Registration By Invite Only

[BrandNewbie]

Hi guys (and gals).

My site is coming along and almost finished. I have not installed any phpBB, though I might in the future. So here is what I'd like to know:

Right now I have certain parts of my main menu listed as "registered"; anyone can use the LogIn Form to register....But

Is it possible to have my registration by Invite Only?

In other words, I want my site open to the general public, but I want certain areas to be only for registered users; however, I do not want just ANYone being able to register by hitting the default "Register now" button. I only want members who subscribe to a newsletter, etc, to be allowed entry....perhaps with me sending them a link with a username/password.

Is this hard to accomplish? DO I need special extensions to achieve this?

[Per Yngve Berg]

1. Set the register link not to show in the login module. Are your invites registered in an external database? Are that database accessible by LDAP or OpenID? If not existent in Joomla, the user will be created when they login with the LDAP username and password.

2. Register the invites in Joomla. Fill in the activation field with a 32 byte hash value. Then the users must activate their account when they receive the activation mail.
To put the users directly into the database, 3 tables must be populated:
jos_users, jos_core_acl_groups_aro_map and jos_core_acl_aro.

3. Use the extension Jfusion to bridge between Joomla, PhpBB and other systems.

[BrandNewbie]

Thanx, Per Yngve Berg.

Unfortunately, i don't have an IT background (this is my first website), and in my ignorance i don't think i understood a word you said.

I opened the standard "Login Form" module and did not see an option to disable the "Register Now" button. I also have a K2 Login module in my template which is disabled (didn't see an option there either.)

As far as whether my invites are registered in an external database: the site isn't up and running yet...my plan was that if someone purchased from the site they would then be privy to "special" areas of the site. After a purchase I was going to use thier email address to send them a username and password. That is what I was hoping to do. I don't even know what LDAP or OpenID are. Should I research exhaustively on these things...or do you have some simple suggestions for me?

(I will definitely look into the JFusion extension....thank you for that recommendation.)

Also, when you said register the invites in Joomla...where do I do that? Do you mean simply create a new user in the User Manager...fill in the details and then email this to the person? Do I need to have phpBB3 installed to do all this stuff?


EDIT/ADD:

I went into my Extensions/Plug-in manager. I notice that I have "Authentication - LDAP" and "Authentication OpenID," thoiugh I still don't know what these things are. I did as you said and installed JFusion. It said my server has an outdated PHP version (1.49) and I need v5. I don't see an automatic way to upgrade PHP from within the Joomal Control Panel: I'm a bit worried bceause I did a forum search and have found many members having problems with their sites after upgrading their PHP. I'm not sure if it's their entire site or simply their forums. I do not have any forums at the moment.

I thank all members who may have something to contribute to my comprehension in this thread.

[Per Yngve Berg]

You did not say you where going to set up a webshop. Virtuemart is a full blown shop extension with products, shopping cart and payments.

I opened the standard "Login Form" module and did not see an option to disable the "Register Now" button. I also have a K2 Login module in my template which is disabled (didn't see an option there either.)

It's in global Configuration->System->User settings->Allow User Registration=Yes/No

[BrandNewbie]

Thankyou.

Yes. i have Virtuemart installed: it's on a sub-domain. I will be using PayPal. When someone makes a purchase I want certain menus (that are for registered users only) to be available to them.

I guess my plan at present is to manually watch my transactions and as soon as someone makes one: 1.) Go into the User Panel and create a username and password for them; and then 2.) email them this information.

Of course, I would love to be able to automate this...so that as soon as they make a transaction, a username and password is generated and emailed to them.

PS. I will be selling software files on the site. That means I will also have to manually send them the download link for the files once they have purchased them. I wish I could find a way where all this was automated.

[Per Yngve Berg]

I have never used virtuemart. When a customer registers to make a purchase, is he then registered as a Joomla user or does Virtuemart keep the customers in a separate table?

So you have 2 installations of Joomla. Use JFusion to sync them. Set up the one with Virtuemart as master and the other as slave.

[BrandNewbie]

Thanx for the advice. Being that my site is not fully constructed (almost), I don't have any users yet (I keep it off-line). As soon as I get everything up and running (hopefully 1 or 2 weeks), I'll let you know how it goes.

[crapola]

Try this, it works great for me:
"JRPassphrase Registration Passphrase Module - used with plg_jrpassphrase. It will appear as "New User Registration" in the Joomla Module Manager. Remember to enable the module and setup any options. Usually the order of this module should be set to one below the Joomla Login Form module. Also, be sure to enable and setup the JRPassphrase plugin!"

[dtouch]

http://extensions.joomla.org/extension/invitex

See feature number 9.

I cant test it though. Anyone has experience with this extension for the said purpose?