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  • Paul Gibbs 12:47 pm on March 20, 2011 Permalink | Reply  

    Welcome Pack update for WordPress 3.1 

    I’ve eventually updated Welcome Pack for WordPress 3.1. It should become available on wordpress.org shortly.

    Welcome Pack is a BuddyPress plugin that enhances the new user experience. When a user registers on your site, Welcome Pack lets you automatically send them a friend or group invitation, a Welcome Message and can redirect them to a Start Page. You can also customise the default emails sent by BuddyPress to ensure that they match the brand and tone of your site.

     

    • Mike Kennedy 6:10 am on August 16, 2011 Permalink | Reply

      Hey Paul, when will Welcome Pack be ready for 1.5? Really need it :)

      • Paul Gibbs 6:11 am on August 16, 2011 Permalink | Reply

        After BuddyPress 1.5 is out; I simply don’t have time at the moment.

  • Paul Gibbs 8:39 pm on October 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags:   

    Achievements 2.0 released 

    I’m happy to announce the newest release of my Achievements for BuddyPress plugin. Available immediately, Achievements gives your BuddyPress community fresh impetus by promoting and rewarding social interaction with challenges, badges and points.

    Be sure to visit its own website at achievementsapp.com. I’ve included an introductory video into the below post, so you can learn about the plugin and see it in action.

     

    • nahum 9:44 pm on October 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Nice job, Paul. This is the best.

    • Arthur Freitas 5:15 am on October 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      This is great, Paul!
      Congratulations.

    • Hachi 12:36 pm on October 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Spanish translation will be done soon ;)

  • Paul Gibbs 6:06 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Joining the BuddyPress core team 

    As if the release of BuddyPress 1.2.6 wasn’t exciting enough by itself, John James Jacoby has today announced that Boone B. Gorges and I have joined the BuddyPress core team; this basically means we get the keys to the car! I am extremely thankful to Andy Peatling and John for this honour, and I am excited beyond words to be working with them on the next versions of BuddyPress.
    I consider this to be one of my highest personal achievements this year, in addition to presenting at WordCamp Ireland and WordCamp UK. If any of you are attending WordCamp New York this week, I’d love to say hi. I am also attending WordCamp Netherlands in November.

    This brings the BuddyPress core team up to five people — Andy, John, Marshall, Boone and I — and puts the project into fifth gear. I’m humbled, honoured and hugely happy. Let’s rock!

    EDIT: I can’t make WC NL. Have a great time those attending!

     

    • Matt 6:39 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congratulations, Paul! It’s excellent to see BuddyPress in such capable hands, and it was wonderful to meet you this weekend at #wcnyc. Keep up the great work!

    • Coen Jacobs 8:35 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congratulations! I must admit that I’m not that into BuddyPress yet, but I need to make some time to jump into it. Let’s talk about it at WordCamp Netherlands! :)

    • Mark Hahnel 9:48 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congratulations! Really looking forward to 1.2.6!

    • Tony Scott 10:59 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congrats on joining the BuddyPress core team, Paul!

    • Shaun Hare 11:17 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congratulations Paul
      Time to dip into buddy press me thinks
      Looking forward to the good things ahead

    • Paul Gibbs 10:50 pm on October 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Thank you everyone :)

    • Bowe Frankema 1:15 am on October 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      You are THE man Paul.. well done mate!

    • Paul Hastings 7:00 am on October 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Glad you’re on the team. Well done and well-deserved. :)

    • Arthur 11:00 pm on October 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Congratulations Paul.
      You really deserve it.

    • John Lynn 7:20 am on October 28, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I realize this is late, but is very well deserved and will be a boon (excuse the pun) to the BP community. I can’t wait to see the progress that’s made with the extra core developers.

  • Paul Gibbs 5:14 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply
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    Achievements 2.0 October update 

    The first version of Achievements is almost ready for release. However, BuddyPress 1.2.6, which Achievements requires, isn’t. I will not be releasing Achievements until BuddyPress 1.2.6 has been.

    Consider this a private beta period. If you want your hands on Achievements now, and know how to use SVN and how to obtain the BuddyPress 1.2 branch (this will become the 1.2.6 release), leave a reply here and I’ll send you the details.

    I apologise for any inconvenience this delay will cause your projects, but I’ll be using this extra time to continue improving Achievements.

     

    • Dawn 7:11 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Yes please!!

      • Paul Gibbs 10:52 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Email en route!

    • donnacha | WordSkill 7:18 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Great, keep up the good work!

    • mike 9:35 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Yes, por favor! =)

      • Paul Gibbs 10:52 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Email sent!

    • Rafel 11:52 am on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Yes, please! btw Great work!

      • Paul Gibbs 12:09 pm on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ve sent you an email, thanks

    • James 7:07 pm on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Please. :)

      • Paul Gibbs 7:21 pm on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        James — I think I’ve sent the details to you previously; those same details still apply. Let me know if you never got it previously (a few weeks ago), and I’ll re-send. Cheers.

