Configuring Your Group's Preferences

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You must opt your group in to allow your members to use the plugin.

We say 'opt your group in' because we don't want to force you to use it. For example, if your members have questions about how the plugin works and you've never heard of it, haven't the time or know-how to figure it out (and so want nothing to do with it) then it wouldn't be fair to allow your members to use it.

Opting your group in is relatively straightforward and involves little more than inserting a link into either your home-page or a file created in your Files area. Simple as that.

When a Member using the Member Plugin visits your site, their plugin finds that link and reads the preferences file stored at that link. It then presents your Member's plugin with the options allowed by that preferences file.

This page describes the two easy ways to opt your group in. Both of these ways will have your Members' plugins reading standardised preferences files hosted here with us. If however you find the standardised preferences are not to your groups liking, you can learn how to host and edit a preferences file on your own site through some links at the bottom of this page.

Contents

Want to try it first?

There's a playground group here, which is set up with default preferences. Feel free to install the plugins, and then join this group. You can then experiment with composing messages to see how it works.

Quick Start

The quick way to opt your group in is to add the following text to your group's description. Remember you can get to this from Yahoo, via Management->Group Settings->Description and Appearance->Edit.

If you're a Freegle group, insert the following into your description. 

 <A href="http://www.memberplugin.org/FreeglePrefs.js" name="memplugin"></A>

If you're a Freecycle group, insert the following into your description. 

 <A href="http://www.memberplugin.org/MemPrefs.js" name="memplugin"></A>

(Or use "FreeglePrefsFOP.js" or "MemPrefsFOP.js" if you want their plugins to give them the option of agreeing to the Fair Offer Policy when posting to your group.)

If you want to find out more or start to change the settings, read on.
If you're interested in Configuring a Map you'll need to keep reading.

How the plugin works

What determines whether or not the plugin will work:

  • The member can only use the plugin if you've opted in (see below).
    • If you've opted in, then the first time they go to the group, they'll see the new function. They can disable it if they want.
    • If you've not opted in, the plugin won't add anything at all to the pages they view on your group site - the pages will look exactly like they did without the plugin.
  • If they've explicitly enabled or disabled their plugin on a given group, the plugin remembers that setting (for that group, not all of them). If it's disabled, it just inserts a button to re-enable it.

Configuring your group

Configuring your group involves pointing it at a set of configurations. You do this by creating one of the following standard configuration files, each of which contains a simple set of default preferences which will be suitable for most groups:

Please copy and paste these links to ensure they're right.  For example, the 'www' part is necessary.

If you want to configure a map, see below.

There are two ways to use these:

  • via the group description
  • via the Files section.

Where possible, put it in the description - it's one fewer step to get confused over.

Once you've opted in, go to the Post page. If you get the text saying "This group does not use the Freegle plugin," then click on it - that'll keep you from having to wait the usual 24 hours to detect configuration changes.

For more complex configuration, see below.

Opting In using the Group Description

The simple way is to add the following text to your group's description. Remember you can get to the description from Yahoo, via Management->Group Settings->Description and Appearance->Edit.

Insert the following into your description: 

 <A href="http://www.memberplugin.org/MemPrefs.js" name="memplugin"></A>

(Or use MemPrefsFOP.js if you want their plugins to give them the option of inserting the Fair Offer Policy when posting to your group.)

Because this is a link with no actual text associated with it, it won't show up in your group description, and members can't click on it.

If you're short on space in your description then:

  • You can usually manage to squeeze a few more characters out of your description by rephrasing it to use shorter words than you normally write. As an example of that: use shorter words in your description.
  • Or, if your description contains a link to a graphic, you might like to delete that and upload an image file of your own via Management - Group Settings - Description & Appearance - Photo.
  • Or you can take a screenshot of text and uploaded that as an image instead.

Don't use a shortening service like tinyurl.com - that will work on Firefox but not Internet Explorer.

Once you've saved that change in your description, members with the plugin installed can then use it on your group. On this point though it is worth bearing in mind that it may take up to 24 hours for their plugins to notice that your group is now opted in. However, they can force it to notice by disabling and re-enabling the plugin on your group with the enable/disable button visible on their My Posts page.

Opting In using the Files section

If you can't change your description, then you can create a file in the Files section. Two very important things to remember:

  • Your members must be able to access the Files section for this to work.
  • You must create the files using Yahoo's "Create Text File" option - uploading them won't work.
  • You must create the file with a description, not just a name.  Otherwise it won't work (for some weird Yahoo reason).

This file has to be called memplugin. Not memplugin.txt, or memberplugin - exactly memplugin. The case is important - so not Memplugin either.

It also has to be at the top level of your Files section - not inside a folder.

Image:PointerFile.jpg

Inside that file you put the URL where the configuration lives: 

  http://www.memberplugin.org/MemPrefs.js  
(Or you can use the following:)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/yourgroup'snamehere/files/pluginprefs.js

("pluginprefs.js" is just an example of what you can name the file.) 

Note:  This is not the configuration itself - just the URL which points to the config. Don't forget the "http://" part!

The configuration file itself can live on a Yahoo group - including your own Freegle group (more on this through below).   First you create another file in your group's Files page.  Here is an example:

  Image:Pluginprefsfile.jpg

Then you create or edit your configuration using the Configuration Editor, which is really very easy!  (See How to Edit the Configuration File .)  Save/download the configuration file to your hard drive.  Then open that file in your browser and copy the entire contents  and paste it into the file you've created that's called, for example, (see image above) "pluginprefs".  Note:  To avoid confusion, you might want this configuration file to have the same name as the file you downloaded from the Editor.   Once you've saved that file, members who've installed the plugin can then use it for your group, though it may take upto 24 hours for their plugins to notice that your group is now opted in. They can force it to notice by disabling and re-enabling the plugin on your group with the enable/disable button visible on their "My Posts" page.

Advanced Configuration

If you want to change the configuration for your group (in particular, if you want to configure a map) then you'll need to create your own set of configuration. Take a look at Creating Your Own Configuration, and then How to Edit the Configuration File.

If you want to point the plugin at the same configuration as My Freecycle, look at Configuring using My Freecycle.

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