The General tab is used to configure overall settings for the Business Directory. There are 4 sub-tabs on General:
General Settings Sub Tab
Permalink Settings Section
These indicate what values will appear in various URLs used by Business Directory.
Directory Listings Slug: The slug used in the directory URL. This is the main directory URL. Must not contain spaces or remain empty. Avoid common terms which are likely already in use.
Categories Slug: The slug used in the category display URL, to which the category name will be appended. Example: http://site/wpbdm-category/manufacturing/ where “Manufacturing” is the category, and wpbdm-category is the category slug. Must not contain spaces or remain empty. Avoid common terms which are likely already in use, like “category”
Tags Slug: The slug used in the tag display URL, to which the tag name will be appended. Example: http://site/wpbdm-tags/red/ where “Red” is the tag, and wpbdm-tags is the tag slug. Must not contain spaces or remain empty. Avoid common terms which are likely already in use, like “tag(s)”
Remove ID from directory URLs? This SEO friendly option is something we added in 3.5.1 to allow you to remove the ID from the URL of the directory listing. It's on by default to ensure that you have the most searchable URLs in BD. We don't recommend turning this off anymore.
Terms & Conditions/Data Collection section
Display and require user agreement to Terms and Conditions: Checking this box will display the Terms and Conditions on checkout. The user must agree to what you put in the next text box in order to proceed with completing a listing. Turn this on if you have some special agreement you need the users to agree with before posting listings.
Terms and Conditions: Here you can enter specific text for the user to read OR you can place a link (starting with http) to a page on your site that we will use in an anchor tag.
Allow BD to anonymously collect information about your installed plugins, themes and WP version? BD has the optional setting where you can send us information about your server so we're better able to test and prepare each release to avoid breaking your site! We have a full writeup on what we collect and do with that data here. TL;DR: We don't collect private data like site URL, usernames, passwords or keys, but do gather general info like PHP version etc to help our testing efforts.
Directory Search section
Search form display: Where BD puts the search form after we return results from the Advanced Search page. 3 choices--above, below, and don't show it at all.
Quick search fields: What fields should be used in the Quick Search box for looking at matching listings? Your list of fields will likely be different than what you see above. The Quick Search box (for review) looks like this in BD:
And is displayed at the top of the directory. When you enter something in the Keywords field, the fields that are checked in this setting will be searched. Not checking ALL fields in your directory helps improve the performance of searches (mostly because many users have shared hosting plans, and their database bandwidth/query time is limited).
Enable high performance searches?: This option is a hack added for Shared Hosting plans where limiting the fields is not enough to make their directory perform as expected. Enable this if you find Quick Search to be too slow, or if you get database errors on query timeouts. It trades speed for accuracy, however, and it removes some of the "wildcard" matching clauses and reduces the number of listings that match your query.
reCAPTCHA Settings Sub Tab
These are the settings for configuring reCAPTCHA that is used on the BD comment and submission forms.
Use reCAPTCHA for contact forms: If checked, a captcha will appear on the contact form and will be required
Turn off reCAPTCHA for logged in users: If checked, logged in users will not be required to fill out ANY captcha on any page if you have them enabled.
Use reCAPTCHA for listing submits: If checked, a captcha will appear on the submit listing form and will be required
Use reCAPTCHA for listing comments: If checked, a captcha will appear on the comment form and will be required (only works when comments are turned on for listings)
reCAPTCHA Public Key: The public key from http://recaptcha.com that you obtain for your domain
reCAPTCHA Private Key: The private key from http://recaptcha.com that you obtain for your domain
Registration Settings Sub Tab
The Registration section is where you manage whether users are required to have a WordPress user account to post listings or not, along with membership plugin configuration so that BD can use their URLs instead of the default WP ones.
Require login to post listings: If checked, users must have an account on your site to create a listing.
Allow anonymous users to edit/manage listings with an access key: If checked, this allows users to manage their listings without an account and instead, use their email and an access key (emailed to them when the listing is placed, or one you can manually send from the Directory → Directory Listings area) to edit or delete the listing. Do not turn this on at the same time as "Require Login to post listings".
Login URL: If you are using a Membership plugin such as s2member, MemberMouse, Restrict Content Pro, WishList member or others, you will need to enter their Login Form URL they provide you here. If you don't do this, BD will use the default WP login form instead.
Registration URL: If you are using a Membership plugin such as s2member, MemberMouse, Restrict Content Pro, WishList member or others, you will need to enter their Registration Form URL they provide you here. If you don't do this, BD will use the default WP registration form instead.
Login URL: If you are using a Membership plugin such as s2member, MemberMouse, Restrict Content Pro, WishList member or others, you will need to enter their Login Form URL they provide you here. If you don't do this, BD will use the default WP login form instead.
Advanced Settings Sub Tab
Disable Advanced CPT Integration: Some themes that we've encountered have incredibly complex implementations and use of hooks and filters that are not entirely compatible with BD's use of a shortcode to output content in a page. For some themes like Elegant Theme or X, we've added this feature which uses a simpler mode of output for a theme that works better under these circumstances. Enable it if you have one of these themes and you are having issues with your directory output on all pages. DO NOT TURN THIS ON unless you are certain you need to.
Enable AJAX Compatibility Mode: BD heavily relies on AJAX callbacks to complete certain actions, such as CSV import and export. If you are having some difficulty performing an import or export and a conflict test seems to help, you may benefit from turning this on to help finish the export or import. Conflicts are serious and you should consider finding and eliminating them, rather than just hide them with this workaround.
Disable Frontend Listing Submission: Turn this on if you only want the admin to post listings and prevent users from doing so. Helpful for curated or private directories.