I've read through a lot of the beta reader posts, and most are either unanswered or heading another direction, so I'm going to ask in a separate thread. Basically, we're wondering if this is even a possibility.
On our site, which has a moderated queue, we have a system set up where users who've gotten rejected for whatever reason can redeem themselves if they use a beta. The problem is, just anyone on the site can offer to be a beta, and about 90% of those offering need betas themselves. What we'd like to do is have an "official" approved list of betas.
Is there a way to:
A) Create this group (they'd be a member group, basically, but you couldn't join this group unless you had permission from an admin or were added or whatever)
B) Assign beta-readers to a specific author (primarily so they'd have access to view the author's submissions in the queue)
C) Automatically show who betaed a story?
I know we can do this in workaround form. We tell our users to put the beta's name in an author note, and we use forums to keep up with who's reading what, but it's kind of annoying to constantly have to flip from one window to another to keep track, and things are falling through.
If there's *not* a way to do any of those, would it be possible to modify it somehow so they could choose their beta from a dropdown list (similar to the way ratings works)? We could input the list of approved betas in such a dropdown, and while that wouldn't stop people from lying about who they used, it would at least make it easier to check.
Basically, we're wondering what's possible and what's shooting for the moon.
URL to your eFiction: http://www.mickiclark.com/efiction33
Version of eFiction: 3.3.1
Have you bridged eFiction, if so with what?: SMF
Version of PHP:
Version of MySQL: MySQL 4.1.14
Anything's possible. The question would be is it possible at your skill level and time frame. The simplest work around would probably be to create a classification group for Beta-Readers and then make the classifications within that group your list of approved betas with possibly "Other" and "None" as additional options.
A more involved solution would be to code a custom profile field where the input would only be available to the admins. That way you could mark people as approved beta readers. You'd then need more modifications to let the beta readers read non-approved stories.
It's probably going to be up to you to write it though since it's something pretty customized.
Thanks for the response. Skill level...well...erm...but time I have.
I think I'll try the classifications for now. If we could simplify even one stage of the process, that would help. Thank you.
EDIT: After talking with our site admin, the classifications looks like a good solution to us! I set it up, and I think we'd be able to do almost everything we wanted using that and perhaps a custom page explaining the beta reader program we have to our users. Thank you Tammy!
URL to your eFiction: http://www.mickiclark.com/efiction33
Version of eFiction: 3.3.1
Have you bridged eFiction, if so with what?: SMF
Version of PHP:
Version of MySQL: MySQL 4.1.14
