CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

On the static HTML website for the organization I am trying to implement CiviCRM for there exists a "Join" form with the following fields:

I will:
[ ] Go Door to Door
[ ] Help with phonebanking
[ ] Register voters
[ ] Take Election Day off
[ ] Other
     [Textarea]

I have special skills including:
[ ] Grassroots Organizing
[ ] Fundraising
[ ] Websites/HTML
[ ] Graphic Design
[ ] Media/Communications
[ ] Event Planning
[ ] Databases

The "[ ]" fields are checkboxes (and there is obviously one "textarea").

When initially projecting how pre-existing data submitted via this form would be implemented I initially thought I'd use "Tags" to allow complex custom queries via "Smart Groups" but late yesterday I ran into a mental roadblock concerning this issue.

I had initially read documentation warning one to limit the number of custom fields, but is it possible for a "Join" form to automatically "Tag" a new contact based on the value of a checkbox in the form (that don't already exist as custom tags)?

Mike

I have been able to implement the custom fields as described.

The checkboxes serve as my organization's basic framework for collecting basic info about interests and skills. We often store more detailed info in our offline DB as we get to know the contact, but believe it would be too intimidating to have a signup form that basically serves as a full resume (therefore it is my belief that i should continue to not include this info in the basic join form).

My issue is that I would prefer that these attributes be managed in one place to avoid confusion for the people that administer the data.  As I said before, my initial direction for managing this whole lot of data was by using "Tags".

My current though is that perhaps i only use these custom fields for the collection of data from people who sign up and then run a nightly Cron job to:
- apply tags based on the data inputted
- clear out the inputted values of the custom tags

Does this sound reasonable or am I overthinking?

Mike

But am i correct in my understanding that:

• there is not a way to allow a user (filling out a form) to "self apply" a tag?
• there is not a way to create a  custom set of checkboxes and make some (but not all of them) available in a sign up form?

My only thought on the first point is that i can make two sets of checkboxes (2 custom fields) on that is used in the join form and one that is not. (The caveat being that the reason for why those boxes are separated won't make much sense to my internal admins)