pay-per-view v.s. individual subscription

[yhan]

Could anyone educate me how OJS handles pay-per-view v.s. individual subscription?

I understand that OJS has a built-in feature to activate pay-per-view (i.e "Purchase Article" in "Fee Payment Options"). But the user still has to register and the subscription type does not have "pay-per-view". How can OJS ensure that the user who paid for article A does not have access to other articles?

[michael]

Hi yhan,

The purchase article option allows readers to buy individual articles. This is useful for readers who don't have a subscription, but wish to access some of the subscription protected content.

In contrast, an individual subscription will give a reader access to all published articles.

Cheers,
Michael

[yhan]

Michael,

Thank you for explanation. I understand the difference. My question is how OJS handles them differently.

What is the individual's status in the system? From what I found, the person who purchased an article still need a status of "active", but then an "active" person can read all the articles.

I am trying to understand the technical side.

Thanks much,

[michael]

Hi yhan,

A reader only needs to have an OJS user account in order to purchase an article. They do not need an active subscription record. Article purchases and subscriptions are stored separately in the database in different tables.

Cheers,
Michael

[yhan]

Michael,

This helps a lot. Could you tell me which tables storing "user purchasing an article"?

I assume that users info are in table "users", paidPurchaseArticle stores "userId" and "articleId" in another table?

[michael]

Hi yhan,

You'll find purchased articles in the completed_payments table.

Please see OJSCompletedPaymentDAO::hasPaidPurchaseArticle in classes/payment/ojs/OJSCompletedPaymentDAO.inc.php for more information.

Cheers,
Michael

[yhan]

Michael,

Thanks much!