Create a directory page

In Composer, multiple Constituent elements can work together on a single page to make a sophisticated community directory. A great Constituent directory may consist of one or several pages, including a search function, browsing capability, and constituent profiles.

The Constituent element is found in the "Module" section of the element list. It contains “Directory,” “Search,” and “Profile” formats.

Constituent Directory element

The backbone of the directory is the Constituent Directory element. Whether users prefer to browse through pages of constituents or search for a specific result, they’ll find who they’re looking for in the Directory element.

Add the Constituent element to the page, and click the Element Settings gear icon. “Directory” is the default format.

The Constituent Filters section can be used to narrow down the constituents included in the directory by role and/or group. If no groups or roles are selected, the directory will display all users in Constituent Manager. You can select as many roles and groups as you’d like. Keep in mind that the roles selected will restrict which members of the selected groups appear. If the role “Faculty & Staff” and the groups “Lower School” and “Upper School” are selected, faculty and staff constituents who are in the Lower School OR the Upper School group will be included, but no other roles.

List Settings allows you to customize the appearance of your directory, specifically the number of constituents on a single page, the number of columns on the page, and where the pagination links are shown (if there is more than one page of constituents in your directory).

The Constituent Details settings determine what type(s) of information about each user are displayed. When a particular type of information (such as role membership, email address, phone number, etc.) is selected, that info will be displayed for each user - as long as it's included in each person's Constituent Manager profile. If an individual does not have an associated phone number or email address, that section of their profile will be left blank.

In addition, profile information visibility may be restricted by settings in Constituent Manager > Settings > Constituent Roles > [Role] > Profile Fields, or by individual users themselves if they are allowed to restrict what information from their profile is visible on site directories. Find out more about these settings in Customizing constituent profile data.

In this section, there are two options for “Link names to profile details” and “View Profile link to profile details.” These allow users to view more details about each constituent than what is displayed in the initial directory entry.

If one or both of these options is enabled, the Open In settings determine where the user is taken if they click on the link. The details may be opened in a popup window, or in a Constituent element (Profile format), either on the same page or a different page.

If “Popup” is selected, the Pop-Up Details settings govern how the additional information is displayed. The “Custom format” option resembles the Constituent Details above, and allows you to choose from some of the most common constituent profile fields. The “Constituent role format” will display all fields from Constituent Manager, based on their privacy settings. More about using the format is discussed in the post from the Support blog Customizing the Constituent Role Format.

Under the Advanced section, you'll find a checkbox labeled "Ignore URL parameters." This feature allows you to configure a Constituent Element so that it always shows the same constituent(s), regardless of how the user arrived on the page. This allows you to use multiple Constituent Elements on a page that loads directory info dynamically: one element can display user-selected information, while the other remains static and only displays the constituent information you select (if, for example, you want to create a directory that always lists certain individuals at the top of the page).

Constituent Profile element

If the “Open In” settings of the Constituent Directory element are set to “Page” or “Element,” it will need to be linked to another Constituent element with the Profile format. If using “Page,” you will choose the page from the site tree that has this Constituent element on it. If “Element,” you’ll place the Constituent Profile element on the same page and choose it from the dropdown list.

As with the Constituent Directory element, you can select which details will appear at first and choose to link to additional details, either in a popup or another Constituent Profile element, on the same or a different page. You can also display links to some or all of a constituent’s Boards, and select a page on which they will open.

The Constituent Profile element can be used to display a specific constituent’s profile, and not just respond dynamically to a search. Begin typing the constituent’s name in the “Constituent” field to search for the desired person. As with the Directory element, the “Ignore URL parameters” checkbox can be used to make this element remain static despite any user selections.

Constituent Search element

Finally, the Constituent element in a Search format can be used to simply finding a constituent by any number of criteria. As with the Directory element, which roles or groups can be searched for is defined by the Constituent Filters criteria.

You can choose from a large number of search fields to display, some of which will appear as text-entry fields, others of which are dropdowns or multi-select menus. The dropdown search options will display any value in use for a constituent within the search filters in Constituent Manager.

The “Open in Page” selection determines whether results will be displayed on the current page or a different page.