Table of Contents
GravityOps Forum is built on top of Gravity Forms, leveraging its powerful form creation and entry management capabilities to power a full-featured forum. This integration ensures a robust and familiar environment for developers and users.
The Gravity Forms Engine #
The plugin uses Gravity Forms to handle the submission and storage of all forum content.
- Topic Submission: When a user creates a new topic, they are submitting a standard Gravity Form configured as a “Topic Form.”
- Reply Submission: When a user posts a reply, they are submitting a standard Gravity Form configured as a “Reply Form.”
- Login & Registration: The plugin utilizes mapped Gravity Forms to handle WordPress authentication and user creation.
- Data Storage: Every topic and reply is a standard Gravity Forms entry.
Mapping and Logic #
The core logic of the plugin is centered on mapping:
- Form Assignment: In the Forms tab of the plugin settings, you assign specific Gravity Forms to serve as “Topics” and “Replies.” You can assign these globally or on a per-forum basis.
- Field Mapping: For each assigned form, you tell the plugin which fields correspond to forum data:
- Topic Form Mapping: Maps fields for the Topic Title, Topic Content, Topic Tags, and optional Additional Fields.
- Reply Form Mapping: Maps fields for the Reply Content and optional Additional Fields.
- Login & Registration Mapping: Maps fields to WordPress credentials and user profile data (Email, Password, Nickname, etc.).
Entry Meta and Organization #
To organize these entries into a cohesive forum, the plugin uses Gravity Forms Entry Meta. When a form is submitted, the plugin automatically attaches the following metadata to the entry:
gofrm_is_topic: Identifies an entry as a forum topic.gofrm_is_post: Identifies an entry as a forum reply.gofrm_forum_id: The ID of the forum where the topic or reply was posted.gofrm_topic_id: (For replies) The ID of the parent topic entry.gofrm_tag: (For topics) Stores the tags assigned to the topic from the mapped field.- Reply totals are calculated dynamically from active reply entries at query/render time.
gofrm_last_post_at: (For topics) The MySQL timestamp of the most recent activity (topic creation or last reply).gofrm_is_sticky: (For topics) Indicates if the topic is pinned to the top.gofrm_is_locked: (For topics) Indicates if further replies are disallowed.gofrm_locked_by_moderator: (For topics) Indicates if the topic was locked specifically by a moderator.gofrm_view_count: (For topics) Stores the number of times the topic has been viewed.
Benefits of This Integration #
- Customization: You can add any custom fields (e.g., “Category,” “Priority,” “Attachments”) to your Topic and Reply forms using the standard Gravity Forms editor.
- Validation and Processing: All standard Gravity Forms features, such as conditional logic, validation rules, and notifications, work seamlessly with your forum.
- Data Portability: Since forum content consists of standard entries, you can use existing Gravity Forms add-ons and tools (like GravityView or entry export) to interact with your forum data.
