Architecture question...looking for advice

Hey all!

So I've got a really interesting question and I'd love some advice...I don't like redoing architecture more than I have to and I know that many of you understand the integration of groups, pages, and discussions better than I do...The question is this:

 

I've got a site called YouhaveIhave.com that I'm building which is a service for college students(and eventually anyone some day but college for now). It is a place where college students can trade services instead of paying for things(i.e. someone says I'll tutor you in spanish if you change the oil on my car).

Requirement 1:

I want people to register(much like facebook) by their school, so that people can only trade with other people on their campus.

Requirement 2:

I want a student to be able to put up a skill that they are either looking for or willing to trade.

Requirement 3:

I want people to be able to put skills they will trade for that skill

Requirement 4:

The original poster chooses the skill they like the most and the two complete a trade.

Bonus requirement:

I want to have some kind of self regulation for the community...something like a thumbs up or a point system(i'm playing around with elggxpoints right now)

 

I know with the en.php files in the appropriate folders I can change the names of certain things(like I changed the pages to be called "skills" in one of my experiments)

 

Does anyone have any thoughts on how I should handle these requirements...my first attempt was making groups the schools and making pages the trades but i'm not sure that's the best choice so i blew away that install and restarted so I would like to get some input before I go at it again

 

Thanks!!!

-Ray-

  • aww come on guys...you know you wanna answer this one!!

  • @Ray, I think what you are talking here would be a project more then some quick advice.  I can say I see 2 existing plugins that would need to be integrated at best.  Unfortunately you may not get many to respond to this posting.  So given that, one of the places I would start would be to look at the classifieds plugin and questions plugin.  They may give you a better Idea of what you are asking for.

    Goof Luck

  • The classifieds plugin looks like it may work for the actual posting a skill you want to trade or posting a skill you're looking to find...now the question is how do I organize the users by groups that are preset when they login...i've looked through the plugins but i don't know what to even call that...fixed membership?

     

    Thanks!

    -Ray-

  • OK so after some more work I have gotten things to look a lot better...anyone is more than welcome to go over to the site and make an account to see what's going on (www.youhaveihave.com) but obviously there's tons more to do...I think the classifieds is a wonderful way to handle the skills request so I have renamed it to be called skills...however the userx points plugin does not have a way of rewarding for posting classifieds *tear* but we will deal with that later...the kink now is simple this

     

    how to bind a user to a group(and then call the group "school")

    how to make classifieds visible only to members of a group

     

    and then i think my problems are solved

     

    anyways, any thoughts are greatly appreciated