Extending the functions of HelpieKB using Complementary plugins – Part 2

In part -1, we saw how the functions of HelpieKB could be extended using some of the Complementary plugins.

Here are some plugins to enhance the capabilities of HelpieKB more than you could imagine.

USER ROLE EDITOR

Some users have come up with this question that they want to have my own user roles to restrict content.

One of the powerful features that HelpieKB offers is the dynamic capabilities features where you could restrict the content from displaying to them based on user roles (There are more though).

There are 5 default WordPress user roles which you will be aware of. Now, what if you want to change these roles and have your own roles depending on your business?

Well, this could be easily done by using a plugin called “User role editor”.

STEPS TO FOLLOW:

1. Install and activate the User role editor plugin.
2. Once activated, go to Users -> User Role editor
3. Select the role that you want to change and select “Rename role” in the right column.
   
   
4. You can change it to any name you wish. Once changed, click update.
5. Once you have done this, you could see the roles name changed in Helpie settings -> Dynamic capabilities.

Remove Dashboard Access

By default WordPress allows many of their user roles (like editor and author) to access the dashboard.

While HelpieKB allows the users to add and edit article from the front-end, many may not want their users to access the dashboard.

This could be easily done by a free plugin called “Remove Dashboard Access”.

Steps to follow:

1. Just install and activate the plugin “Remove Dashboard Access”.
2. After activating Go to Dashboard -> settings -> Dashboard Access.
3. Under Dashboard User access, enable the option “Administrators only” so that no other user roles will have access to the Dashboard.

Restriction access based on WooCommerce User Role

For restricting WooCommerce products and checkout, check these plugins out: WooCommerce Restrict Checkout Plugin and WooCommerce Product Restrictions.

Now, You can restrict any category you want using HelpieKB based on the WooCommerce User role. By default, WordPress has five user roles:

• Administrator
• Editor
• Author
• Contributor
• Subscriber

Every of these user roles has different capabilities. You can check this doc to know more about the default WordPress user roles.

Now when you install WooCommerce, there will be two more user roles added by default which are Customer Role and Shop Manager Role.

Customer Role:

Any user who registers using the checkout or signup option is defined as a customer on your site. Presently, the capabilities of the customer role are as follows:

• Have read access, similar to a blog subscriber
• Can view orders and order history
• It can edit your account details.

Shop Manager Role:

If you hire someone to manage your store, you have to give them access to your site’s back end. This is where the Shop Manager role comes into the picture. This role has the same capabilities as the customer role, along with the option to edit WooCommerce settings and products. Also, this role is capable to view WooCommerce reports as well. The shop manager role is similar to the Editor role in WordPress.

Create and Modify WooCommerce User Roles:

There are no inbuilt features in WooCommerce to modify or create a new user role. However, you can get the help of a suitable plugin for this functionality. To help you with it, here’s a plugin which can do that:

Capability Manager Enhanced

This is one of the best Plugin available on WordPress.org for free. Using this plugin, you can modify the capabilities of specific roles, create new roles, copy the already-existing roles to new ones, and add additional capabilities to existing roles.

Once you have installed this Plugin, Go to users -> Capabilities, where you can assign a new user role and can give any capabilities as you wish for that user Role.

Once you add a new User role here, it will be automatically added to the HelpieKB User Access Restriction setting where you can restrict any topic for that User role.

Plugins to Modify User Roles

There are also some more free plugins which help you in creating and modifying user roles:

• Groups – This is a group-based user role management plugin that supports unlimited groups. Also, users can be assigned to any group.
• Members – With this plugin, you can create roles and capabilities. Also, you can give multiple roles to the same user, or deny specific capabilities to a particular user.

Plugins for WooCommerce User Roles

WooCommerce user roles offer great possibilities to create varied pricing models for your store. You will find quite a few premium WooCommerce plugins to set up pricing strategies on your store:

WooCommerce Catalog Mode, Wholesale and Role-Based Pricing

With the help of this plugin, you can create different pricing plans for various user roles on your WooCommerce store. You can create your own custom user roles on your WooCommerce. You can make use of the newly created user roles as well as the existing roles to create different pricing plans and price adjustments.

Prices by User Role

This plugin extends WooCommerce to add role-based pricing functionality to WooCommerce. You can offer discounts or markups to specific customer groups, or display completely different prices based on roles. This plugin helps in hiding the ‘Add to Cart’ button too. Similarly, you can even hide product prices from unregistered users, if it makes sense to your store strategy. Please note, this plugin won’t work well with other plugins that alter the way variations work on WooCommerce. You can check the product page to find the list of incompatible plugins and themes.

HelpieKB User Access Restriction

To Restrict certain topics based on the user roles in HelpieKB, Go to Dashboard -> Helpie Kb Wiki -> Helpie Settings -> Dynamic capabilities. Under Can view -> Who can view -> Select By: Role, you will see different user roles where you can restrict everything to any user Role.

When you have installed Woocommerce, the Customer Role and Shop Manager Role will also be added so that you can restrict everything to that user Roles.

If you want to restrict a specific topic, go to Dashboard -> Helpie kb Wiki -> Wiki category. Go to that particular category and edit it. You will find the same “Who can view” option in the left bottom. Here you can set it to the user role and set it to the customer role or shop manager role.

The same applies for restricting a specific article also.

WP Advanced PDF

Do you want to add a PDF download for your Kb/Wiki articles? Recently one of our readers asked if there was an easy way to turn the articles into PDF. 

In this article, we will show you how to add a PDF download for the articles in your kb/wiki.

STEPS TO FOLLOW:

1. Download and install the free plugin “WP Advanced PDF”
2. Once activated, go to settings -> WP Advanced PDF -> Display option. Select ‘Front-end’ if you want to include an option for pdf download in the front-end.
3. Then go to General -> Allowed post type.
   
   
4. Select Pauple_helpie and save the changes.
5. You can now visit any articles, and you will see a PDF download icon. Clicking on it will start the PDF download.

There are also many more options in their settings like Button positioning, Watermark, etc. Review them and adjust them as needed.

Intuitive Custom Post Order

While HelpieKB does allow you to order the articles with certain parameters (like alphabetically, date, etc.), some users want to custom order the articles in a way they wish.

Certain users also want to custom order the categories in the categories listing (on the main page) and also in the Table of contents.

This could be easily done by adding a free plugin called “Intuitive custom post order”.

Let’s say you want to order the articles which are displayed on the Main page and category page in a way that you wish.

Steps to follow:

1. Install and activate the plugin.
2. Go to settings -> Intuitive CPO. 
3. Under Sortable post types, select the articles and under Sortable taxonomies select the Wiki categories.
4. Once you have selected this, you could now drag and drop all the wiki articles and categories in the dashboard.
5. Now go to Helpie kb Wiki -> Helpie settings -> Components -> Article order. Choose “Menu order” in it.
6. Then go to Helpie kb Wiki -> All articles. Drag and drop the articles in the order that you want it to be displayed. 
7. Your articles would now be displayed in the order you arranged on the dashboard.

Sort the categories:

1. If you want to sort the categories in the TOC and Main page categories listing, just follow the above four steps and then drag and drop the categories in a way you wish.
2. Your categories would have now been arranged as you did on the dashboard.

Have you tried any of these plugins with HelpieKB? Do you have any plugins in your mind that we can add to this list? Share with us in the comments section.