Kavi Help CenterKavi® Members Help
| Chapter 6. How to Configure Kavi Members | ||
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Part I. Kavi Members Concepts and General Instructions | 
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Table of Contents
Kavi Members manages company, user and membership data and handles most of the access control functionality for your organization's web site, so it's important that all Kavi Members configuration options are set according to your organization's requirements before the Web site goes live. Configuration options set here have a profound effect on all aspects of the Web site and the behavior of other applications that draw on Kavi Members for access control and data management. The most basic of these options reflect the organization's structure: whether its participants are companies and company representatives only, individuals only, or both companies and independent individuals. The organization's membership structure and configuration of the membership feature also has widespread impacts, as does the question of whether the organization tracks and manages nonmembers in its database. The Kavi Members database structure is primarily determined by these configuration settings (possibly with the addition of custom fields created specifically for your organization).
Before a site can be configured properly, the organization's requirements must be well defined—and experience indicates that this isn't necessarily as straightforward of a task as organizations sometimes expect. This is especially true of membership types and processes that must be rigidly defined so they can be encoded in the software. Many organizations find they must open up discussions aimed at taking their membership policies to a new level of formality and refinement. They are often surprised to find the problem domain more complex and nuanced than it appeared when the organization was small enough to allow memberships to be handled casually. Time spent investigating the organization's options and selecting those that are the best fit for the organization will pay off in a solid set of requirements, quicker configuration, a smoother running site, and less need for administrator intervention or costly site overhauls.
Another preliminary step is to identify any custom fields that should be installed before data is uploaded. Custom fields should be added to the database after all other configuration steps are complete, but before the final data migration step.
Back to topThe amount of time needed to configure Kavi Members depends on the complexity of the organization structure and its processes, and the kinds of features the Web site will use (especially the membership feature and application forms).
It is possible to successfully configure a basic implementation of Kavi Members capable of providing controlled Web site access and issuing passwords in about thirty minutes. Complex configurations, such as those where multiple membership types are defined, or that implement online application and signup processes, or require an extensive set of scheduled email notifications, may require several hours to configure, even when comprehensive and detailed requirements are available.
Note
The last step of the site setup process isn't included in these time estimates: the migration of legacy data. Depending on the current state of the organization's databases and the amount of work required to bring that data into compliance with the specific set of requirements imposed by the web site's configuration (including any custom fields), data migration can be one of the most challenging and time-consuming tasks performed during site setup, so it isn't possible to provide a rule-of-thumb time estimate for this step.
New organizations without a formally defined membership structure may benefit from a phased approach to configuration and implementation. The site can be configured simply at startup so that the organization can immediately begin to enjoy the advantages of having its own access-controlled Web-based collaboration site without the need to formally define its membership structure. As the organization matures and adopts a formal membership structure, membership can be enabled and the site can be configured to support membership processes, possibly adding Kavi® Billing and Kavi® Commerce for online processing of membership fees.
Once Kavi Members configuration is fully established for a site, it requires little effort to maintain and automates many of the mundane tasks administrators would otherwise perform, such as sending email to members to remind them to keep their account information up to date. Configuration options may need to be tweaked as the organization grows and changes over time, but are unlikely to require extensive reconfiguration unless the organization's structure changes (e.g., the organization's site was set up for company members only, then the organization revised its structure to include memberships for individuals).
The configuration steps illustrated below are shown in the order recommended as the most efficient route through the configuration process. Depending on your sites, some steps may be skipped, and performing steps out of order will not harm the software in any way (although data migration must always be done last because many configuration settings affect database structure).
These are broad setup steps. Some steps can be performed through a single configuration tool, while more complex steps such as roles and types setup are performed through a set of related tools. Remember to install and configure any other applications needed for your site, such as Kavi® Groups or Kavi Billing, so you can successfully launch a fully functioning Web site.
Back to topKavi Members is installed on all new sites by default, but if it hasn't already been installed for some reason, a Kavi administrator can easily install it through the Zope Management Interface (ZMI).
As soon as you have set the organization properties (so that email sent from the site will have the correct organization name and return email address), it's possible for administrators to begin adding companies and users, and assign default types to grant them regular or administrative access to the Web site.
Kavi Members uses the terms "Company" and "User" by default. These terms can be changed throughout the application to terms more appropriate for your organization, although the help will still use the default terminology. If Kavi Members vocabulary is to be customized on your site, this step should be performed immediately after installation.
Organization properties include the organization's name, administrative contact email address and type. You can also decide which contact fields will be requested or required when new companies or users are added.
You only need to perform this step if the organization uses Kavi Members for online company representative signup.
