Running ver 1.6.3 of the extension,i am unable to turn off the requirement that a prayer requestor enter an e-mail address. Is this by design? (I can exclude the field altogether, so I'm thinking it's not by design.)

Hi David,

It is the design of the Connector that if you have the email displayed, then it is required. This is because the purpose of the Connector is to connect people...very often by using email. If you do not want to have email required/displayed, you need to select which fields are displayed AND required, because the default includes email.

If there is some reason you would want email as optional, please let me know why and what use it could be, and I can consider adding a special feature for that.

-Dave

While I understand the logic, I'm not so sure that e-mail should be any more required than a person's name. There is certainly a significant loss in direct communication by not using e-mail, but I don't think it's necessary for prayer to be effective.

I want to encourage requestors to leave their e-mail address, but I don't want to require it, driving away some who would otherwise benefit from the prayers of the prayer team. It seems to me that the code shouldn't legislate this issue. The e-mail field itself is optional, so why shouldn't its completion also be? (Having said that, I might wish for a pop-up or something to encourage e-mail address omitters to reconsider, then let them go on anonymously.)

Another argument favoring not requiring an e-mail address: Members of our prayer team want to be able to post prayer requests for people who either don't have access or - because they are sick or in the hospital, etc.= have only limited access to the Internet.

I have decided to delay deployment of this extension until it meets our needs. That's a disappointment, because we were looking forward to this function as a significant enhancement to our website.

Hi David,

We should be able to accommodate this need. I can understand what you are saying and why it is needed. It will be in the next version of the Connector which I hope to release later next week.

-Dave

David,

If you have not checked it out yet, the WEC Prayer Connector has been updated and you now do not have to have the email address. Thanks for your suggestion in doing this.

If you do not want the email, you need to set which fields you want to show and are required because the default selection is email is shown and required.

-Dave

Thanks, Dave. Looks like it's working just as we want.