        • ironicbond 2:38 am on October 4, 2010 Permalink

          D’oh. I did get it but missed it in my inbox. Thanks. Looking forward to trying it out. :)

    • Linus F 3:31 pm on October 4, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Yes please!

      • Paul Gibbs 10:40 pm on October 4, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Linus
        I’ve just emailed you the details, thanks.

    • mrdink 2:03 pm on October 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I would love to try this out. Looks like exactly what I need. Great work!

    • Dave M 7:31 am on October 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Sounds great! May I try it out?!

      • Paul Gibbs 5:55 pm on October 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ve sent an email to you

    • Armin 10:44 pm on October 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Sure why not, send me a copy.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:40 am on October 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi – I think you were already on my mailing list. If you haven’t received my previous emails, let me know and I’ll resend. Thanks.

        • Armin 10:25 pm on October 8, 2010 Permalink

          I checked my email. There wasn’t any previous email.

        • Paul Gibbs 10:31 pm on October 8, 2010 Permalink

          I’ve just sent the details to the email address which you left on your comment.

        • Armin 10:44 pm on October 8, 2010 Permalink

          Thanks received it.

    • Isis 5:55 pm on October 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Why is it you are unable to create new achievements in Version 1.23, but you are able to create additional categories? This seems to be a bug- maybe it didn’t install correctly on my wordpress install? Doesn’t look like there’s a support forum for this plugin version that’s active to ask others if they’ve run into the same problem, which is why I’m posting here.

      As for Achievements 2.0 – can one create their own achievements? Example: I have a founder’s club for the first 1,000 users on my site, along with other special achievements and awards related to polls and quizzes. I would also like to create custom badges/award achievements for special posts/forum topics that are really outstanding. There should be a way for the website owner to add custom achievements. Thank you.

      • Isis 5:57 pm on October 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        oh, never mind. I see it’s going to happen in 2.0. :-)

        • Paul Gibbs 7:30 pm on October 7, 2010 Permalink

          ;)

    • Eliotto 9:52 pm on October 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I would very much love to try this, thank you.

    • Mark 4:13 pm on October 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Please send me details when you can!

    • Arthur 10:55 pm on October 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I’d love to try it.

    • Vikram Jhaveri 6:41 am on October 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Just a feature request. Can we have external triggers? I plan to use this in my wordpress flash arcade. I would like to trigger an achievement from the flash game. I can run any php, database code through it. So any ways to have custom triggers for achievements?

      • Paul Gibbs 4:30 pm on October 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        All you need to do would be to build a function in WordPress that intercepts an appropriate AJAX request generated by your external app, and it’d work. Email me if you need a pointer how to do this.

  • Paul Gibbs 11:06 pm on August 14, 2010 Permalink | Reply
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    Achievements 2.0; lights, camera and actions 

    In Achievements 2.0, there will be two types of Achievement; badges and events. A badge is awarded by a site admin, whereas an event is awarded automatically when its criteria are met.

    When you create an event Achievement, there is a drop-down list of actions to choose from. Currently there are twenty eight core WordPress and core BuddyPress actions integrated. The full list is after the fold, and I’ve love to know if you can think of any that I’ve missed. (More …)

     

    • Hachi 10:35 am on August 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hello, I think one of the more important things to implement are the repetition events.

      I mean, when a user replies 100 private messages, he gets the achievement “Secret Agent”; when an user changes his avatar 10 times, he gets “Chameleon, or, Cunning”; When the user changes his status in his profile, 50 times, he gets “Orator”.

      And Other thing i want to ask is, the badges you have posted, are unique aren’t them? I mean, you don’t get the achievement EVERY time you change your avatar, only once.

      Still offering Spanish and French translations. ^^

      Congrats for the plugin.

      • Paul Gibbs 3:59 pm on August 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Thanks Hachi
        Don’t worry, what you’ve described is already possible. You can configure an event to need to happen ‘x’ many times before the Achievement is unlocked.

        I’ll send you an email soon, I want to test that the translations are working properly :)

        • Hachi 4:43 pm on August 15, 2010 Permalink

          I’ll stay tuned!

    • Simon 11:03 am on August 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hey Paul, this sounds really, really good. Would still love to test the hell out of it (have not found your email, but now you have mine).

      • Paul Gibbs 3:55 pm on August 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Cheers Simon, I’ve just sent you an email.

    • Mark Hahnel 12:34 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul,

      I commented on your last update before noticing this one! When is 1.2.6 coming then? Are we waiting for that before the public beta is released?

      Thanks
      Mark

      • Paul Gibbs 12:46 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Mark
        I believe BuddyPress 1.2.6 is targeted to be released by the end of this week; it’s not holding up Achievements’ progress in any way.

        • Mark Hahnel 1:28 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink

          Tremendous. But did you not say that achievements will need 1.2.6 to run? So the plugin still has a bit of time before release? Looking forward to it. Cheers Paul.

        • Paul Gibbs 9:49 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink

          Achievements does need 1.2.6 to run, yes. But as I expect BP 1.2.6 to be out before Achievements, that’s not a problem.