You can configure Kavi Members to present applicants with a click-through terms and conditions agreement and set options that determine how moderation and billing steps are handled in the membership workflow. You can also configure whether accepted domains are enforced and whether a moderation step will be included in the company representative signup process.
Kavi Members Privacy Options allow the organization to provide privacy opt-out for its members. By default these options are set so each user and company has the ability to opt-out of sharing their contact information and receiving members email. Depending on the organization's published privacy guidelines, you may need to reconfigure the privacy options.
Back to topKavi Members is installed with a set of default roles and types that are sufficient to get most standard Members Web sites up and running. If the site has special areas that should only be accessible by certain kinds of users you will have to add a role that controls access to that area and custom types that can be assigned to the appropriate users. Sites for organizations that gives nonmembers access to the Members Area have to be customized and custom roles and types usually have to be added to give appropriate levels of access to nonmembers and screen them from areas that are reserved for use by members only. This kind of customization is outside the scope of this document, but the concepts document on Roles and those on types (listed in the following paragraphs) discusses these topics in depth.
If your organization offers memberships to companies, you need to define Company Types that correspond to the company membership types that you will add in the next step. Other Company Types can be added as needed to provide access or categorize companies so they can be managed as a group and retrieved by type in searches and reports. For more information, see Company Types.
If your organization offers memberships to individuals, you need to define User Types that correspond to the individual membership types that you will add in the next step. Some organizations also add types that are used merely to categorize individual members and nonmembers so they can be retrieved by type in searches and reports. Kavi Members and other Kavi applications automatically install privileged administrative and editorial User Types by default. These types may be adequate for most organizations but can be edited and other User Types can be added depending on the needs of the organization. For more information on adding user types, see User Types. To review default types, see Default User Types.
Kavi Members and other Kavi applications automatically install Company Administration and Contact Types by default. These types may be adequate for your organization, or they can be edited and expanded by the addition of new types depending on the needs of the organization. For more information, see Company Administration and Contact Types. To review default types, see Default Company Administration and Contact Types.
If your site doesn't offer memberships, you can skip this step.
At a minimum, you will need to set the membership type names, terms, and descriptions to begin automating the membership renewal and signup process. Try to provide enough details about each membership type to clarify the membership structure and minimize questions from prospective members.
Configure Kavi Billing
If members will be billed for membership as part of the membership application process, be sure to install and configure Kavi Billing before adding membership types so you can define membership fees. Kavi Members will only provide fields for setting fees for each membership type if Kavi Billing is installed.
Set the text that will appear at the top of the page that lists your organization's memberships and provides links to membership applications. If Kavi Billing is installed, configure the membership workflow with respect to billing processes.
Set how the organization's company membership application collects Company Contact and Administrator information, set a post-signup URL and terms and conditions agreement.
Set how the organization's individual membership application assigns users to companies, set a post-signup URL and terms and conditions agreement.
A set of standard scheduled email is created by default when Kavi Members is installed. The scheduled email can be edited or expanded upon at this time if required, or the organization can rely on the standard email at setup, then customize its email schedule later. Scheduled email is such an important part of an organization's day-to-day business processes and member interaction that its worthwhile to devote some attention to the way the schedule and template text fit the organization's needs.
Each scheduled email sends a specific email template. The text in default templates is designed to be both informative and innoffensive, but lacks character and may not include all the information this organization considers pertinent. Because the content and tone of an email message support an organization's goals and work to establish its reputation in the community, your organization may wish to review and custom-tailor the default templates.
This step is only applicable if your organization needs to import legacy data into the Kavi Members database.
Kavi Members can be extended to capture information beyond what is provided by default. If you need to have custom fields added to the database, it is important that these filed are added before populating the database so that data migration can proceed smoothly. If you try to add data files with custom data fields before these fields have been added to the database the upload will fail and you will have to remove the custom fields and values from the data file(s), then add the data later after the database has been reconfigured in a separate batch operation.
Upload new companies first, then new users. Once all the users and companies are in the database, you'll be ready to send out passwords to your new members-only Web site.
The last step of the site setup process isn't included in these time estimates: the migration of legacy data. Depending on the current state of the organization's databases and the amount of work required to bring that data into compliance with the specific set of requirements imposed by the web site's configuration (including any custom fields), data migration can be one of the most complex and expensive tasks performed during site setup. The Kavi Members Upload Data tool is designed to handle the massive data uploads necessary to populate the database, but the real work occurs during data file preparation, as described in the Upload Data page help.
Companies have to be uploaded first, then users. Once all the users and companies are in the database, you'll be ready to send out passwords to your new members-only Web site.
If your organization has preexisting memberships, they can be added when a company or individual member is added to the database during the intial upload or as a separate step.
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| Chapter 5. Logging |  |
Chapter 7. Membership Application and Company Representative Signup |