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Member

Introduction

The Member class is used to represent user accounts on a SilverStripe site (including newsletter recipients).

Testing For Logged In Users

The Member class comes with 2 static methods for getting information about the current logged in user.

Member::currentUserID()

Retrieves the ID (int) of the current logged in member. Returns 0 if user is not logged in. Much lighter than the next method for testing if you just need to test.

:::php
// Is a member logged in?
if( Member::currentUserID() ) {
	// Yes!
} else {
	// No!
}

Member::currentUser()

Returns the full Member Object for the current user, returns null if user is not logged in.

:::php
if( $member = Member::currentUser() ) {
	// Work with $member
} else {
	// Do non-member stuff
}

Subclassing

This is the least desirable way of extending the Member class. It's better to use DataObjectDecorator (see below).

You can defined subclasses of member to add extra fields or functionality to the built-in membership system.

:::php
class MyMember extends Member {
	static $db = array(
		"Age" => "Int",
		"Address" => "Text",
	);
}

To ensure that all new members are created using this class, put a call to [api:Object::useCustomClass()] in (project)/_config.php:

:::php
Object::useCustomClass("Member", "MyMember");

Note that if you want to look this class-name up, you can call Object::getCustomClass("Member")

Overloading getCMSFields()

If you overload the built-in function getCMSFields(), then you can change the form that is used to view & edit member details in the newsletter system. This function returns a FieldSet object. You should generally start by calling parent::getCMSFields() and manipulate the FieldSet from there.

:::php
function getCMSFields() {
	$fields = parent::getCMSFields();
	$fields->insertBefore(new TextField("Age"), "HTMLEmail");
	$fields->removeByName("JobTitle");
	$fields->removeByName("Organisation");
	return $fields;
}

Extending Member or DataObject?

Basic rule: Class "Member" should just be extended for entities who have some kind of login. If you have different types of Members in the system, you have to make sure that those with login-capabilities have unique email-addresses (as this is used for login-credentials). For persons without login-capabilities (e.g. for an address-database), you shouldn't extend member to avoid conflicts with the Member-database. This enables us to have a different subclass of Member for an email-address with login-data, and another subclass for the same email-address in the address-database.

Member Role Decorator

Using inheritance to add extra behaviour or data fields to a member is limiting, because you can only inherit from 1 class. A better way is to use role decorators to add this behaviour.

:::php
DataObject::add_extension('Member', 'ForumRole');
// OR
Member::add_role('ForumRole');

A role decorator is simply a subclass of [api:DataObjectDecorator] that is designed to be used to add behaviour to Member. The roles affect the entire class - all members will get the additional behaviour. However, if you want to restrict things, you should add appropriate [api:Permission::checkMember()] calls to the role's methods.

:::php
class ForumRole extends DataObjectDecorator {
  /**

   * Modify the field set to be displayed in the CMS detail pop-up
   */
  function updateCMSFields(FieldSet $currentFields) {
    // Only show the additional fields on an appropriate kind of use 
    if(Permission::checkMember($this->owner->ID, "VIEW_FORUM")) {
      // Edit the fieldset passed, adding or removing fields as necessary
    }
  }

  function extraStatics() {
    // Return an array containing keys 'db', 'has_one', 'many_many', 'belongs_many_many',
  }

  function somethingElse() {
    // You can add any other methods you like, which you can call directly on the member object.
  }
}

API Documentation

[api:Member]

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