        • Mark Hahnel 11:26 am on August 17, 2010 Permalink

          Thanks Paul, if you need any help with beta testing, I’d also like to get my hands on a copy :)

    • Alex W 9:43 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hello DJ Paul,

      I’m launching a new community site with my company very soon — later this week — and we’d love to use Achievements 2.0 with it. There’s going to be a strong “Game” aspect to the site so we really feel the badges would add a lot for the users.

      Any chance we can help you out with the beta testing?
      Please contact me via my email address here.
      Best,
      Alex

      • Paul Gibbs 9:49 pm on August 16, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Will do, thanks for writing Alex

    • Armin 3:30 am on August 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Nice. Hope to use the plugin soon.

      • Paul Gibbs 9:38 pm on September 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Not long until the end of September :)

    • ironicbond 6:19 pm on August 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hey Paul,

      I’ve been jonesing to see v2.0 for a while too. However now I have a new beta buddypress site running mulitsite and would love to try it out and help out with testing… that is if you still need testers.

      James

      • Paul Gibbs 7:48 pm on August 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I sure do! I’ll be in touch either this weekend or next week, want to get some more done before adding more testers. Thanks

        • Armin 7:25 am on August 19, 2010 Permalink

          By the way, if you are ever in need of more testers. Contact me, I would be more than happy to fully test the plugin’s abilities.

        • James 9:10 am on September 3, 2010 Permalink

          Possible to get on the beta testing action now? :D

        • Paul Gibbs 12:02 pm on September 3, 2010 Permalink

          Hi James
          I’ll send you an email, hopefully at the end of the weekend or next week once i’ve got a bit more done. Thanks.

    • modemlooper 12:24 am on August 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Thanks Paul, installed it and the only two things that don’t work are images and unlocking.

      When you go to the image page it shows the images but there is nothing to click or save it and I set up an event and after doing the sequence it did not result in an achievement.

      I know your still working on it.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:25 am on August 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Can we keep bug reports to email for now please? You have probably not uploaded all of the files, or you’ve put the plugin in a directory called “Achievements”; it needs to be “achievements” (no capital).

    • J A R 2:03 pm on August 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul,

      Launching a new TV network site on WordPress/BuddyPress and would love to test the new version of the plug-in, if you’re still looking for beta testers.

      Thanks!
      J

      • Paul Gibbs 8:00 pm on August 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ll contact you, thanks J.

    • Kevin Wallace 9:46 am on August 29, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Paul,

      Looks like its coming along, launching a internal system that tracks updates and awards points to employees. Eventually it will be developed into something like this: http://www.bunchball.com/ . So if your looking for an extra beta tester, I would be more than glad to help out.

      Thanks
      Kevin

      • Paul Gibbs 9:48 am on August 29, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Kevin, thanks for writing. I’ll drop you an email :)

    • Mark Hahnel 4:05 pm on August 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul, any news, can we do any testing yet?

      • Paul Gibbs 5:56 pm on August 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        HI Mark, I’ll send you an email.

    • BJ 7:45 pm on August 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul. We’re looking to enhance our community points system on our Buddypress install, and can’t wait to try out Achievements 2.0.

      If you are open to beta testing, we’d love to give it a go.

      • Paul Gibbs 9:43 pm on September 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hello BJ
        I am very sorry for the slow reply; your comment was filtered as spam accidentally — sorry! I’ll be in contact soon about adding more testers.

    • Blaine Johnson 7:51 pm on August 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Would be happy to do some beta testing in our Buddypress community.

      Sooooo looking forward to 2.0!

      BJ

    • Ben Matthews 10:20 pm on August 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul,

      Have you thought about adding awards for:

      • When a user connects their profile to Twitter
      • When a user connects their profile to Facebook
      • When a user shares content to Twitter
      • When a user shares content to Facebook

      Not sure if this would be possible?

      Also, we’ve hired a designer to customise our Achievements badges – hopefully will be fully up and running in a few weeks :D

      Cheers,
      Ben

      • Paul Gibbs 11:30 pm on August 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Ben

        If there’s a WordPress/BuddyPress plugin that provides those features then Achievements can support it. Prior to release I intend to add support in the core for the most popular BuddyPress plugins.
        It’s also built so it’s really easy for developers to add their own Achievement types in, too.

        Really cool to hear that you’re using it

        • Ben Matthews 11:40 pm on September 6, 2010 Permalink

          Hi Paul,

          Take a look at Facestream and Tweetstream, two mainstream plugins that allow you to connect your activity stream to Twitter and Facebook.

          Cheers,
          Ben

        • Paul Gibbs 9:38 pm on September 7, 2010 Permalink

          Thanks for the tips Ben!

    • Nuno Tomás 11:27 am on September 1, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I’m launching a site with buddypress and this is the feature I was looking for… Can we test this out? Thanks.

      • Paul Gibbs 11:01 pm on September 1, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yep — I’ll email you. Thanks.

    • Ricardo 5:12 am on September 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi!
      At first glance, the only thing I think it’s missing it’s favorites.

