There is a newly updated version of the native extension called "Fancy Tokens". This new version (2.1) includes enhancements suggested by the community. Specifically the request from Xavier to include tokens for individual event registration pages, where the event ID can be easily changed.
Have you ever needed to send an email from CiviCRM that includes a list of upcoming events? Then you know how much fun the copy/paste effort this entails, especially if you want to use a checksum in the links to register. Plus you know you get to repeat the whole exciting process for the next newsletter the following week or month. Or if you have someone else you need to train on this task, try explaining to a non-technical person how to hand-edit the URL query string to include the checksum paramaters. (is the contact ID query string param name "cid=x" or "id=x", well that depends....) And even if you do not deal with events, you can have the same fun teaching someone else to properly use checksums when you need to include a hyperlink to a contribution page or a stand-alone profile.
If you want a much easier process for listing upcoming events with links to register, including links to contribution pages and stand-alone profiles, then try out the new extension called "Fancy Tokens" https://civicrm.org/extensions/fancy-tokens. That page also includes more details about how to use the new tokens. I have tested this with versions 4.3 and 4.4. Since this is a native CiviCRM extension, it works with WordPress, Drupal and Joomla.
Never used checksums before? Then you are missing out on a great (but previously hard to use) feature of CiviCRM. Checksums give each recipient a unique URL that will be preloaded with the recipient's contact data (such as email, first name, last name or whatever data you are collecting.) The use of checksums saves time for the recipient when filling in your contribution pages, event registrations, and stand-alone profiles. It may also reduce the chance of duplicate contacts in your database due to poor data entry habits of your recipients.
Technical Note: I had to include the .tpl file "/CRM/Mailing/Form/InsertTokens.tpl" within this extension because the core version of this file has a hard-coded width for the token dialog window that is too narrow to display longer token names. If this file can be eliminated, then this extension would work with more versions of CiviCRM.
-Sarah Gladstone
Comments
Forgot to mention: If you are running under Drupal, then there is also a token created for each Drupal WebForm that uses the WebForm CiviCRM integration module ( https://civicrm.org/extensions/webform-civicrm-integration )
This is all really cool Sara! Adding links to civicrm webforms is a nice touch.
I'm wondering though what's the purpose of the "Community News & Engagement" prefix on the tokens? Is it necessary to have any prefix?
Also, in 4.5 the token selector is much better, and includes headers for each group. To give your group a header you should prefix the token name with it and separate by ::
So my recommendation for token names would be to get rid of the "Community News & Engagement" prefix and use the other prefixes you have followed by :: instead of :
For example:
Event Registration :: Name of event
Contribution Page :: Name of page
The main pupose of the prefix is so the user does not have to scroll endlessly through the list of available tokens. Instead they can just type a few letters (I type "news" ) and then the only tokens I see are the ones from this extension.
Even if the user does not type anything, all the tokens from this extension are together since the list is alphabetical order. It also makes it easy to train end-users who are not familiar with CiviCRM lingo.
I really like the new layout for tokens for version 4.5, and will update the extension soon to take advantage of the new header functionality in 4.5.
I've been looking into the possibility of pulling in the details of upcoming events into a Mailing and someone suggested this extension, which is justthe thing I'm after! Can I check, though, whether it's possible to filter the events, e.g. by campaign, so that only those listed from a particular department will appear in the Mailing?
Thanks
Rose - This is a good enhancement idea. I have added this as an issue on github. You can track this at: https://github.com/sgladstone/com.pogstone.fancytokens/issues/10
I plan on adding this to the next version of my extension
Brilliant! Will this be possible to use in conjunction with the date tokens, rather than instead?
Great time saver, had it on 4.6 but wonder if it Is this compatible with 4.7 for WP?