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There was a bug in the last version of amProtect that affected the login widget. It has been corrected in version 3.0.0.08.

So I thought I would take this opportunity to talk a little bit about the four widgets that now come with amProtect.

The Four amProtect Widgets

Login Widget

amProtect Login Widget (Top)

This widget shows a login screen for your members and a signup link if your visitors are not yet members.

When they do login it greets them with their first name and gives them links to their member page, their profile page and a logout link.

amProtect Login Widget (Bottom)

It can also display a second widget with the list of all of their products /subscriptions from aMember. If you’ve configured those products with a product URL then the title of the product will be linked so your members can very easily navigate to their product and consume it.

Everything is configurable. You can change all of the language and you can decide whether or not to display specific pieces of the widgets.

Drip / Incremental Content Widget

amProtect Drip Widget

This widget used to be part of the login widget but recently I’ve separated it out so that it can be placed separately from the login widget, perhaps in other sidebars.

This widget will only display if you are using the amProtect drip content feature on your posts or pages or if you are using the Incremental Content plugin from aMember. It works with both. It only displays if the member is logged in and if any drip / incremental content is available for them to view.

It displays a list of the drip links with the title and link to the content. You can decide how many links will be displayed and you can decide to display them alphabetical or reverse chronological order.

This is good, for example, if you wanted to title this the “Recent Content” widget and only display the last 5 links with the most recent on top. As time progressed each member would see those links at different times but to them it would appear as fresh content.

Protected Text Widget

amProtect Text Widget

This widget works exactly the same way that a text widget works with the exception that it has aMember protection on it. You can show or hide the widget to very specific subscribers. Or you can elect to only display the widget when the member is not logged in which works great to entice visitors to become members but not bug them once they do.

So for example, you could display a text widget to your Gold members only which advertises the benefits of your Platinum membership level and invites them to upgrade. Once they do, that widget won’t show to them any more.

Protected Menu Widget

amProtect Menu Widget

WordPress 3.0 has a new feature for you to be able to create custom menus. Once you do, they can be used in sidebars with their Custom Menu widget.

The amProtect Menu Widget is exactly like their widget but with aMember protection capabilities just like the text widget mentioned above. So you can display the menu to specific members and hide it from others or just display it to non-members.

A good usage of this would be to create a set of “Dashboard Links” for each of your member levels by creating specific menus for each one. Then you can add one of these protected menu widgets for each level and only show it to the right level and/or hide it from the others. That way the sidebars can become dynamic depending on what products / subscriptions your visitors have or have not purchased from you.

This is the widget that makes it necessary for you to upgrade to WordPress 3.0 before you upgrade to this version of amProtect.

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