      Ricardo

      • Paul Gibbs 7:49 am on September 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi; how do you mean? Email me if you have specific feedback about the alpha. Thanks.

    • Paul 12:02 pm on September 4, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hello,

      you did a great plugin. Do you can say when you publish the new version? You can send me the current beta version. I would test it :)

      • Paul Gibbs 12:08 pm on September 4, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi
        it’ll be released by or at the end of September. I may add more testers in a week or so, I’ll be in contact.

        • Armin 2:49 am on September 5, 2010 Permalink

          Send me an email whenever, I’ll be available to test out this great plugin and give you detailed feedback on possible problems.

        • Paul Gibbs 9:46 pm on September 7, 2010 Permalink

          Will do Armin, thank you

    • Alex 5:03 pm on September 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi there.

      I’m on the way to switch from elgg to buddypress. The reason: your uncoming plugin Achievements 2.0!

      I think this will be the most important plugin for buddypress, okay… one of them :-)

      atm I create some badges, an alpha/beta-version of archiements 2.0 may help me testing …

      – Alex

      • Paul Gibbs 9:47 pm on September 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hello Alex, thank you very much for writing.
        I will contact you towards the end of the week with details, I am adding more testers then :)

    • Gavin Stone 1:01 am on September 8, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      will there be a way to award an achievement based on commenting on a specific author’s post? Is that even possible?

      • Paul Gibbs 7:11 am on September 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Gavin
        Not out-of-the-box in version 1. Internally, it’s possible, so you could code it in yourself. The big thing is there mightn’t be a very easy way of editing the UI on the add/edit screens to add an option. I’m currently working on adding a similar option (to specify which Group an Achievement works on) so I’m going to make sure this is possible for a third-party to add onto the first version, and I’ll add it myself to the second release (unless I find myself with lots of spare time!)

    • Thomas 9:05 am on September 8, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      WOW! This will be PERFECT for my BuddyPress travel photoblog at FavTrip.com

      Cannot WAIT for this to be available.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:09 am on September 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Glad to hear it, Thomas! Thanks for your comments. End of September is getting closer!

    • Vikram Jhaveri 6:44 pm on September 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Could i get a beta test version. I had stopped by your site a month or so back. Today it just popped my to do list, i am looking to put this into a arcade game system with cubepoints. Will appreciate it.

      • Paul Gibbs 1:25 am on September 11, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’m planning to add more testers 1 or 2 weeks, so I’ll be in contact then. Thank you for getting in contact.

    • Mark Goodway 9:32 am on September 14, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Wonderful plugin. Is it possible to give action for a category of post? Can u add action to upload photo and video?

      • Paul Gibbs 10:09 am on September 14, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Not per-category post at the moment, but I’ve a big list of actions to add so I’ll try. Do you mean upload video through the WP Media Library or another plugin?

        Thanks for leaving a message Mark :)

        • Mark Goodway 11:46 am on September 14, 2010 Permalink

          if it is possible with plugin (for example Bp Gallery)

          thanks for your quick answer :)

      • Paul Gibbs 4:28 pm on September 19, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Mark
        Just to update: Post per category achievements won’t be in the first release, though it is possible to add manual support for this with a short piece of code in a theme’s functions.php. I’ll be documenting this and any other snippets upon release.

    • Bowe Frankema 12:18 am on September 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Mark and Paul.. there are action available for BP-Gallery from Brajesh his plugin:

      // BP Gallery Upload
      add_action(‘gallery_media_upload_complete’;

      // BP Gallery Upload
      add_action(‘gallery_media_after_delete’;

      Brajesh provided these for another plugin, but could be use for achievements as well

    • Peter Tandlund 3:04 pm on September 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul,
      The plugin is looking great! Is it possible to be in the beta test?

      Appreciate the work you put in to this.
      /Peter

      • Paul Gibbs 8:40 pm on September 15, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Peter, thanks.

        I’m aiming to get out a release out at the end of the month. If I add any more testers before then, I’ll email you. Thanks.

    • EpicWindustries.org 4:47 pm on September 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I’m hoping to use your achievements system in an ARG I’m running in November for an Arts and Disability group. It’s the whole reason I’m building the online part of the game with buddypress! Can’t wait to see the new release and all the wonderful things it does.
      -Happily waiting for the end of the month.

      • Paul Gibbs 6:42 pm on September 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Very interesting sounding idea, looking forward to see how it works out

    • Armin 9:32 pm on September 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Will there be hooks for this plugin, because I was also hoping users get trophies for voting on X number of polls. WP-Polls plugin.

      • Paul Gibbs 8:22 pm on September 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yep, definitely. There will be developer documentation – in most cases it’s about twenty lines of code (and that includes blank lines for spacing!)

