Articles / Menu Items that only a specific user can access

[krishatherley]

Hi,

My website needs to have a sort of 'Order Tracker' on it that I can update, but the order tracker page will have client specific information on it so is there a way I can have a seperate article for each client and set that article so that only their user logon can access that page?

If someone can explain how to do this it would be great

Thanks

[tharkun]

let me propose another solution.
don't create an article for every customer but create one page which has always the same layout but shows the user specific data. this is the way it's done in dynamic web development. so you will have certain fields and numbers and you will fill them with different content, according to the person who looks at them.

so for Rob, who is 24 and has ordered two pairs of black socks and a sixpack of beer the page would look like this.
-----------
Name: Rob
Age: 24
Items ordered:
- two pairs of socks (black)
- 1 sixpack Duvel
-----------

for Jane, who is 19 and has ordered a ferrari and a micro model of the same ferrari it would look like

---------
Name: Jane
Age: 19
Items ordered:
- Ferrari Testarossa
- Model of Ferrari Testarossa
----------

now the page as such without the specific content would look something like this

Code: Select all

<table>
  <tr>
    <td>Name:</td><td>$name</td>
    <td>Age:</td><td>$age</td>
    <td colspan="2">Items ordered:</td>
    <td colspan="2"><ul>
    <?php
    foreach ($items AS $key->$value)
    {
      echo ('<li>'.$value.'</li>');
    }
    ?>
   </ul></td>
 </tr>
</table>

then you have to decide where to get the data from which you fill into these variables.
that can be a database, an xml document or other sources.

[krishatherley]

Unfortunately that wont work, basically my business is going to be doing a service for the client, and in the meantime I need to update a page only they can access so i can write comments, log phone calls, etc etc on it so they can log on and see where its at

can you password protect individual pages or something? i remember in 1.0x you could make more classes of people - i could make a class for each customer and stuff - but how do i do it in 1.5x

[tharkun]

why wouldn't that work? it works! what you are explaining is exactly why there is dynamic programming.
maybe I get you totally wrong but I don't think so. if you want to may explain in more details, what exactly this page will show and why it shouldn't be possible as I suggested.

of course you can password protect them.
each user gets a joomla account and only when they're loged in do they see their personal content.
you may want to use Community Builder (www.joomlapolis.org) to extend your possibilities.

[krishatherley]

Maybe im not being very clear!

The page has to be nicely displayed, with a list of all phone calls ive made on their behalf - now im not a programmer or a web designer by trade so maybe i dont understand what you mean.

Basically the 2nd thing is I have to make sure this is secure ie only that client with that user ID and password can view that content, because the information on their page will hold some quite specific confidential data and therefore I have to ensure I am being as secure as possible in this.

has the user class thing gone from 1.5? i remember in 1.0 i could set 10 or 20 user classes and then each page can show which classes can view it, has that option been removed?+

[tharkun]

that has never been a core functionality if I'm not mistaken but you can do such things with JACL and simiar extensions.
but for your case I don't see the reason for complicated user groups. you want to display personal data for every user and for that you don't need user groups but rather user accounts. if you're not a programmer then I think you should either become one or hire one because I don't see how you could possibly solve this problem without any programming.

how many customers are you talking of. if the number of customers is very very small you can of course do it all manually but I don't recommend that. then you can maybe succeed without any programming at all. but as soon as the number of customers is more than let's say 20 and the frequency of change not extremely low then your task can become already quite demanding since you want something like a CRM with contact history... (do you know sugar CRM?).

now about security. joomla user accounts are secure. as secure as joomla itself and the password this person makes for their account. when you signed up for this forum you created a user account for yourself. only you can see your personal messages... and the joomla guys don't have to maintain one personal message page for each and every of the thousends of users. there is one such page and according to who logs in the page dynamically shows the respective content. that's the core of dynamic web programming.