[consulting] multisite with shared users, but with different roles

[Boris Mann]

On 15-Mar-06, at 2:15 PM, Laura Scott wrote:

> [I posted this on the support list, but given the mission of the  
> consultants' list, perhaps it's a good one to post here, as it gets  
> to architecture, a current project and best practices on a current  
> problem....]

Is this 4.7 or 4.6? I'm assuming 4.6 for now...

> I am working on a multisite-type of project involving over a dozen  
> sub-sites. The main site will have accumulated content (and I  
> assume I'll use agg2 for that, though I'm not 100% sure that's the  
> best or easiest way) and the sub-sites will have their own content,  
> own admins, own bloggers, etc.

Publish/Subscribe are excellent modules to look into.

> Ideally, people could register on one site and be registered for  
> all sites. But they would have user roles only as appropriate for  
> the site they're on. In other words, someone on Site A with  
> blogging permissions is also registered on Sites B, C, D... but  
> without blogging permissions. Same with admins.
>
> I am contemplating a multisite install with:

> shared tables
> - users
> - profile
> - ?

I'm not a huge fan of shared tables in this manner. What if you want  
to add a site that is under control elsewhere? Difficult to upgrade,  
etc. etc. That being said, it's a "works today" solution.

> unique tables per site
> - users_roles
> - roles
> ...and everything else
>
> Questions: Am I looking for trouble going this way? Are there other  
> tables I will need to share (e.g., sessions, cache)? Are there  
> other pitfalls to this hybrid multisite approach I should watch out  
> for?
>
> Can you suggest alternative approaches you might try? (I'm looking  
> at SXIP, but it seems to be overkill for what we're after.)

Doing a "real" identity system will make it easier to expand the  
system and make it more flexible. Someone can start a site elsewhere  
and decide to interoperate with you, instead of having to connect at  
the database level.

In a dream scenario, we get a sort of "controller" function from one  
of the identity modules. A dashboard that lets you connect in other  
sites, and actually set roles of users across sites.

Also, related to multisite, have people heard of Performancing.com?  
They are built on Drupal, and made a Drupal-based metrics/analytics  
system. See http://performancing.com/metrics/start

I don't know if they would release the module, but it would be a  
great way to get cross-site metrics. As perhaps a slightly more  
realistic approach, it would be great if instead of using javascript,  
this could be turned into a more full-featured module that you  
installed on all sites that you wanted to monitor. It's kind of the  
tough thing...if they don't release, I know that I'll eventually have  
to rebuild that functionality...

--
Boris Mann
Vancouver 778-896-2747 San Francisco 415-367-3595
SKYPE borismann
http://www.bryght.com