Query: Why is it not arranged so that users permissions can be altered in order to gain access to private forums?

This would save you time from having to deal with people's PM box, and that person wouldn't have to remember (yet another) password, let's face it memorizing multiple passwords + add = Not happening.

Just a thought.

Because of the size of the community, it is impractical for admin to set permissions by individual for the private forums.

Altering moderator permissions so that they could change this setting themselves takes less or equal time to the amount of time it would take to come up with a password, and then distribute it to every single person who needs it to access the individual private communities, and then asking everyone of those people to remember it, etc.

Not to mention it seems like less of a hassle all around, I mean, if I want to log onto the private forums from another place, I have to hope I can remember the password, or If I'm lucky I didn't accidentally delete it from my PM box.

I've worked with VB forums enough to know that it wouldn't be hard to set that up, and in the end it would give the same if not more private forum protection and a lessened amount of work. Not to mention allowing the members o NEVER have to juggle yet another password (again, that's not exactly ADD friendly). As for editing the user permissions individually... there are a multitude of ways that user's can be quickly added to an 'allowed' list and never bothered with again...

Thank you for your feedback.

Altering moderator permissions so that they could change this setting themselves takes less or equal time to the amount of time it would take to come up with a password, and then distribute it to every single person who needs it to access the individual private communities, and then asking everyone of those people to remember it, etc.

Not to mention it seems like less of a hassle all around, I mean, if I want to log onto the private forums from another place, I have to hope I can remember the password, or If I'm lucky I didn't accidentally delete it from my PM box.

I've worked with VB forums enough to know that it wouldn't be hard to set that up, and in the end it would give the same if not more private forum protection and a lessened amount of work. Not to mention allowing the members o NEVER have to juggle yet another password (again, that's not exactly ADD friendly). As for editing the user permissions individually... there are a multitude of ways that user's can be quickly added to an 'allowed' list and never bothered with again...

Actually, changing the passwords isn't that much of a problem. A matter of a few minutes work and the moderators here do an excellent job of getting those passwords out to the private forum members. I have also taken steps to ease this situation which should be coming your way soon. :)

I realize that for our members that memorizing a password can be a pain in the nether regions :), but due to difficulties we've had keeping the private forums truly private we chose to go with a more difficult system. First and foremost, is our committment to give people a truly secure place to discuss issues that just can't be dealt with in the open forums.

Thank you for your iinput, though, and your interest in helping our Forums to be the best they can be.

Kim

Actually, changing the passwords isn't that much of a problem. A matter of a few minutes work and the moderators here do an excellent job of getting those passwords out to the private forum members. I have also taken steps to ease this situation which should be coming your way soon. :)

I realize that for our members that memorizing a password can be a pain in the nether regions :), but due to difficulties we've had keeping the private forums truly private we chose to go with a more difficult system. First and foremost, is our committment to give people a truly secure place to discuss issues that just can't be dealt with in the open forums.

Thank you for your iinput, though, and your interest in helping our Forums to be the best they can be.

KimIf you need help on setting up a private forum I can use a Dummy forum to give you easy to follow instructions on how to do it. I've worked with VB forums for WELL over a year now, and my main job was pretty much organizing the forums, which meant setting up new ones; Sometimes these new forums were for staff and had to be hidden or sometimes they were for 'private community' members just like you have here.

I'm saying this as I have the THIRD new PM in the last couple days about a change of password for the Teen Private forums.

So let's break it down:

Using private forums with permissions allowed for groups of people to join and never juggle a password for it. It's easier on your users, which is always a good thing considering the nature of this board.

You'll get the same, if not better, levels of security by doing this. first off no one can spread the password around to let friends into places they're not supposed to be. I've never heard of a base-level user altering permissions masks to let in a friend.

You do it once, and leave it alone. You say that sending out PMs about the new password doesn't take long, but you wouldn't have to spend that time doing anything of the like. With user permissions you would simply alter the user's permissions or addhim to a group that has permissions and then leave it alone. The only reason you would have to worry about changing it is if a person is notallowed in the forum anymore or something.

It's easier on US, the members. Juggling a password is difficult for everyone, a reacent survey from pc magazine that normal people were having problems juggling the average users 7+ passwords (Although numbers showed that a large amount were juggling as many as 20). THEN we can see when something new is on the board, with a password you have to LOG IN to the forum and then check it. Have you considered that this may be part of the reason that forums like the teen private forum are a bit 'slower' in response time, and rarely get new posts.



I'm not trying to be arguementative, but I've done this at numerous communities that I helped run that housed hundreds or even thousands of members that needed to be grouped and given special permissions. (Art judges, Moderators, Administrators, Super Moderators, etc.). I know that his approach works and that it's easy and simple.

Thank you for your very detailed explanation. I too know that this approach works, as I've run and set up MANY a forum with these and much more complex access mechanisms. I've heard your suggestion and always consider the input of our members as we grow our community.

Again, your message is heard and understood.