Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Mark Schultz-mit -
Antal besvarelser: 17
The wonderful Amember script causes an upgrade failure when moving from 1.5.2+ to 1.6+

When executing the upgrade it "hangs" on the first page at this point:

(mysql): SELECT name FROM mdl_config WHERE name = 'enrol_plugins_enabled'  
(mysql): UPDATE mdl_config SET value = 'manual,amember' WHERE name = 'enrol_plugins_enabled' 

I have verified the upgrade success without Amember installed.

Unfortunately, the Moodler who wrote the plugin, Grant Swaim, has left the Moodle community and provides no supoort for this plugin.

Can anyone give me a clue what has changed with the enrolments section in 1.6 that could induce and error in a 3rd party plugin? Could it be the Unicode implementation ?
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

N Hansen-mit -
This is precisely why I was so opposed to the idea of AMember in the first place. There was no guarantee that after one paid that one would be able to use it in the future. I was always suspicious that Grant Swain was getting a some momey too for this from AMember since he seemed to control access to the plugin.

In any case, we hope to get a plugin integrated into Moodle itself that will be open source and part of the Moodle core so that it will get upgraded whenever Moodle is upgraded and therefore won't break. We certainly will need to contribute some money to get it implemented, but in the long run it will be a more upgradeable investment. I created a page in the Moodle Docs wiki earlier today to brainstorm a blueprint for such a plugin so please feel free to contribute your ideas about what you liked about the AMember plugin that you would like to see in an integrated Moodle plugin.
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Mark Schultz-mit -
I need a recurring-subscription based ecommerce system and unless I missed something(which is entirely possible!), the Amember integration is the only viable solution right now.

I don't have 6 months or a year to wait. I have a site that will be launched July 10. I'm backing off to 1.5X so I can launch the site-- very disappointed about that. I like Amember, it is easy to setup, has powerful features and even an affiliate program. The only drawback I don't like is no single login.

I'm more interested in having a permanent integration with Amember than developing another solution right now, because I need a solution today, and any future integrated solution would require a migration process from Amember.

The plugin is pretty simple from what I can see, but I don't know the inner workings of Moodle very well yet. I'd really enjoy hearing about the changes in 1.6 that might have broken Amember. I'm willing to see it through to get Amember plugin working on 1.6.

Any of the core developers willing to provide a little help here to point me in the right direction?

Thanks for your attention,

Mark
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

N Hansen-mit -
All of us would like to have these features now, but some of us can't afford to get these features now only to have them break in the future once we have become dependent on them (as just happened to you). I predicted this last year when the AMember plugin was released and unfortunately now my prediction has proved correct. If all those people who needed AMember NOW a year ago had contributed their $135 towards the development of an integrated plugin for Moodle, you probably wouldn't be in the predicament you are in now. You may need to stay with 1.5 for now, but please consider contributing to the effort to get an improved enrollment plugin developed and I think we can count on it upgrading at the same time as Moodle in the future without any of this hassle or need to pay extra money again later.
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Mark Schultz-mit -
Sounds like it's frustrating to you to see money go to an outside organization when it could support the Moodle development community. I'd rather have an integrated solution in the long haul, and I have contributed ideas to the wiki. I'm also willing to contribute financially to an integrated solution that may appear sometime in the future.

You wrote earlier that you added a page in the Wiki to brainstorm this "earlier today" not last year. I'm not sure how I could have been aware that this was an option on the table last year when I was brand new to moodle and not yet understanding how this community works together.

I'd like to offer a suggestion. How about: creating a forum for new or enhanced features. In the description of the forum, add a suggestion to contribute to Moodle development to speed implemention. Then any new feature discussion in any of the forums could be redirected to the new features forum by the moderators. Hopefully, this could raise awareness about contributing to Moodle development and bring the new feature development discussion to one recognizable location.

Meanwhile I have a real-world problem I'm trying to resolve and my request goes out again:

I'd really enjoy hearing about the changes in 1.6 that might have broken Amember. I'm willing to see it through to get Amember plugin working on 1.6.  Any of the core developers willing to provide a little help here to point me in the right direction?
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

denis cahalane-mit -
I'm just a bystander trying to understand what the conversation is about, but - it seems from the discussion at http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=24231#182110
that classroomrevolution.com have independently integrated aMember with Moodle.
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

cdx cdx-mit -
Grant did not write the Plugin, aMember did.  You should post on the aMember forums and ask Alex to update the script for 1.6

it is a great script and i have been using without any problems since Grant first mentioned it.

Grant received no compensation for his work in writing the integration documentation.  He left the Moodle community because it was too complex for his needs.  I applaud him for his personal investment in wirting the docs.
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Mark Schultz-mit -
Thanks Craig,

You're right, in Grant's docs he credits Alex at aMember for writing the plug-in.

I have just put in a trouble ticket at aMember for this issue. I'll post the results here.

And I agree, aMember is a great script.
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Mark Schultz-mit -
Alex at aMember writes the reply below to my request for support with the aMember plugin, so I am hopeful we'll continue to have support...

Well we didn't test it with 1.6 yet. I will add this to our todo list.
Of course we will update plugin if necessary.

--
Alexander
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Re: Amember enrolment plugin fails upgrade to 1.6

Ted Sorrells-mit -

OK folks....I've taken a shot at making aMember work with 1.6.  Basically, this is the modified External Database Enrollment Plugin.  I haven't fully tested it, so your feedback is appreciated.  And, as I'm not an expert in Moodle programming style, I can't offer any fleet-footed support. 

Simply drop this in your enrol/amember directory.  As for setting up aMember...simply follow Grant Swaim's excellent documentation.

Good luck...and please let me know how/if it works for you.

Ted

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Updating 1st attempt.....

Ted Sorrells-mit -

.....found some bugs in relation to how the plugin was defining the "enrol" column in mdl_users_students

 

 

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Re: Updating 1st attempt.....

cdx cdx-mit -
Have you gotten it to work and have you reported the bugs to Alex?

thx
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Re: Updating 1st attempt.....

Ted Sorrells-mit -

We have this on a production server and have already processed over 100 transactions with it.  This is using the 7/10/2005 version by Grant Swaim.  Alex must've only recently put up his latest 7/19/2006 version.

 

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Re: Updating 1st attempt.....

Tranquil Earth-mit -

Hi Ted,

When you downloaded the new aMember plugin for Moodle, was it using the 19/7/06 version.  Which can be found at:

http://www.amember.com/p/Integration/Moodle

If it is this version that your zip file fixes, do you just replace the plugin /moodle/enrols/amember files with these files included in your zip?

Ditto - have you got it working yet?

Thanks

Penny.

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Re: Updating 1st attempt.....

Don Schwartz-mit -
I've got it working but it is throwing an error.
 
Warning: mysql_pconnect(): Access denied for user 'nobody'@'localhost' (using password: NO) in /home/(mysite)/public_html/moodle/lib/adodb/drivers/adodb-mysql.inc.php on line 372
 
When a user logs into moodle it works but gets this.
 
I decided to use amember for single membership and make my moodle enrolments open to registered users.  This seems to work great except for the error.
 
 

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Re: Updating 1st attempt.....

Ted Sorrells-mit -

No, I was using the July 10, 2005 version......which was the one available at Alex's link at the time.  I must've downloaded it just prior to the posting of his latest version.

If you use the older version, then you'll simply replace the enrol.php file.  But, I'll defer to Alex's expertise.

I will be rolling out aMember to another client later this month and I'll use Alex's lastest file for comparison's sake.

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