what I was referring to - so that nothing appears if the User doesn't meet the Privacy criteria, rather than letting them see some things but just prevent the page/content from loading.
My thoughts about this as an FR is to either include an ADMINcp setting for ADMIN to determine which way to go (i.e. old way vs. new way) or to allow the User to do so when posting each content. Not sure which is better from a legal perspective.
The Show in Search results is a core feature in each of the core plugins. It is in the groups plugin. When editing a group or creating one, it is one of the settings and is shown in the screenshot that @Maria posted above.
Make sure they are friends of the user inviting them as posted above. As you have a thread for this issue, we can continue in that thread.