Membership

An end-to-end guide detailing the BAB membership lifecycle, authentication workflows, profile metadata binding, and gated access controls across the platform.

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Membership Ecosystem Overview

The Belgian Alliance for Biomechanics platform implements a strict multi-tier access gate. Users registered with the custom Member (bab_registered_member) role receive exclusive access to research toolboxes, gated event assets, and private working group dashboards.

1. Member Onboarding & Profile Setup

Members can be registered via frontend intake or directly by administrators in the WordPress backend.

Core Member Metadata Fields

Position: Academic or clinical standing (Professor, PhD Researcher, Research Collaborator, Industry, Lab Manager, Student).
Industry / Affiliation: Primary institution, research laboratory, or company (e.g. UGent, KU Leuven, ULiège, VUB).
Working Group Assignment: The specific committee to which the member contributes (e.g. Communication, Conference, Liaison & Corporate, PhD Event, Research Award).

2. Authentication & Gated Content Rules

Access privileges automatically adapt based on authentication status and user roles:

Public Visitors: Unrestricted access to general informational pages, public event listings, research publications, and open job boards.
Subscribers: Can purchase conference tickets and manage basic billing, but cannot view gated academic resources.
BAB Members: Unlocks private educational toolboxes (GitHub repositories, specialized datasets), past event slide decks, and member-only download vaults.
Administrators & Editors: Full administrative privileges with universal bypass across all gated routes.

3. Automated Working Group Routing

When a logged-in member accesses the working group area:

Navigating to /workgroups/ automatically evaluates their assigned bab_workgroup metadata.
The system redirects the user straight to their specific working group dashboard (e.g. /workgroup/phd-event/).
Attempting to access unauthorized working groups triggers an immediate 403 Access Denied boundary.

4. Secure File Access & Upload Protocol

Working group members can upload and stream confidential committee files through encrypted proxy routes:

Protected Storage: Files reside in /wp-content/uploads/workgroups/{group-slug}/ behind a server-level .htaccess barrier (direct file URLs are blocked).
Secure Streaming Route: Files are securely streamed via /secure-wg-file/{group-slug}/{filename} following identity and group verification.
Upload Limits: Supports documents and video presentations up to 100MB per file with automatic filename sanitization.

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Security & Permission Hygiene

Reassigning or removing a member's working group in their user profile immediately updates their access permissions across both the frontend dashboards and the secure file streaming proxy.