Activity stats for wp-admin/Profile

[imath]

@hnla, in a comment to ​5197, suggested to enhance the wp-admin/Profile stats metabox with some new ones using the activity types.

This patch is suggesting some new functions to get activity stats by type, or not.. Here's a screen capture of it :

I think it can be useful for a community manager to see how a user is participating to the community, this might be interesting in this case.

[shanebp]

@imath - cool to see this functionality going into core. We've been doing similar things for awhile now in various plugins. It's very useful and clients love it.

It's one of those things that is seductive and can get quite elaborate.
See ​http://www.philopress.com/products/buddyreports/

At the bottom of the page, you'll see the basic stats we include on wp-admin/Profile pages.
[ I'll be removing those stats when 2.0 drops ]

So I'm suggesting that it would be trivial but helpful for you to add things like:

• join date
• blog articles count
• blog comments count
• bbpress check and then topic & replies counts
• favorites count

[imath]

Replying to shanebp:

@imath - cool to see this functionality going into core.

So far it's just a suggestion. If other core team members think it's a good idea, then it should be ;)

We've been doing similar things for awhile now in various plugins. It's very useful and clients love it.

Very Nice.

So I'm suggesting that it would be trivial but helpful for you to add things like:

• join date

It's already in the first metabox of wp-admin/profile BuddyPress tab

• blog articles count
• blog comments count
• bbpress check and then topic & replies counts

In fact the patch attached to this ticket is getting all registered activity types and make a count of it. So all blog posts/comments/topics/replies that has generated an activity will be in the detailled by type count.

Types created by plugins can be in this stats metabox if they hook bp_register_activity_actions to register their types using the function bp_activity_set_action().

Thanks a lot for your feedback @shanebp

[shanebp]

Oops, I should have looked at the diff before commenting - sorry.

I didn't know bp_displayed_user_id() would work in wp-admin/profile - thanks.

I think it's a great enhancement and hope it makes it into core.

[imath]

Replying to shanebp:

I didn't know bp_displayed_user_id() would work in wp-admin/profile - thanks.

Actually, it's not the case. But the stat functions can be used on front end too, that's why bp_activity_get_profile_stats() user_id args default to bp_displayed_user_id()

[shanebp]

Okay - thanks for clarifying - too early here.

Types created by plugins can be in this stats metabox if they hook bp_register_activity_actions to register their types using the function bp_activity_set_action().

So if plugins aren't using the component api, the types won't appear?
A lot of plugins just use bp_blogs_record_post_post_types for cpts.

[imath]

Replying to shanebp:

So if plugins aren't using the component api, the types won't appear?
A lot of plugins just use bp_blogs_record_post_post_types for cpts.

In this case, i guess they also filter 'bp_blogs_activity_new_post_action' to use a "specific to their plugin" activity type.
They still can do that, but to have their type in the stats, types must be registered see ​this codex post

[imath]

Maybe we should see that in next version if some requests are coming on this feature.

[mercime]

+1

[DJPaul]

What does the EXPLAIN look like for that query?

[imath]

Hi mercime, thanks for your feedback :)

Replying to DJPaul:

What does the EXPLAIN look like for that query?

Hi DJPaul, it looks like this :

id	select_type	table	type	possible_keys	key	key_len	ref	rows	Extra
1	SIMPLE	wp_bp_activity	ref	user_id,type	user_id	8	const	9	Using where; Using temporary; Using filesort

5397.02.patch is an update for latest trunk.

[DJPaul]

I don't think we should do this unless the query(s) can be made better; even if there's caching, that's still a potentially slow query.

[DJPaul]

Moving to 2.2 as I think this needs more consideration. I'm very concerned about adding expensive queries and slowing down the dashboard (I'm not sure adding BP data to this widget is useful).

[imath]

Replying to DJPaul:

I'm very concerned about adding expensive queries and slowing down the dashboard (I'm not sure adding BP data to this widget is useful).

Just to be sure there's no confusion: this metabox would be in the wp-admin/profile of the member not in a dashboard widget.

The 'stats' metabox already exists in the wp-admin/profile of the member the ticket is suggesting to add activity stats to it.

[DJPaul]

I'm inclined to think we don't want to do this, because the patch doesn't cache the values, and I'm not sure that the proposed feature is worth the overhead. If other people really like the idea, I'm not going to stand in the way, but we do need caching for the raw SQL queries.

[imath]

Added caching in 5397.03.patch, but i'm ok with DJPaul's latest comment. Since the introduction of admin profiles, nobody requested such a feature. So unless this changes in a near future, i don't mind closing this ticket as invalid.

[boonebgorges]

I'm not as concerned as DJPaul about the query overhead, but at the same time I don't see an overwhelming need for this data. I'd suggest packaging it (and maybe some other advanced admin stuff) in a plugin, and seeing if it gains any traction.