SDM – Download url used in Elementor button always displays user login message

[KnowledgeMappers]

Hi. I have just started using EMember with Simple Download Monitor on a site I have built using Elementor Pro page builder.

I have created a test download and made it so that it’s only available to logged in users and it works as it should with the download button inserted on the page using Elementors Shortcode widget ie. if you’re not logged in, it displays a page with the “You need to be logged in to download this file. Click here to go to login page.” message.

The Elementor Shortcode Widget does allow me to add additional parameters to the shortcode itself, as well as add additional CSS in the advances settings, as per the various support suggestions on the SDM website (I am not a coder though so there are limitations with this). Elementor also allows certain elements of the widget to be changed so I can add a background colour ond border radius and padding. However even with all this I have not been able to get the download widget to look the same as the other buttons in the site built with Elementor.

Thus I am now investigating controlling the downloads using buttons created in Elementor. I have used the download url suggested in the support SDM pages –

[staging.scotlandthemap.info/?smd_process_download=1&download_id=12378]

However no matter if I am logged in or not, when I click on the button it takes me to the page with the “You need to be logged in to download this file. Click here to go to login page.” message. When I click on the link it does go to the Member Login page, which shows that I am logged in.

I have enabled the ‘Only Allow Logged-in Users to Download’ and ‘Redirect Users to Download Page’ SDM settings. It still behaves the same if you disable the latter setting. The download has been set to be allowed only to all 3 membership levels, the first of which is free so the download is not likned to some sort of payment action.= or anything like that.

So is there anything I can do to fix this issue? Is there a setting in SDM or eMember that I can change? Is there additional shaortcode parameters or CSS code that I could add to the button?

I would be really grateful for any help you can give.

Best regards

Angus

PS – I have searched the SDM forum but I couldn’t find an answer there and it wouldn’t allow me to post a question there.

[KnowledgeMappers]

PPS – Sorry if the ‘Redirect Users to Download Page’ setting is enabled then clicking on the “You need to be logged in to download this file. Click here to go to login page.” message takes you to the download single page and you are able to download the file. If the setting is diabled it just takes you to the Member Login page where it shows I am logged in. Thus it seems to be aware that I am logged in, but just isn’t taking me to the right place when I first click the download button.

[wzp]

1. Does your site have an SSL certificate?

2. When I visited your site, I got the following error:

ERROR: Google reCAPTCHA verification failed. Do you have JavaScript enabled?

[KnowledgeMappers]

PPPS – Having now become more familiar with the way SDM works “in anger”, I can see how trying to get a non-SDM button designed using Elementor to completely control the download is going to be too much trouble.

I have now successfully got reCAPATCHA v2 integration sorted out on the site, enabling the “I am not a robot” tickbox to be displayed beside the download when enabled in the settings panel. Obviously this will not happen for an Elementor button just with the download shortcode. Furthermore when it is enabled, I get a “reCAPTCHA failed” error message when clicking the Elementor button so the user has nowhere to go.

I have been too hung up on trying not to interupt the users flow from the content post such that they just had to click once to initiate the download, and then click one more time only to open the downloaded file.

A more sensible compromise is to not have the SDM download widget in the content page but instead have the elementor designed button, but linking to the single download page (permalink shown in the settings page for the individual download).

Even if the user is not logged in the flow isn’t really interupted much as with the ‘Fancy Login Widget/Popup’ enabled in the eMember settings the user will not be taken away from the single download page during the login process. Also once they’ve downloaded, they can just click the browser back button to get back to the content page they just left. Neat

So….. the only problem now is changing some things on the single download page. I would like the content to be centre justified within the page for example. I can change the colour of the button to one from the usual range (SDM General Settings), and change the button text (individual download settings), but that seems to be about it.

As far as I can tell it is using it’s own page template when generating the page so I can’t control any appearances by adjusting the template file (without coding, I am not a that technical).

All I would like to do right now is change the appearance of the button to mimic the style of all the other buttons on my website (10px border radius for example), and to make the page centre justified. Can I do that in a similar way that have you have posted shortcode parameters / additional CSS code for the download fancy widgets?

Thanks and apologies for the slight “stream of consciousness” nature of this post (might be useful to other users).

[KnowledgeMappers]

I am working on the staging version of the beta site, which is why it’s a bit of a mess. Trying to nail down the functional moving parts in the backend before I finish off the frontend design. The staging site does have an SSL certificate supplied by my host.

As you can see from my PPPS post above I have come to a compromise solution that means I will no longer need to control the whole download process from an elementor button. A bit of control over the formatting of the single download page (either in settings panel or support documentation on coding tweaks) would make this solutin perfect for now.

Thanks.

[wzp]

If you require coding assistance with your site; you are welcome to request a custom work order quote:

https://support.tipsandtricks-hq.com/need-custom-work-done

[KnowledgeMappers]

Hi

Thanks for the swift replies to my query. OK I’ll keep your customisation service in mind, but I’ve still got to get to the end of the basic learning curve first.

