Classified Directory Page

RYO Membership Directory Plugin Administrator Manual
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This is how you set up a Classified Directory Page to search for a member by keywords or by clicking on a Classification link.

This can be used as a Yellow Pages style listing or for any special classification of special information, separate from a regular Category Search page.

The Classified Directory Page consists of the following two elements:

• Search Field: This is a box where your website guest enters key words to search in the member records.
• Category List: This is a list of topics or categories that is displayed. When your website guest clicks on a category, members are displayed who have selected that category in their profile.

You may create a page with both Search Field and Category List, or with Category List only, or with Search Field only.

Setting Up a Classified Directory

We've made it very easy to set up a Classified Directory, which is just a modified Category Search Page with different fields for the categories and for the displayed information.

The Classified Directory is created with the [classifieddirectory] shortcode.

At its simplest, you can create a Page and just enter this shortcode:

[classifieddirectory]

This will display the search listing with our standard format.

We usually set it up to list categories from ts4, limit results to members who have an entry in ts4, and with wording appropriate to a general Classified Directory. But you could change that with attributes.

You can change any of the layout using the attributes below.

Search Results

Your search results are created automatically after scanning the database for matching records.

Results are displayed in a column including an image, if any, and basic information about the member.

Website guests who want to view the complete detail page can click on the member name and a full profile page is presented.

Attributes to Classified Directory Pages

You may modify these displays somewhat by specifying special attributes within the [classifieddirectory] shortcode notation, as in :

[classifieddirectory attribute1=value attribute2="Value of more than one word"]

Note that if you're assigning more than one word as a value, the value must be enclosed in quotation marks.

Each directory has three separate "views" which you control:

1. The "Directory View" is the initial page seen by a guest. It's either a list of members or a list of categories that can be clicked to search for members who have selected that category. For the Classified Directory, it's a list of categories (classifications).
2. The "Search View" is the list of members seen after a search request, either a keyword request or a category click.
3. The "Detail View" is the detailed information displayed about a single member after clicking that members listing in a directory list or search results list.

As far as WordPress is concerned this all happens on one Page. In practice, that one Page shows a lot of different information.

Use these attributes to customize your Directory:

None of these need to be used unless you want to change the way your directory is put together. The standard directory is already set up in the software.

• membertypes: This is a list of member types to include in this page. You may include multiple types by listing them with a comma separating them and enclosing the list in quotation marks. If you don't set this, all member types are included.
• sortby: This must be either company or name or firstname -- lower case as shown. Results will be sorted in the respective order.
• format: This attribute indicates whether a Search Field and/or a Category List will be included on your Directory Page. SC = Search Field and Category List included. S = Search Field only. C = Category List only.
• top: Set this to change the text that appears at the top of the page.

Appearance of the Directory View, including a Category List (for categories, topics, or special interests):

• categoryhead: This text will appear at the top of your Category List.
• categories: Use this attribute to direct the system to the category list you want displayed. Do this by naming the Text-Selection field which corresponds to the Choices list you want to use. Acceptable codes: ts1, ts2, ts3, ts4, ts5, ts6, ts7. (These attributes must be used even though your directory calls them something else. See the Directory Setup page to determine which field you want searched. And be sure you've set up a list of categories for this field in Settings, Choices.)

If you're including a Search Box:

• searchhead: This text will appear over the Search entry box.

Appearance of the Search View:

• searchview: Set this to the name of the list template you want to display the each record when a search has been initiated. This might be the same as directoryview, but we like to use a larger template with more information, since search results are typically smaller than the whole membership. Typically listtemplate5
• resultsinstructions: This text will appear over the search results after a report indicating how many results were obtained.
• searchindex: Set this to 1 to display an alphabetical index at the top of the page with the first letters of entries on that page. These can be clicked to jump directly to that portion of the list. Set this to 0 for no index. If you are displaying a lot of entries on the page, you may want to repeat the index every 40 or 50 entries. If so, set this to the number of entries to display before repeating.
• searchperpage: Set this to the number of entries you want to display per page for search results.
• returnlink: This text will appear at the end of search results as a link back to the Main page.
• searchrequire: This attribute limits Search Field searches to records which have an entry of any kind in the designated Text-Selection field. This applies to Search Field searches only, not to Category List searches. Acceptable values: ts1, ts2, ts3, ts4, ts5, ts6, ts7, or set searchrequire='' if you want all active records of this member type searched. (These values must be used even though your directory calls them something else. See the Directory Setup page to determine which field you want searched.) In the Classified Directory this is normally set to ts4.

Appearance of the Detail View, a Member's Detail Page:

• detailview: Set this to the name of the detail template you want to display the full member profile when someone clicks on a directory listing. Typically detailtemplate2

Here's an example. Note that you only need to set the data for codes you want to change, and that you can put each code on a separate line if you wish.

[classifieddirectory
sortby=company
top="Enter the keyword you want and click the 'Search' button to search members."]

Here's another example.

[classifieddirectory
categories=ts4
searchonly=ts4
format=SC
listhead="Choose your desired vendor classification"
skiplisthead="Back to Vendor Classifications"
resultsinstructions="Click on the company name to see our full profile on that vendor."
top="Our unique search engine is ready to help you find the vendors you need! Simply enter the keyword you want in the space below and click the 'Search' button."]

In the above code we set Category List searches to use the ts4 choices list (by setting categories=ts4), and Search Field searches to records that do have a ts4 entry (by setting searchonly=ts4. The format SC designates that both Search Field and Category List searches are provided on the one page. And we set appropriate display text.

Limiting Search Field searches to ts4 means that members who have not selected a Classification will not be found in the Classified Directory. For business associations, this may not matter, but for organizations like churches or alumni associations using one set of member records for both a private Member Directory and the public Classified Business Directory, the searchonly directive avoids displaying members with no business information.

Template Layouts for Profile Display:

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