    • Ali 4:33 pm on September 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      looks great – can’t wait for it to be out.

      my suggestion/question – would it be possible to create custom-made badges that could only be earned by being awarded by an admin, or moderator?

      for example – my website is a gaming community (physical, not online). we host tournaments and i would love to award the winner of a tournament with an achievement that says they won “X” tournament. this would be a condition that is not met online, so it would have to be manually entered, which is fine by me. the question is, does the plugin support this kind of manual add-on?

      i’d love to test if you’re still looking for testers, otherwise i’ll just wait patiently!

      • Paul Gibbs 4:43 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yes, this will be possible.

      • Paul Gibbs 4:44 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Also, sorry for the late reply — I had a bunch of comments get caught by Akismet accidentally.

    • Ali 7:18 pm on September 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      d’oh, I apparently didn’t read everything. you have already answered my question in basically the first line of this post. i do, however, have a follow-up question:

      with the Badges, can admins assign categories? in my above example, badges could be awarded for winning tournament. so i’d like to make a “tournament winner” category, and then create an Event where a member might get achievements for earning 5, or 10 “tournament winner” badges. i’d also like to make a “tournament participant” category, which would go out to all attendees, and then create events based on the number of tournaments they’ve attended.

      would being awarded a badge count as a condition for an event? also would these badge categories be possible?

      • Paul Gibbs 7:41 pm on September 23, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        You can unlock Achievements for unlocking Achievements, yes. There is not any support for “categories” of Achievements, because that is a presentational concern for your site.

        Rather than having lots of pots of Achievements, so to speak, as in the old version 1 of the plugin, just imagine you’ve got one big pot for all of them. You can still do what you want.

        The only thing not possible (at the moment?) is a sort of meta-Achievement, which would unlock when certain other Achievements have been unlocked.

    • Armin 10:35 pm on September 27, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Any specific date on release? I can almost smell it. The end of the month is almost here :)

      • Paul Gibbs 10:54 pm on September 27, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        As you might know, Achievements requires BuddyPress 1.2.6. I believe if I release a .zip version of Achievements before BuddyPress 1.2.6 is out, I will get lots of people saying that “it doesn’t work”, because in my experience, users don’t often read the documentation. I am still thinking about if I want to give out the SVN details or do a “release candidate, you’ve been warned” version if BuddyPress 1.2.6 is not released by then.

        I need to talk to the BuddyPress team and find out when 1.2.6 is coming (it looks like it must be pretty soon).

        Other than that, things are on-course. :)

    • Armin 10:19 pm on September 28, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      So the plugin is pretty much ready all it needs is the buddypress 1.2.6?

      Ok. thanks.

      • Paul Gibbs 12:12 pm on October 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Pretty much yep.

    • jamie 6:17 pm on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Very Cool!

      Will it be possible to have different levels of an achievement? For example, when a user submits their first post they will earn “post newbie”, at 50 posts they will earn “post master” and at 200 earn “post guru”. Obviously these achievements would be automatically awarded right?

      Thanks, and can’t wait for this to be rolled out!

      • Paul Gibbs 6:33 pm on October 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Jamie. To do this, you’d need to create, for example, two different Achievements. There isn’t a way to have multiple levels of a single Achievement.

    • Computer courses 4:39 pm on October 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I want to incorporate this when I form a BuddyPress group on my computer courses website. I want every student to have achievements.

  • Paul Gibbs 10:03 pm on August 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags:   

    Achievements 2.0 update 

    I’ve been re-working my Achievements plugin for some time now and, with the invaluable aid of some amazing testers, it is getting closer to a beta release. Achievements will require a minimum of WordPress 3.0.1 and BuddyPress 1.2.6, and it will work on both regular and multisite variants of WordPress. In the next few weeks, I will be launching a dedicated site for Achievements. In addition to explaining why every BuddyPress-powered website should use Achievements, it will contain screencasts, walkthroughs, developer and site admin documentation, as well as support options (both free and premium).

    Enough pitch! As with any software that is still in development, certain sections of it are more finalised and robust than others. I’m excited to share with you the following screenshots of these more finished sections, and I look forward to reading your comments here, by email, or on Twitter. (More …)

     

    • Andrew Wetzel (@CircleReader) 10:11 pm on August 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Looking forward to working this into my site redesign – thanks!

      • Paul Gibbs 7:19 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Great to hear that, Andrew!

    • Daithi 10:47 pm on August 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Loving the (alpha) plugin, wish all plugins were coded so well.
      Looking forward to the proper release…

    • Ben matthews 11:49 pm on August 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul,

      first of all, congratulations on getting Achievemets to it’s current state – fantastic work.

      Realise I haven’t been helpful in testing code, but hopefully a few UX comments will help:

      1. Could you post a list of complete achievements? I imagine that a lot of users will want to customise their achievemmt badges so a list would be useful to brief designers with

      2. Can you provide stock images for a price? Might help to monetize the app, and give new users a headstart. Much like premium WP themes take the effort out of getting an attractive site from the get go

      3. With the predefined achievements, is there a way of giving them different levels, eg 100 comments, 250 comments, 500 comments, 1000 comments, etc?

