I like the concept of using the Private Message feature, BUT there is a problem. My Users don't want to get an email every single time someone responds to a post (one parent offers a pack of Legos, 15 teachers respond...other parents and teachers get 15 emails from people wanting those Legos). That's why they don't have tracking/subscription checked for that forum.
Keeping that in mind, if Users check the boxes under the appropriate forums in the tracking/subscription they get all 15 Lego responses. If they don't check the tracking/subscription boxes, they aren't sent an email when they have a message in their Private Message box. This is bad for my application because if Users aren't reminded to go on the forum, they may forget about it. They may have offered an item, then not heard any replies from other Users because they haven't gone back on the forum after their initial posting.
Based on the above, I decided to remove the Private Message feature from that forum and see how the whole thing behaved. I figured I'd have the Users click directly on the Posting User's email address within the post, and change my forum directions to reflect that. Here's my new problem...some Users can see other Users email addresses, other Users can not see the email address.
1. Forum Admin--Display Email Address is checked, and you the Forum Admin can see the email address in her forum settings. Users can not see Forum Admin's email address.
2. Forum User--Display Email Address is checked, but email address does not show up on their own Forum User Settings page. Forum Admin can see User's email address, but User himself cannot see it, and other Users do not see it either. No Users other than Forum Admin can see the email addresses I am trying to display.
Help.
Thanks
Jennifer