I have encountered another problem however. Now that I can upload MindManager (.mmap) files (see other query) I have set up a test download for it and assigned membership level access to it (basically MindManager file downloads will be the premium content). I have also created another elementor button on the content post linking through to the single download page for the .mmap file.

So the problem is when a Free member is logged in and clicks the Download .mmap file button they go to a page with the only the following message “!You do not have permission to view this content”. Nothing more so the user is left hanging.

I can’t see any options to change this in the settings of either eMember or SDM. I am thinking that a message along the lines of “Your current membership level does not allow you to access this content. Upgrade here” with a link to either the Membership renewal Page.

I have just looked through the support documentation again on upgarding but all I could find was this article https://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/wordpress-membership/allow-members-upgrade-add-new-level-profile-free-1508. This tells you how to create a meachanism to upgarde – specific payment buttons embedded in pages only members of a particular level can see – but I can’t see anything about how to control this in the settings panel in a way that would direct the logged in free member to the upgarde page when they have tried to access the restricted content.

Guidance would be appreciated. Thanks.

Angus

[KnowledgeMappers]

I have implemented this on my site here – [staging.scotlandthemap.info/governance-and-politics/local/scottish-local-councils-electoral-wards-and-local-councillors-political-knowledge-atlas-2-feb-2020/] Download link buttons will appear at the top of the page after a few seconds.

Feel free to create a free account if you wish.

Angus

[admin]

I am a little bit confused with the subject matter of this topic.

Please reference the feature that you are talking about (so I can understand which of our plugin’s feature is not working). Then I should have better understanding and can provide a reply.

You can point out any documentation from our following page (pointing out which one you are following and what is the expected behavior that we say and what discrepancy that you are seeing):

https://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/wordpress-membership/

with that said, I hope some of the following info is helpful for you:

#1) You can customize some of the user visible messages displayed by the plugin using the following technique:

https://support.tipsandtricks-hq.com/forums/topic/how-to-customize-various-textmessages-displayed-by-the-plugin

#2) The following section protection feature allows you to create sections with custom “protection” messages if you want to:

https://www.tipsandtricks-hq.com/wordpress-membership/how-to-protect-a-section-of-a-post-or-page-88

[KnowledgeMappers]

Hi admin

Apologies fr the delay in responding to your reply, I was diverted onto other aspects of the site. Thankyou very much for your quick responses to my queries so far.

I really only have 1 remaining issue from this thread, and that is the fact that when logged in as a FREE member and I try to access a downloaded avavilable only to a paid member, the message displayed in the page simply says “!You do not have permission to view this content”, with no link to an upgrade page.

I have followed the advice and downloaded the English language PHP file with a view to changing this message, however I see that on the next line of the file (line 5) there is a message that says “Your membership level does not have access to this content.” That would be the more appropriate one to display for the situation.

So I could just change displayed text part of line 4 – R_CONTENT_RESTRICTED”,”You do not have permission to view this content.”) – to read “Your membership level does not have access to this content.” However I am concerned that the fact that the EMEMBER_CONTENT_RESTRICTED (line 4) message is displayed rather than EMEMBER_HIDDEN_CONTENT_MESSAGE message means that there is a problem with the logical path.

If I am already logged in as a free member and am trying to access paid member content, I would expect to be told “Your membership level does not have access to this content.” along with a link to the membership upgrade or edit profile page. Not to be just left hanging with an access denied text message with nowhere else to go.

Also even if I alter the text of the message displayed in the PHP file it will just be a different text message. I do not have the ability to insert a link into it as well (not within the langauge PHP file anyway).

I am thinking that this task – the upgrade pathway from a free member to a paid member – is just a normal part of the operation of a membership site, rather than something that requires bespoke customisation over and above the range of tasks that I can do involving altering the text in an individual file as directed in your support pages.

If it is beyond what you would expect a “non-techie” user like me to do then that’s fine too. Just don’t want to spend any more time on trying to do something I can’t.

So for reference my site is still [staging.scotlandthemap.info] (still not implemented on the live site yet). Within a blog post such as [staging.scotlandthemap.info/scottish-local-councils-general-and-geographic-knowledge-atlas-19-sep-2019/#Embedded-Map-Buttons], Free membership allows you to download the knowledge map as an HTML file, whilst paid membership allows you to download it in MindManager format.

Thanks.

[admin]

There are various different reasons for the different messages output in the plugin. Some sites will need to customize the messages based on the particular project you are doing.

Edit the language file and then you can edit the following line:

define("EMEMBER_CONTENT_RESTRICTED","You do not have permission to view this content.");

To something like the following to use a message with link to a page that you feel is appropriate for your project.

define("EMEMBER_CONTENT_RESTRICTED","Your custom message goes here with a <a href='domain.com/my-test-page'>test example link here</a>");

[KnowledgeMappers]

Admin

Many thanks I will give it a go.

Best regrads

Angus

[Author]

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