News
09/06 : Adding your new e107 plugin comments to RSS feed
I recently helped sort out adding comment links to an RSS feed. I am not talking about creating a new feed for your plugin which is a case of adding an e_RSS file to your e107 plugin directory. This topic is covered in the e107 wiki so I won't add anything here.The problem I had was including a title link for the comments that applied to this new plugin in to the core comment RSS feed. The file that needed to be altered was the e107_plugins/rss_menu/rss.php file. In here you will find a section that derives the title, link, description etc for the RSS feed. Search for:
switch ($value['comment_type']) {
case 0:
$this -> rssItems[$loop]['link'] = "http://".$_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'].e_HTTP."comment.php?comment.news.".$value['comment_item_id'];
break;
case 4:
$this -> rssItems[$loop]['link'] = "http://".$_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'].e_HTTP."comment.php?comment.poll.".$value['comment_item_id'];
break;
To add the new link simply add a new case, note that you are switching on 'comment_type', for plugin comments this will be a string that you supplied eg 'myplugin'. This will only work if you have a comment subject too! If users are not manually inserting a subject then you will need to derive this during comment submission. This should shortly be demonstrated on an e107 site, so you can follow comments on the top cms list, I suggest you go and vote on e107 now!
03/06 : e107 Comment Stop Plugin
So, any regular visitors to this site (are there any?) will have noticed that some nice folk have been posting some friendly links to WOW Gold merchants on a regular basis. Currently, with e107, managing these comments and removing the posts is somewhat of a chore. But it has to be done. Some time ago I made life much easier for myself with a few tools to quickly find and remove spamming users. This has worked well for the spamming that goes on here and I wanted to share the code with other e107 users who might have the same problem.
I wanted to be able to quickly remove a user and all of their comments and posts by clicking a link in the forum. I wanted to be able to block all link posting in comments. In the future possible in the forum. I wanted to create rules that would allow certain users to post. Nothing too complicated but enough to make life a little harder for spammers and make it much easier for me to remove them.
This plugin will not be the answer to all your problems as it was designed to specifically deal with the annoying posts and comments that I was experiencing. In time I will add new features to deal with rogue user posting that still occurs.
The Comment Stop plugin page can be found here: e107 comment stop anti spam plugin
I will be adding future improvement ideas here:
e107 comment stop forum
Please add your own thoughts and I will see if I can include them.
06/05 : Wordpress versus e107 versus Blogger.com
I have been asked by a friend, who has been hosting WordPress blogs on his blogercise.com domain, to investigate the possibility of adapting Wordpress and creating some plugins for the network. I have been a big fan of e107 for sometime but I am always open minded about other content management systems, so was happy to have a look.WordPress vs blogger
Wordpress is slightly limited in that it is aimed squarely at the bloggers, but after a quick play around, it was very clear that WordPress really leads the field. It seems that the latest release overcomes a number of criticisms raised by users of Googles super popular blogger.com. There is no longer much doubt when it comes to blogger vs wordpress - for now there is a clear winner!
WordPress is way ahead in functionality and design. The slick interface allows the manager to perform all the tasks required. Great use of AJAX technology ensures an easy ride that looks impressive and feels like a modern day platform. Support of ping backs, gravatars, tags, and a very active plugin community ensures that WordPress is really the only player worth considering right now.
However Im sure Blogger.com will not sit back and a new all singing and dancing version must be on the way. With the entire weight of Google backing Blogger.com no one will suggest that the resources arent there to set a new standard in the future.
Where does this leave e107?
e107 is starting to look a little dated. It is finding it hard to compete with the slick looking Joomla and its active community. This is a shame because I have always found e107 to be far better in terms of usability and out of the box functionality. With no functionality added to e107 for almost a year now it is becoming imperative that a new version of e107 is released soon, and it needs to impress. The developers have been hard at work on e107 0.8 for some time now and the roadmap has some great ideas in it.
To me, it seems that there are some obvious things required to become the leading open source CMS system, and Im sure none of them are that hard to add into the core code base.
CMS must haves:
- Tagging. I have done my best to add tagging to e107, but this needs to become a core feature. If 0.8 doesnt include tags I will work on a new release of my plugin!
- A Web 2 feel. Yes we all hate the term, but we all know what it means. One look at WordPress and it is clear that this is what people want. Releasing with several core Web 2 themes would be a massive win.
- OpenID. There is actually a bounty open for any big project that includes OpenID. Site owners will love this because it will clearly increase accessability
- Gravatar. The universal web wide avatar. Another little feature of WordPress which improves the connected, social feel of the site greatly.
- Ping back. Again, a small feature that quickly improves connectivity between community sites.
- Social bookmarking. Easy access to the Diggs of this world.
I dont think any of these things are that hard to put into excellent e107 framework, but they are all small features that any 21st centuary web site must have as a minimum. The first CMS system that nails all of these things in an out of the box solution will quickly be the envy of all the other systems.
What other must have features are there?
27/04 : e107 Plugin: Live Search beta 0.1
This plugin provides an AJAX style search function to the e107 CMS system. The current download is a simple search screen that will provide hints to the users as they search. The plugin has the ability to learn popular search terms and offer these as future hints.It is also compatible with the tagcloud plugin and can use the tags and site wide hints. These terms should always lead the user to some content greatly improving their chances of finding the content that they are looking for in your e107 site!
Feedback can be passed back via the site forum!
The download can be found here: live search plugin download
A demo can be found here: Live search demo
Cheers.
23/04 : Live Search e107 Plugin Beta Test
After a request on the e107.org website I thought Id have a quick go at creating a live search plugin. This allows a site user to search for content and instantly see results as they type. Although this doesnt introduce overwhelming functionality to a site it does mean that users can search at a much greater speed and get to the content they are looking for quicker. Currently the plugin searches all site areas that are searched through the normal e107 search routines. Pressing Enter when a term is typed in will take you to the normal search page and any advanced options.
The plugin can be seen in action here:
http://www.jezza101.co.uk/e107_plugins/livesearch/livesearch.php
Download available shortly... I need to tidy it up a little first.
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