Year based subscription access

[jaik_70]

Dear Michael

The suggested code modifications are not working for OJS 2.3.0.

-Jaik

[michael]

Hi Jaik,

Can you please describe in more detail what is happening.

Cheers,
Michael

[jaik_70]

Dear Michael
1. we made changes in the file "localhost\ojs-2.3.0\classes\issue\IssueAction.inc.php "
2. In Archives the issues (subsription based) were for the years 2007, 2008, 2009
3. Then we set a Individual subscription (online) for Jan. 2009 to December 2009.
4. But it also allow the access for 2008 and 2007

IInd case (step 3 and 4)
3. we set a Individual subscription (online) for Oct. 2009 to December 2009.
4. Then it's ask for subscription.

IIIrd case (step 3 and 4)
3. we set a Individual subscription (online) for Jan. 2007 to December 2007.
4. Then it's ask for subscription.

-Jaik

[michael]

Hi Jaik,

For the archive issues that you've setup for testing (2007, 2008, 2009), can you please confirm that the article publication dates for the articles in those issues do in fact correspond to those years?

That is, if you assign recent articles to past issues, the article publication date may be recent (2009) even though the issue publication date is older (2007).

Cheers,
Michael

[jaik_70]

Dear Michael

Thanks for continuous help and reply.

We set the date for year 2007 as 11 Feb 2007; 2008 as 11 Feb 2008, 2009 as 11 Feb 2009. But still it's not working.

However your code for OJS 2.2.3 is working fine for OJS 2.2.3.

-Jaik

[michael]

Hi Jaik,

I had a chance to test the above code and it seems fine to me, I couldn't reproduce the problem.

I would suggest double-checking that the article publication dates for your test articles are in fact dates that fall in 2007, 2008, and 2009, respectively. In your OJS database, this is the date_published column in the published_articles table. The code first checks this date and then the issue publication date (column date_published in issues table).

Cheers,
Michael

[jaik_70]

Dear Michael

Thanks for your reply. Yes it's working fine. Thanks again for caring this.

-Jaik

[cnelson]

Hello,

My institution also needs to use year-based subscription access. I've read this thread and several others on this topic and just want to confirm a couple of things (at the request of my programmer :) ), namely that:

1) The code Michael wrote is replacing code that exists in OJS already (rather than being a plugin of any kind)

2) The functionality of this code is implemented by treating the "Start date" and "End date" (under individual subscription edit) as the dates for which we are enabling access for corresponding published issues of that particular journal, rather than the dates for which access is granted for the entire journal. So if I want to grant access for issues in 2005-2007 I would set a start date of Jan. 1 2005 - Dec 31 2007, for example.

Is there anything about this that I am misunderstanding? Is there anything else I should know in order to implement this correctly? This is a really important feature - without which we may not be able to use OJS, so I just want to make sure I have it right. Thank you so much for your help,

C Nelson

[michael]

Hi C Nelson,

I've included some comments below.

1) The code Michael wrote is replacing code that exists in OJS already (rather than being a plugin of any kind)

Yes.

2) The functionality of this code is implemented by treating the "Start date" and "End date" (under individual subscription edit) as the dates for which we are enabling access for corresponding published issues of that particular journal, rather than the dates for which access is granted for the entire journal. So if I want to grant access for issues in 2005-2007 I would set a start date of Jan. 1 2005 - Dec 31 2007, for example.

Yes.

Is there anything about this that I am misunderstanding? Is there anything else I should know in order to implement this correctly? This is a really important feature - without which we may not be able to use OJS, so I just want to make sure I have it right. Thank you so much for your help,

One additional thing comes to mind: by default, the subscription block for the sidebar will display the end date of the subscription for the user. If end date < current date, it will be shown as expired. You can either disable the block so that it's not shown to users at all (see Setup, Step 5) or modify it to show something else (e.g. start and end date of the subscription). The relevant code is in plugins/blocks/subscription/block.tpl

Cheers,
Michael

[ams.jour]

Dear Michael
1. I am amazing why this important feature (Year based subscription access) missing in OJS 2.3.1-xx. All the senior OJS user (subscription based) needs this feature. So please incorporate this to OJS mainstream.

2. Can we apply the code of OJS 2.3.0 for 2.3.1-xx ?

-AMS

[michael]

Hi AMS,

While I can appreciate that this particular feature is important to you, we recently completed a review, refactor, and overhaul of subscription management for the 2.3.0 release and while this requirement was not identified as a priority we may consider it for a future release. Full integration of this requirement into the OJS codebase would require many modifications throughout, including payment processing, settings, admin and user interfaces, etc. For now, we believe that the provided patch provides a reasonable workaround that achieves some of the required functionality and can be used as a basis for additional local customizations as needed.

Yes, the provided code for OJS 2.3.0 will work in OJS 2.3.x.

Cheers,
Michael

[ams.jour]

Dear Michael

Thanks for confirmation of Year based subscription access CODE for OJS 2.3.1-XX version.

-AMS

[iangoulding86]

I just registered because I wanted to say THANK YOU for this, you saved me hours of frustration, THANKS!

[michael]

While I can appreciate that this particular feature is important to you, we recently completed a review, refactor, and overhaul of subscription management for the 2.3.0 release and while this requirement was not identified as a priority we may consider it for a future release. Full integration of this requirement into the OJS codebase would require many modifications throughout, including payment processing, settings, admin and user interfaces, etc. For now, we believe that the provided patch provides a reasonable workaround that achieves some of the required functionality and can be used as a basis for additional local customizations as needed.

An update on this: The PKP team has had a chance to discuss and review this feature request and at this time we do not plan to include it in a future release of OJS. Unfortunately our resources are limited and priority is given to feature requests that are both beneficial to the greatest number of users and which help advance access to knowledge.

Please note that the suggested code modifications and workarounds posted in this thread will continue to work in OJS 2.2.x and OJS 2.3.x and will work as-is or with minor changes in OJS 2.4.x once it is released.

Cheers,
Michael

[cnelson]

Hello Michael,

Thank you for the update - even though you won't be implementing this feature directly I really appreciate you taking the time to update us. It shows a great level of customer support. I'm grateful that the code modifications will continue to work, and I hope we can continue to get support with making them work with 2.4.x in the future as well. Thanks again!

CNelson