Having a few teething problems

Between myself and another Technical Author, we're trying to convert an existing Intranet based on .ASP pages into a Joomla!+CB-powered solution.

Our existing solution relies on tables connected with tables to generate search results - e.g. any member of staff who has a car has their registration number stored in the 'vehicles' table and it's linked to the 'employees' table via a unique ID.

To recreate this, we've have to export all the employees and vehicle data and create 'cb_vehiclemake', 'cb_vehiclemodel', 'cb_vehicleregno' and 'cb_vehiclecolour' fields to hold the data. We've got a few employees who have multiple cars so the above fields have been duplicated a further two times.

However, whilst this allowed us to import the data (we used the CBJuice2 plugin), the search function refused to find the details in these fields. So another field was created and that's a copy of all the vehicle data fields as one long string. The search works now.

There are other niggly problems that we've come across. So before I start entering them all and make our first post a very long one .. can someone suggest a fix to the above first?

(Mike & Steve, Technical Authors)

Please run CB tools to ensure users are synchronize and that fields and their values are stored properly. The users fieldvalues should be in the _comprofiler database. Please confirm that your import was successful. I do recommend posting to the below boards if you're having troubles with a CB Juice import.

www.joomlapolis.com/forum/226-cb-juice

The problem itself wasn't caused by CBJuice but I will look on their forums to see what I can find. We've already synced the contacts and that works fine but the above problem still exists.

Our main problem, as we can see it, is as follows:

Our comany has the following heirarchy: an MD, below are some Divisional Heads, underneath them are some Managers / Specialist Staff / Team Leaders, under each team leader are a number of Seniors, 'normal' staff and junior staff. On top of this are the occasional contractors.

We've also got a problem with the heirarchy - each user within the CB data is just that. We can't (or we haven't found a way so far) to get the same heirarchy working in CB. We can't use the group levels as not all Divisional Heads will want to submit articles but some other staff might do.

This links to the vehicle fields in that each one of these staff could own: no vehicle, a single vehicle, two vehicles or multiple vehicles (although we've limited the range to three in Community Builder). There doesn't seem to be a way to simulate this relationship.

We went with Joomla! because our existing website (albeit Joomla! v1.x) and our new WIP website will be using Joomla! too.

If we've installed the wrong package (as in Community Builder) then please confirm this and and we'll investigate other extensions that can handle the data we have. If it's not possible in Joomla! at all (without knowledge of PHP) then we'll go back to the drawing board.

Hope this helps get an answer.

The problem itself wasn't caused by CBJuice but I will look on their forums to see what I can find. We've already synced the contacts and that works fine but the above problem still exists.

I see, but is the data actually present in your database? Please see the table _comprofiler and ensure the "id" and "user_id" columns match each other as well as "id" matching in _users to ensure the user logging in is being matched with the correct profile.

Our comany has the following heirarchy: an MD, below are some Divisional Heads, underneath them are some Managers / Specialist Staff / Team Leaders, under each team leader are a number of Seniors, 'normal' staff and junior staff. On top of this are the occasional contractors.

We've also got a problem with the heirarchy - each user within the CB data is just that. We can't (or we haven't found a way so far) to get the same heirarchy working in CB. We can't use the group levels as not all Divisional Heads will want to submit articles but some other staff might do.

This could be done using J1.7 and it's ability to create custom usergroups and accesslevels. What you'd need to do is create new usergroups under the Registered usergroup in a tree that fits what you've just explained. You'd then want to create new access levels composed of those new usergroups. You'd then use them throughout Joomla to determine various accesses. Then assign them to whatever users you feel necessary from CB > User Management.

This links to the vehicle fields in that each one of these staff could own: no vehicle, a single vehicle, two vehicles or multiple vehicles (although we've limited the range to three in Community Builder). There doesn't seem to be a way to simulate this relationship.

CB doesn't have continuous fields like that. As in you can't create 1 field and continually add new rows or something to a table. We've this planned for CB 2.0 actually, but that doesn't help you now. Really the best approach is to create a new CB plugin that provides exactly what you want. I recommend reviewing profilebook and profilegallery perhaps as best examples for a self maintained CB tab (allows data entry, storage, and display to the infinite).