BuddyPress is a massive plugin for WordPress. It has the vast majority of features and plugins which are used to make community websites where users can communicate, share thoughts, do discussions, and many more. But it lacks one of the common features which could be a big problem for the members of the community. It’s searching for a community member. Yes, BuddyPress does have the feature to search for articles and post but it doesn’t support particular member searching, that’s by design.
But, with BP Profile Search you can easily fill that loophole and start performing member searches without any hassle and coding knowledge. This plugin provides you to create a form for users and showcase them to the front-end which can later be used to search members. It works on widgets, shortcodes, or simply from member’s directory. Lets get started with BP profile search plugin review:-
Features of BP Profile Search
- Form Builder for Member Search
- Create Custom Member’s Directory
- Add, Remove or Reorder Search Fields
- Different Search Field Types
- Three Search Modes i.e., contains, is, is like
- Dedicated Widget and Shortcodes
BP Profile Search In-Depth Plugin Review
Create New Form
In order to use BP Profile Search, first, you have to create a search form that users will use to search members from the front-end. To create a new form, follow the given steps:
- Navigate wp-admin > Users > Profile Search.
- Click Add New to create a form.
- Click on Add Field option, this field will be displayed on the form from which the users can enter some values to perform a search.
- Fill the field and rest of the information and click Publish/Update.
- This search form will be displayed automatically in the member’s directory only if the Add Form to Directory option is Yes. If you don’t want this form to show in the member’s directory just turn it to No.
Search Form Settings
BP Profile Search provides you with many options while creating a form, from From Template to Layout, from Custom Field types to Form Methods, it’s just a perfect plugin to tweak member searches. Let’s take a glance at them.
Form Fields
- Field
BP Profile Search provides you with many different types of custom fields that works as a parameter for search values. The following are the Custom Fields provided by this plugin:
- Name
- Any Profile Field
- Groups
- ID
- user_login
- user_email
- user_url
- user_registered
- display_name
- first_name
- last_name
- role
- roles
- total_friend_count
- total_group_count
- Search Mode
There are also three search modes available to alter the search results.
- like
- is
- is like
Form Layout
Form Layout allows admin to change some styling of the search. Just make sure that you are using any custom template because it only works with custom form templates, not with a built-in template. You can change text and background color, show or hide display and placeholders, etc.
Form Settings
In Form Settings, you can change the Form submission method and Target directory. Also, you can show or hide the form from the directory. The target directory is where the form will be displayed.
Form Template
Here, you can change the theme of the search fields and template. Also, you can make the form collapsible.
Persistent Search
You can allow/disallow persistent searches from this section.
Display Search Form
Using Shortcode
You can display the search form field anywhere in your post or page by using the generated shortcode with every form.
- To get the shortcode of your form, Navigate to wp-admin > Users > Profile Search.
- Now in the list of your forms, the last column will specify the generated shortcode for the particular form. Copy that shortcode.
- After copying the shortcode, paste it on the page/post while updating/publishing.
- A form should be displayed at the front-end.
Using Widget
BP Profile Search also has its own widget which you can use to display a search form at any of the sidebar. You can find the Profile Search Widget in wp-admin > Appearance > Widgets.
Just Drag and Drop this widget at any of the sidebars and it will start displaying a member search form.
You can also switch between forms that you created from wp-admin > Users > Profile Search > Add New
Custom Members’ Directory
BP Profile Search also offers you a shortcode to display all members, to create a custom member’s directory. Also, you can customize the member’s directory as much you want with it. You just have to paste the following shortcode into a page or post.
[bps_directory]
Also, the following are the arguments which this shortcode supports to filter the member’s directory. These arguments will only be meaningful if you use [bps_directory] shortcode with it, for example,
A Field Gender with ID 35 and values Male and also a field Status with ID 56 and values Married, the code should look like this:
[bps_directory field_35=”Male” field_56=”Married”]
- For Fields containing textcontains: [bps_directory field_xy_contains=”text to find”]
is: [bps_directory field_xy=”text to find”]
is like: [bps_directory field_xy_like=”text with wildcards”] - For Fields containing numbersis: [bps_directory field_xy=”number to find”]
range: [bps_directory field_xy_range=”from number, to number”] - For Fields containing a dateis: [bps_directory field_xy=”date to find”]
range: [bps_directory field_xy_range=”from date, to date”]
age range: [bps_directory field_xy_age_range=”from years, to years”] - For Fields containing a single value chosen from given options (e.g., Drop Down Menu)is: [bps_directory field_xy=”value to find”]
is one of: [bps_directory field_xy_one_of=”value1,value2,..,valueN”] - For Fields containing multiple values chosen from given options (e.g., Checkbox)match any: [bps_directory field_xy_match_any=”value1,value2,..,valueN”]
match all: [bps_directory field_xy_match_all=”value1,value2,..,valueN”]
Conclusion
Now, if you ever want to create a custom members’ directory then BP Profile Search should definitely be your choice. It also provides various form options and customization options. No wonder why this plugin already has over 10,000+ Active Installations.
As always, if you have any questions/queries regarding this plugin, then feel free to ask in the comment section below. Thanks for Reading!
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