Login Redirect for Community Builder Documentation

Written by Sarah Long Monday, 01 February 2010 11:54

Overview

The Login Redirect for Community Builder Component is very simple to configure and has the following features:

• Define a default login URL (page) to display for when a specific URL is not defined.
• Define up to 50 different URLs (pages) to display based on the values of  a Community Builder select field.  
• Can use any field from Community Builder that is a select field.
• Easy to set up as you only define the CB field value and the URL.
• Can work to redirect users to any URL, including a completely different Website, a specific Joomla page, or a specific Joomla component! Anything reached via a URL on any Website can be used as a redirect.
• Designed specifically for  Community Builder!
• Makes a great compliment to any site with different user groups.
• Can be used in conjunction with a non-select field to create custom homepages for selected users.

Installation

The Login Redirect Component installs into Joomla 1.5 the same as any other component. Simply download the zip file, and install using the Joomla installer in the administrator backend.

Component Configuration for Select Field Use

Once it is installed you access the component by going to Components in the back-end and select Login Redirect CB.  You will see a select box that is prepopulated with all Community Builder fields.  Non-select fields will display as well as select fields. To map specific values to specific URLs for redirect, it is necessary to use a select field.  Below is an example of the select field that will display.  Click on the drop down to review your list of choices, and select the field whose values will control the login path for users.

1) After you select the field to use, click the "Apply" button to save the choice. The page will refresh and load as many URL lines as you have valid options available in the select list. In the first option enter a default URL. You do not have to enter a URL for every value. Users with values that are not mapped will get the default. The default URL should be entered as a fully qualified URL. (http:// prefix must be used.)

2) Pick the target URLs for each of your field values as desired. You will need to enter all of them as fully-qualified URLs into the component. That means entering all of them with the http:// prefix and the full URL.  You do not have to specify a URL for each possible field value. 

The screen capture below shows a select field with four possible values. Only two of those values - Hardrock and Classical - are mapped to specific URLs. Users with any of the other values will be redirected at login to the default URL which is specified first.

Component Configuration for URL Field Use

1) To create a unique homepage for each user, or for selected users to share, first set up a field on the CB profile to house the URL. It can be a hidden, admin-only field or it can be a field that you allow users to input a URL into. An example is shown below:

This field should not be a select field. It should be a text field as shown above as the contents will be a fully qualified URL.

2) Go to the Login Redirect CB component and select the field which will contain the URL from the list. Click "Apply." Enter the Default URL as shown below which will be used for all users which do not have a valid URL on their profile:

For each user that needs a personal landing page, enter that value on his/her profile.

Login Module Configuration

Login modules for Joomla offer two different types of login URL functionality.

Direct URL Entry:

The first type allows you to specify a URL. An example of this type is the Community Builder (CB) login module as shown below:

You can enter the URL to the Login Redirect Component as a relative URL in most login modules. Enter the following URL:

index.php?option=com_loginredirectcb

If your login module requires a fully qualified URL, then simply enter it as http://www.mysite.com/index.php?option=com_loginredirect

After setting the URL to the Login Redirect component in your login module, you are done with setup. Any user logging in through the module will see the correct Web page based on either the default URL or the URL assigned to that user's User Group.

You can use any login module for Joomla as long as it can point to the URL for the component.