Using an image instead of text on follow buttons

You can filter the entire contents of the button using the 'bp_follow_get_add_follow_button' filter.

It’s not ideal right now because you’d need to find out what the link text is and replace it with nothing manually.

You can also do this with CSS. Search for “CSS image replacement” on Google for some tutorials.

Also not ideal, but if you can’t wait for the new code, you can use those techniques.

Thanks for the ideas, think i’ll give the filter approach a shot!

Hi r-a-y

I’ve tried to use the filter approach but just can’t seem to get it to work. My PHP is failing me :{

Any pointers would be really helpful?

OK managed to filter the button properly now.

function custom_follow_button( $button ) {

global $bp, $members_template;

		$defaults = array(
			'leader_id'   => bp_displayed_user_id(),
			'follower_id' => bp_loggedin_user_id()
		);

		$r = wp_parse_args( $args, $defaults );
		extract( $r );

		if ( !$leader_id || !$follower_id )
			return false;

		// if we're checking during a members loop, then follow status is already queried via bp_follow_inject_member_follow_status()
		if ( !empty( $members_template->member ) && $follower_id == bp_loggedin_user_id() && $follower_id == bp_displayed_user_id() ) {
			$is_following = $members_template->member->is_following;
		}
		// else we manually query the follow status
		else {
			$is_following = bp_follow_is_following( array( 'leader_id' => $leader_id, 'follower_id' => $follower_id ) );
		}

		// if the logged-in user is the leader, use already-queried variables
		if ( bp_loggedin_user_id() && $leader_id == bp_loggedin_user_id() ) {
			$leader_domain   = bp_loggedin_user_domain();
			$leader_fullname = bp_get_loggedin_user_fullname();
		}
		// else we do a lookup for the user domain and display name of the leader
		else {
			$leader_domain   = bp_core_get_user_domain( $leader_id );
			$leader_fullname = bp_core_get_user_displayname( $leader_id );
		}

		// setup some variables
		if ( $is_following ) {
			$id        = 'following';
			$action    = 'stop';
			$class     = 'unfollow';
			$link_text = $link_title = sprintf( __( 'Stop Following %s', 'bp-follow' ), apply_filters( 'bp_follow_leader_name', bp_get_user_firstname( $leader_fullname ), $leader_id ) );
		}
		else {
			$id        = 'not-following';
			$action    = 'start';
			$class     = 'follow';
			$link_text = $link_title = sprintf( __( 'Follow %s', 'bp-follow' ), apply_filters( 'bp_follow_leader_name', bp_get_user_firstname( $leader_fullname ), $leader_id ) );
		}

		// setup the button arguments
		$button = array(
			'id'                => $id,
			'component'         => 'follow',
			'must_be_logged_in' => true,
			'block_self'        => empty( $members_template->member ) ? true : false,
			'wrapper_class'     => 'follow-button ' . $id,
			'wrapper_id'        => 'follow-button-' . $leader_id,
			'link_href'         => wp_nonce_url( $leader_domain . $bp->follow->followers->slug . '/' . $action .'/', $action . '_following' ),
			'link_text'         => $link_text,
			'link_title'        => '',
			'link_id'           => $class . '-' . $leader_id,
			'link_class'        => $class
		);

   return $button;
}
add_filter( 'bp_follow_get_add_follow_button', 'custom_follow_button' );

Link title was the only part I changed as poedit accepts HTML markup so was able to swap out the text for an image using the localisation file.

The approach works for me but if there is an easier way….? (i’m sure my filter can be stripped down too – probably have unnecessary stuff in there)

Ref: bp-follow-templatetags.php line 117

Humm, spoke slightly too soon. Although it is working on the profile page, the button isn’t displayed at all in the members loop.

Hi Henry,

Try this:
https://pastebin.com/ST1C3NGk

Thanks r-a-y!

Of course my badly written function had no way of accepting the leader ID and follower ID variables so that explains why it didn’t work.

I actually re-wrote my function to work but your approach is far cleaner so will use that.

Thanks!