      4. Is there an option for users to suggest new achievements? Something Foursquare doesn’t seem to take much advantage of (as yet)

      5, What’s the release date? :)

      Cheers,
      Ben

      • Paul Gibbs 7:28 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Ben

        1. Achievements are created by the admin, see edit/create screenshot in the article. What you probably mean is, what actions can Achievements use? (i.e. on blog post, on comment) I’ve got about 15 actions integrated at the moment, and I’m going to spend this weekend working on adding more. I’ll let you know a complete list soon.

        2. It’s something I’d have to outsource, but which I’m looking into. I love the idea.

        3. There aren’t any predefined Achievements. In general terms, if you have an Achievement that you want to trigger after “10 blog comments” and “20 blog comments”, you’ll have to build two separate Achievements.

        4. Not currently. The implementation of this may be too site-specific to do well; some people may want to collect ideas via blog, or twitter, and so on. I’ll have a think about this.

        5. I need to finish up a couple of screens before I’m going to publicly commit to anything. And, hey; you’ve got the alpha version already ;)

    • donnacha | WordSkill 12:03 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Paul, thanks for all your work on this amazing plugin, thanks to all your testers too.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:22 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Thanks donnacha!

    • michelle 12:14 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hey Paul,

      Thanks for the update and all your input on this plugin, it really is amazing and I’m itching to use it. My designer is working on our badges as I type :)

      I’m sure I’ll need input from you soon so will be in touch.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:29 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Nice to hear from you again, Michelle. Thanks!

    • Mark Smalley 12:54 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Now that’s an upgrade!

      Seems this plugin is coming along VERY nicely – so glad to see it reach version 2.0.

      Can’t wait to use this within a production environment…

    • Armin 1:43 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Nice update, you’ve renewed and strengthened my hopes :)

    • Armin 1:45 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      By the way, is there an option to change the points slug to something else like Trophies? because I use Points slug for CubePoints.

      • Paul Gibbs 7:31 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yes. Unlike BuddyPress, you can change all of the slugs. i.e. from example.com/achievements/change-picture to example.com/badgers/mushroom

    • Arthur Freitas 3:57 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Wakakakaka.

      I need translate use it!

      • Paul Gibbs 7:30 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        As soon as it is nearly ready, I’m going to ask you to translate it, don’t worry ;)

    • modemlooper 8:23 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      If you want you could Jack Foursquares badges

      http://thekruser.com/foursquare-badges/

      • Paul Gibbs 12:45 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Sounds a bit naughty ;)

    • hnla 10:47 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Paul this looks like stunning work, very polished! Have to admit I hadn’t really taken note of ‘Achievements’ before.

    • 21cdb 11:26 am on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Great work! Looks awesome so far …

      We have a Gamecenter on our upcoming site. Say the Flashgame developer is going to build in some hooks into his code (e.g. if one finished a level = user gets 100 Points), are we able to build an Achievement around it?

      • Paul Gibbs 12:45 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        As long as you have a way of calling a WordPress action hook, you can.

    • dawn 2:16 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Cannot WAIT for this! Cubepoints integration has never worked as well as I would like on our site and I’m looking forward to replacing it with this. Thank you for all of your hard work!!!

      • Paul Gibbs 5:43 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Thanks dawn, it’s always exciting to hear about people considering using the plugin

    • Linusf 2:39 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I think this in the top of my most anticipated plugins list, I cannot wait for a release!

    • Hachi 3:09 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      VERY interested.

      If you need translations, I can translate it to Spanish, and French.

      I’ll stay tuned for more!

      • Paul Gibbs 5:43 pm on August 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ll be in contact nearer the time, thanks :)

    • nahum 12:21 am on August 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Amazing-ness!

    • Peter Kirn 4:04 am on August 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Brilliant! I was toying around with some ideas around this very concept and… lo and behold, there it is! (That happens regularly with WP plug-ins, sure, but not ones with so specific an idea. That only tells me this is an idea that’s intuitive, whose time has come!)

      I’m happy to help contribute – thought of uploading to GitHub / bitbucket etc., even in raw form?

      • Paul Gibbs 12:39 pm on August 7, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        It is available but I’m reluctant to give out the URL here because I don’t want people to think that it is finished (I’m still classing this as alpha-quality). Send me an email if you want to give it a test drive to see about contributing, etc.

    • Patrick 3:53 pm on August 8, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I’ve been looking forward to this since I played with the initial release wa-a-ay back in circa BP1.1!

      Being able to award achievements incrementally (1 comment, 10 comments, 100 comments, etc) is a must to encourage participation and I think I’ll be exploiting the badge feature to its fullest on this.

      On that point, I’m wondering if it’ll be possible to combine several achievements, or create an achievement that’s awarded when several actions are completed. That way, once a user completes actions 1, 2 & 3, award “Bronze” status badge; complete actions 4, 5 & 6, award “Silver” status badge; actions 7, 8 & 9, “Gold” badge and so on.

      Of course, some users would be tempted to abuse a system such as described in the previous 2 paragraphs by completing the required actions to get the points/badge, and then deleting them. Ex: create 100 “dummy” comments to get “Bronze” badge, then delete all dummy comments.

