hi.
I am NOT new to joomla. I followed every instruction, set up a trial site and things seemed to be all right. Tried it on the production site and bang! I was unable to do anything any more.
I uninstalled it, but the component does not "go quietly". Ended up doing the whole installation again.
The system is not hard, but to my view, it should not be installed in production sites: too many variables can go wrong.
Also,you will need a patch for every upgrade and not all components are supported.
Beware also, if you site is in another language... it changes everything back into english.
To add up: it went down and took a good site with it. I hope it does not take my client as well.

JACL installed perfectly for me the first time on my live, heavily modifed site and caused no complications. It provides a tremendous amount of flexibility although it takes a bit of time to learn how to use it.

The documentation PDF is also excellent because it a) shows how to use the component in detail with screenshots, and b) explains how the entire Joomla user access system levels are structured.

One bug I found is that it denies permission to create an admin account even through you're logged in as a superadministrator. This was fixed by commenting out a few lines as suggested in the support forum.

I didn't have any problems with this component and it does what it says it will do.

During installation I had to change some the the file permissions and there was allot of them but it worked like a charm. I also uninstalled it without a problem.

This may well work very well for some people but it is just too much of a pain to use and GET RID OF for the majority of people.
I installed after a bit of hassle and found the system painful to use. There is documentation but I felt this didn't offer any useful examples. I uninstalled and this is where the trouble started! Despite following all of the manual uninstall instructions to the letter my site Front End login failed completely. Even after searching forums and carrying out further fixes it still failed.
If you want to try this definitely backup your data first and/or use it in a test environment. After a few hours I'm just about getting my site in order after using this!
Their support appears to be very poor and they could do much more to provide a more automated uninstall. Will not consider using again now whatever they do.

After reading the documentation several times, I had no success with operating this. However, the only way to uninstall it it to basically reinstall my whole system.

It never functioned, telling me I was could not assign a member to a permission because I was not a Super Admin. (That is not correct). So, it never worked.

Proceed with caution. Do not use this on a live site, test it first. Back up your files. Read the directions.

In addition to the explanation below I'd like to add that it's also possible to change the ownership of the requested files/folders to the webserver. This works just as well, and leaves the permissions as they are.

I was looking a means to add additional user groups and it seems I've stumbled on a gold mine! I just downloaded this component so I haven't done exhaustive testing in my sand box yet but so far I love what I see!

A total surprise for me was a feature addition that has long been a pet peev of mine with joomla. In Joomla, content that has already been published can be edited by the author-owner and editor class without it being unpublished so it can be reviewed. JACLPlus solves this too!

I thought this was the mod for us at the beginning. Seemed to have exactly what we needed. However, when it came to setting up the access I had the problems that I've now read here.
I wanted the usergroup to access limited things at the backend. Whenever I tried to edit a user in that group I got the "you must be a superadmin" error, and like others I was a superadmin.
Oh well. I suppose it would be liveable if you don't mind it's quirks. It certainly seems to be the only mod out there like it? Please correct me if I'm wrong!
Deffo agree Joomla need to beef up their user group/access level admin.

This extension, be it a self-described hack, is great. It provides the level of control that I think should be part of the core Joomla install. I also like the integration with other components. The developers seem to have tested JACL out with many other components and have posted patches. I tried JUGA, but I couldn't get it to integrate with other components, especially DocMan. A hack this may be, but it works. The Joomla team should reaaaaaly consider making JACL part of the core.

The only thing to be aware of is that once the core JACLplus component is installed, you need to install your other components and then look for patches on the JACL website. Basically many components look at the core access control groups and they need to be re-referenced to the JACL control groups. The patches take care of this.

I've unistalled Jacl using the unistallation guide in the Byostech site, I'had problems and now I'have yet some trash code of this component in the core of Joomla. I think I've to reinstall Joomla to definitely to remove Jacl Plus from my life!

Well its a good thing I just started out on my site and theres no content at all on it. This component has trashed my site on both frontend, backend, and locked me out. There is no way I am gonna jump through all the loops expected to uninstall this.

Not for a people that are new to joomla.

I had three problems I wanted to solve: 1) show some pages exclusively to administrators, 2) show pages exclusively to anonymous visitors and 3) show pages exclusively to registered but not special users. JACL does all that very simply. After installing, I created three new access levels named "anonymous", "webmember", and "administrator". Then I edited the groups, adding "anonymous" access to Public Frontend, adding "webmember" to Registered" and adding "administrator" to Administrator. Voila! I could now tag a page as "Anonymous" and put it on the front page to be seen only by Public. Once you are logged in, the page is gone. Kudos.

I had a problem after un-installing whereby my entire site broke. A quick visit to the developer's homepage got me a rescue guide that was very clear. Again, kudos.

This contribution is great, and the install is EASY.
FFS People, learn how to CHMOD. Your running an opensource website, its not that hard.
I went to the website, downloaded the correct file that corresponds to my sites version (good start), then I went and read the install documentation.
Its all of one page.
I read it again.
Then I ftp'ed into my server and changed the permissions of files that needed to be changed. Yep there is a few, but thats because this contribution needs a few files changed.
So what, it still took me 5 minutes.
I then logged in and installed the component. The install failed, told me I had missed CHMODDING 1 file!

Still logged in to my ftp program, I fixed that files permissions, and installed again, SUCCESS!!!!!

To conclude.
It works, and works well. It took me 2 minutes to integrate it with AEC (well integration is automatic, I just had to create a new access level and it was there in AEC). Im up and running in less than 20 minutes.

For those people here that speak negatively of this contribution, have a good look at yourselves. Its free. It works. Yes it does work. It works well. The install is easy.

Its not the contributions fault that you need to change the permissions of a few files. Its not the fault of Joomla either. If you cant change file permissions, you really should not be on the internet.

Finally, thanks to those that have posted positive reviews here. Your levelheaded review allowed me to see through the negativity and realise its mostly just user error....

Thanks for JACLPlus

The idea of allowing different levels of users seemed appealing, however it just wasn't what I was looking for - no big deal there, however when I tried to uninstall the component it destroyed my entire site!

I could not view or do anything on the main front-end, and I was unable to login to the admin back-end! I now have to sift through all of the source files for Joomla and remove, by hand, all references to the extension, or would do if I didn't have a recent backup.

This component does exactly what the developers claim it is going to do. I get disgruntled at seeing bad reviews based on hopes never set as a claim of a product, and the reviews so far for this one seem to fit that bill.

Every last detail the developers claim it can do, it does. If you're looking to add new groups to joomla for a my dynamic feel to an interactive site, then this is the route to go. If you're looking for a thousand things byostech never claimed this extension would do, quit complaining and keep looking.

This product has taken a HUGE burden off my chest and added EXACTLY what I was looking for regarding the functionality of my site.

Thanks byostech for this development... and for the record, I don't mind waiting a bit after release to get the free version. Keep that going too.