I am new here, but I am planning to use Elgg for a number of clients.  I am really impressed with the extensibility of Elgg and the plugin system.  That said, I have searched and searched for a plugin to disable the friend function --entirely.  I don't want it renamed to "followers, "contacts" or anything like that.  The reality for me is that almost none of my clients care to have the "friends" features.  It is antithetical to small corporate and educational environments who are trying to increase the sense of community.  From my clients perspective, friends are for facebook.  I am aware of the Elgg Trac ticket #3445 and that this has become a "long term discussion."  I am posting this to cast my vote that the friends function should be pulled out of core, since MANY clients have no use for it an it just adds clutter.  In the meantime, if anyone has any suggestions (links to other groups/discussions) for how to quickly rip-out/hide all friends functionality without messing with core files too much, that would be greatly appreciated.  I am not a PHP guru, but I am going to start hacking, so any tips would be great!  And thank you again for the great work with Elgg!