Yearbook Directory

RYO Membership Directory Plugin Administrator Manual
Back to Index

Some folks prefer a member listing that looks more like a yearbook, with reasonably sized photos, than a text-based directory. You can do that, too, with your entire directory styled like the search results you get throughout the system. And it's easy!

This directory is identical to the [memberdirectory] except the initial directory list view is the Yearbook-style list template.

The Yearbook 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. This way it's fast to look up someone.
• Yearbook-style List: Alphabetical lists of members with photos and short descriptions.

Setting Up a Yearbook-style Directory

We've made it very easy to set up a Yearbook Directory.
The Yearbook is created with the [yearbook] shortcode.

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

[yearbook]

This will display the members with our yearbook style format.

It's usually set up to show all members, but you can customize it to show only members in certain category levels.

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

Search Results

Users can search the database and search results are created automatically after scanning the database for matching records.

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

Attributes to Yearbook Pages

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

[memberdirectory 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 Yearbook style directory, it's a list of members.
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 will be included on your Directory Page. SD = Search Field included. D = No Search Field.
• top: Set this to change the text that appears at the top of the page.

Appearance of the Directory View:

• directoryview: Set this to the name of the list template you want to display each record in the initial directory listing. Typically listtemplate4 for the yearbook-style listing.
• index: 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.
• perpage: Set this to the number of entries you want to display per page for the initial directory listing.

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 listtemplate4
• 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.

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 detailtemplate1

Here's an example. Note that you only need to set the attributes you want to change.

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

Here's another example.

[yearbook
format=SD
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 format to SD to designate that the Search Field is provided on the directory page. And we set appropriate display text.

Template Layouts for Profile Display:

Back to Index