      There would have to be some kind of point retraction system. Maybe “award” a negative point value for deletion?

      Anyhoo, my fingers are itching to play with this again, and get it integrated on my site which I hope to launch by year’s end.

      Thanks so much for creating this plugin!

      • Paul Gibbs 5:13 pm on August 8, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Patrick

        There’s no currently no way to define multiple requirements for each action. It’s not impossible to add such a feature but it wouldn’t make it into the first release.

        Points are never retracted automatically. I’m not trying to create a virtual currency, and a site could hide the points total all together. There will be a way for an admin to unreward an achievement from a user, and to change that person s points total.

        • Patrick 5:44 pm on August 8, 2010 Permalink

          Hi Paul,

          Thanks for a speedy reply!

          My site will cater to folks recovering from alcoholism and drug abuse. This is a demographic that is notorious for finding loopholes and exploiting them (and I speak from experience ;-) ). So a way to remove points/awards is, at least for my needs, a requirement. If it has to be done manually, so be it… at least it can be done.

          Thanks!

    • Mark Hahnel 5:19 pm on August 9, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Perfect. Except for the minimum buddypress 1.2.6, is it tested on 1.2.5?

      • Paul Gibbs 6:30 pm on August 9, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Mark; it won’t work on 1.2.5 (if you’re technically-minded, it needs bp_core_current_time() introduced in http://trac.buddypress.org/changeset/3142/). There’s only bug fixes between 1.2.5 and what will be 1.2.6.

      • Paul Gibbs 10:27 pm on August 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ve also just committed support for the activity stream secondary avatars… something so new it only was put into BuddyPress last night. So that’s another reason!

        • Mark Hahnel 9:16 am on August 16, 2010 Permalink

          1.2.6 it is then, any eta on a public beta yet? I’m getting itchy fingers!

    • MBA 7:44 pm on August 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      This is sooper!
      You’ve rekindled my hopes! I’ll run re-start a site I own, rechristened & from scratch!
      I’m bootstrapping, setting up a team here. And our to-be-team may in some(substantial)time, get into a position to contribute too!
      Do meanwhile, let me know if I can taste it on from the alpha release, please. I can contribute with bug-reporting or UI/UX suggestions, as much as possible from my end. Keenly awaiting your reply. :) :)
      And alas, I hope I could’ve email-subscribed to this comment thread :(

      • Paul Gibbs 10:30 pm on August 10, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hey MBA, thanks for posting. If you send me an email, we’ll chat about the alpha.

    • Dominic 6:36 am on September 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I am getting that tingly feeling (and not the kind you have to see the doctor about). VERY excited to see this come out, let us know soon!

      • Paul Gibbs 6:52 am on September 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        End of September; not long now!

  • Paul Gibbs 12:06 am on July 3, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Shameless copied from Matt Mullenweg’s blog, from Jonathan Haidt in The Happiness Hypothesis:
    Most people approach their work in one of three ways: as a job, a career, or a calling. If you see your work as a job, you do it only for the money, you look at the clock frequently while dreaming about the weekend ahead, and you probably pursue hobbies, which satisfy your effectance needs more thoroughly than does your work. If you see your work as a career, you have larger goals of advancement, promotion, and prestige. If you see your work as a calling, however, you find your work intrinsically fulfilling you are not doing it to achieve something else. You see your work as contributing to the greater good or as playing a role in some larger enterprise the worth of which seems obvious to you. You have frequent experiences of flow during the work day, and you neither look forward to “quitting time” nor feel the desire to shout, “Thank God it’s Friday!” You would continue to work, perhaps even without pay, if you suddenly became very wealthy.
     

    • Michelle 6:27 pm on July 13, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Really like this & totally agree with it :)

      • Paul Gibbs 9:12 pm on July 13, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yep, it’s something I really identify with. Thanks for leaving a comment :)

    • CODEHX 5:17 pm on July 19, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      I can’t wait to be able to make achievements.. It’s going to be awesome.

      • Paul Gibbs 8:55 pm on July 19, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Thanks, Codexh! I’m going to put up a lot more information in the next couple of weeks

    • Bowe Frankema 4:45 pm on August 26, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Really nice if you can fully relate to #3.. I feel very lucky to be one of them :-)

  • Paul Gibbs 9:06 pm on June 12, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Welcome Pack 2.1 released 

    Welcome Pack 2.1 has just been released, which adds Start Page; when the new user logs into your site for the very first time, use Start Page to redirect them anywhere you’d like.

    For those new to Welcome Pack, check out this intro video, updated for 2.1:
    http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=12514248&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1

     

    • Roger Coathup 1:47 pm on July 13, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      no video showing! (I’m on Safari / OSX 10.6.4)

      • Paul Gibbs 3:23 pm on July 13, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I’ll investigate this; thanks for the heads-up Roger

      • Paul Gibbs 8:53 pm on July 13, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Roger, it’s appearing fine for me. It uses flash, in case you’re using a blocker.

    • Gabriel 2:55 pm on July 17, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi, I have the same problem, cannot see the video, tried with Safari and Firefox, just updated the flash to make sure, but nothing…

    • uloga 10:11 am on September 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Great Plugin ,thanks for sharing.

    • Nikolaus Reisel 3:18 pm on February 24, 2011 Permalink | Reply

      Hello Paul,

      we are trying to use your welcome-pack for our buddypress – but I´ve trouble to make my settings – wp-admin shows no config for me – what´s wrong ?

      we use wp 3.0.4 an bp 1.2.6 with FF or IE

      thx for help

  • Paul Gibbs 11:07 pm on June 1, 2010 Permalink | Reply  

    Achievements 2.0 change picture sneak-peak 

    Achievements 2.0 change picture screen

    Current version of the Achievements 'Change Picture' screen.

     

    • donnacha | WordSkill 5:28 pm on June 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Looks great, looking forward to this!

    • balebond 10:07 pm on June 2, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Can’t wait. :)

    • Blogging Network 6:04 pm on June 29, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Does this version work with WordPress 3.0?

      • Paul Gibbs 6:06 pm on June 29, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        The new version will require WordPress 3.0 and BuddyPress 1.2.5. I’m hoping to get a beta out this weekend.

        • nahum 5:20 pm on June 30, 2010 Permalink

          getting my badges ready! there will be custom badges option right!? exciting!

    • Sarah Gooding 10:12 pm on July 12, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Just checking in on Achievements ;) Very excited for 2.0 release. Will be using it on a major project. Do you expect to have it ready in July?

      • Paul Gibbs 10:35 pm on July 12, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        I expect to have a solid beta or a release candidate out at the end of the month.

    • Armin 11:35 pm on July 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Is the points system integrated with cubepoints, because that would be great.

      • Paul Gibbs 11:40 pm on July 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Hi Armin
        Thanks for writing; no, it isn’t.

        • Armin 2:22 am on July 24, 2010 Permalink

          Ok. I’m so exciting for the release. So it will be released with Buddypress 1.2.5? Are both coming out this weekend or just the beta of Achievements?

        • Paul Gibbs 10:27 am on July 24, 2010 Permalink

          I assume you mean BuddyPress 1.2.6. I would expect to be that out towards the end of next week, but I don’t know anything specific. Achievements will not come out at the same time ;)

    • Danny J 9:42 am on July 26, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Really looking forward to this, I’m currently using version 1.23 and I was just wondering if version 2.0 will have a widget component that will allow me to display meta data, like top contributors and such?

      Thanks and keep up the awesome work!

      • Paul Gibbs 10:15 am on July 26, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Yep :) . Thanks for writing

    • Armin 1:12 am on July 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Quick question. In the plugin, will there be an option for adding your own custom achievement?

      • Paul Gibbs 7:27 am on July 30, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        Oh, definitely. That’s what the new version’s all about! I’ll write an update on this blog this weekend showing all the screens.

    • Vikram Jhaveri 4:26 pm on July 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Any chance this is being launched this today? I cant wait for the month to end.

      • Paul Gibbs 5:19 pm on July 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        No way, I’m afraid. It’s not finished.

        • Armin 12:43 am on August 1, 2010 Permalink

          Beta is coming tomorrow? You said by weekend?

        • Paul Gibbs 10:22 am on August 1, 2010 Permalink

          No, sorry. If you read above, I said that I expected BuddyPress 1.2.6 to come out by the end of this last week. It hasn’t happened yet, I spoke to John James Jacoby and we’re hoping for BuddyPress 1.2.6 before the end of this week.

          As I have told several people, I hope to release a beta version of Achievements in the next two or three weeks, but that’s not a promise.

    • Linusf 7:34 pm on August 1, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Hi Paul

      Just curious to know if it will be possible to add achievements retroactively as in your last version? Just about to launch my site today.. and I want to cover all my activity into the achievements system.

      /regards

      • Paul Gibbs 8:05 pm on August 1, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        i’m undecided if this will make it into version 1. What I’m most likely to do is write a one-time plugin that hooks into Achievements and does this for you; the code would be quite messy to put into the Achievements core for a one-time use.

        • Linusf 8:19 pm on August 1, 2010 Permalink

          ok thats really great news!

          I suppose I´m not the only one with a present site that wants to hook up with the achievements plugin =)

          I would have delayed the release of the site if my summer vacation wasnt about to end..

          /regards

    • gerbil 2:54 pm on October 26, 2010 Permalink | Reply

      Change picture feature doesn’t work with my custom theme..

      • Paul Gibbs 4:28 pm on October 31, 2010 Permalink | Reply

        It’s probably a javascript conflict. Which theme? Is it one I can download and test out?

  • Paul Gibbs 7:19 am on May 20, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: ,   

    Welcome Pack and BuddyPress 1.2.4 

    For those people using Welcome Pack, please be aware there is a new release of BuddyPress, version 1.2.4, out at the end of this week. The email feature of Welcome Pack might stop working until I get an update out, which I shall endeavour to do as soon as possible; might not be until after the first weekend.

     

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