Forums enhancements and other module concerns :: Archived

[Bluefin221]

I was wondering why the forums are never enhanced on any CMS versions? I know that forumspro exists now as a spilt from here as Rayvenhaus was a moderator here, however just curious, forums are a central point to this site and many others and is probably a big part of why people would download any package, however I have never seen another CMS have to split into separate versions of forums, it seems a strange concept to me. I use both forums and forumspro on various sites as I have certain needs depending on the site I use, and some modules like discuss this won't work on forumspro.

Its an honest question I'm not looking for a big debate on pros and cons just wondering.

[Phoenix]

Fair question - Forumspro does have some overhead which is inconsistent with the core objectives, and the vast majority of users are content with a "lite" forum setup.

In the future, the core package will contain less modules and you select what additional options you want, which pretty much sounds like how you operate

However, we do still have more work to do in totally isolating CPG-BB from the core, and in setting up PMs so they also function totally independently of CPG-BB.

Groups is another issue and Nano has work in progress on that matter, further down the track.

[NanoCaiordo]

Forums hacks are always wanted, DragonflyCMS will not include any of them if not a very nice and useful 'hack'.

However after the road map will be finished I have i mind few small changes that will make forums hacks possible. Even if upgrading core that will include forums changes, 'forums hacks' will still be in place, so no need to remove/re-install those hacks ... well cannot guarantee the plug-in compatibility.

Will work with plug-ins but in a very portable way.

But yeah long way still ...

[Bluefin221]

Mostly good news, however the core containing less isn't good news, I believe it has stock features which essentially make dragonfly good out the box, forums, news, surveys, gallery etc keep it slim but give it appeal. What happens if the module makers don't exist to enhance the core, I use DF on 4 sites two of which I keep private but one of them is a pretty large site and its the enhancements which keep it going, infact a large majority of the enhancements are essential to the site. Its missing some things but I work around that due to the speed and security that exists within DF.

In regards to forumspro and overhead is this possible to reduce, I believe only Rayvenhaus is now working on it, and I imagine its a huge project for one person, so its a real pity, I use it on two sites, one which is pretty busy due to the fact my members demanded certain features which were not available in forums. I would be delighted to help people with coding however I run a webserver, a radio site and over 40 websites which I administer so my online time is very thin and I have no time to learn the code in the system unless of-course its to get by.

[Bluefin221]

NanoCaiordo wrote:

Forums hacks are always wanted, DragonflyCMS will not include any of them if not a very nice and useful 'hack'. However after the road map will be finished I have i mind few small changes that will make forums hacks possible. Even if upgrading core that will include forums changes, 'forums hacks' will still be in place, so no need to remove/re-install those hacks ... well cannot guarantee the plug-in compatibility. Will work with plug-ins but in a very portable way. But yeah long way still ...

Thanks for responding, on another note I just clicked into your website and noticed a very interesting module you're developing.

[Phoenix]

The core containing less is not a worry. It simply means we shall provide a mechanism in core where people can be alerted to other modules and grab them with one click - Nano's new upload feature will help take care of that problem.

Times have changed at Dragonfly - Nano has transformed the core quite dramatically with recent releases and continues with preparation for future development. Rogue user behavior is no longer acceptable, so we should see less troll and flaming activity and the consequent disharmony that detracts from developing the cms and supporting the genuine users.

I wouldn't worry about losing enhanced modules either - we have no intention of letting them fall off the radar. Similarly with themes. One way or another, addons and themes will be retained/rebuilt where required.

You will see the Downloads section expanded in the near future to facilitate this objective and to ensure that people are at least provided with download links to other sites if the addon is not directly uploaded to Dragonfly itself.

One example of a lost module was BlogsPlus which did drop out of sight but has since been revived and extended. Similarly with ProNews, CPGNuCalendar, Random Quotes, etc.

In regard to Discuss_This, the module itself is flawed and does add a system overhead when in use, which is why BlogsPlus now has it built-in and the implementation there has had bugs removed and its application further enhanced.

[Bluefin221]

Thanks for the responses, I have a better understanding of what's happening.

[Phoenix]

If you don't mind, I'll move this to the "This Site" forum because it really is about a lot more than just the forums, and should be the subject of more open discussion

[Bluefin221]

Phoenix wrote:

If you don't mind, I'll move this to the "This Site" forum because it really is about a lot more than just the forums, and should be the subject of more open discussion

No probs, I'm getting tired hence less questions, on enhancements I should say that a few good ones have developed recently, I guess its where you look for dragonfly sites and who does what, I probably only know maybe 15 DF sites who actively develop themes and modules. Maybe I should search a bit more.

PS: What's up with your site?

[Phoenix]

Well, our objective will be to save you searching the net for Dragonfly enhancements by providing at the very minimum, a link to where it exists. Naturally this would only be for those freely available without registration.

Thanks for the notice on nukebiz - seems I edited the wrong htaccess file while testing the CVS blocks issue - simply playing with too many different sites at the same time on less than 4 hours sleep All fixed now

[insaner]

Phoenix - Thanks for the update. My main concern is that we've been living with a "stable" branch of dragonfly so long that we rarely if ever see any new features, particularly in the forums module. I see so many other sites that have nifty things & features on other forums, and it seems like dragonfly isn't even trying to play keep-up.

It's both good and bad that phpBB has been forked completely away from the original code, but I'm afraid that it will make it harder to keep up with the functionality that phpBB is offering in their latest releases and that those feature sets will not make it back into dragonfly because of it. I actually migrated my original phpBB site, to phpNuke, then migrated phpnuke to dragonfly a few years back. I only used nuke because the scripts were there for the migration. However, I really liked the fact that my users would feel comfortable with the change since it was built around phpBB. Feature for feature, cpg-nuke was almost identical to what I could currently offer my users in the latest version phpBB at the time. However, a few years have passed and nothing has changed at all in terms of features available to the end users in the forums in dragonfly. If I would have stayed on phpBB, I could have upgraded and received all the latest and greatest. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad we're using a full CMS system and not just phpBB, but it is frustrating to see such a core part (95% of the utilization of our site is in the forums), of dragonfly stagnate.

Hopefully, this will change in future releases, but I also hope those future releases come soon.

[rlgura]

I can see this as a positive and a negative.
The main reason I chose DF was included News, Forums and Photo Gallery.
Many add-on modules hook into these included "core" modules.

The plus side:
Able to use current phpBB with a DF bridge -or- ability to choose from a variety of forum modules.

[Bluefin221]

insaner wrote:

Phoenix - Thanks for the update. My main concern is that we've been living with a "stable" branch of dragonfly so long that we rarely if ever see any new features, particularly in the forums module. I see so many other sites that have nifty things & features on other forums, and it seems like dragonfly isn't even trying to play keep-up. It's both good and bad that phpBB has been forked completely away from the original code, but I'm afraid that it will make it harder to keep up with the functionality that phpBB is offering in their latest releases and that those feature sets will not make it back into dragonfly because of it. I actually migrated my original phpBB site, to phpNuke, then migrated phpnuke to dragonfly a few years back. I only used nuke because the scripts were there for the migration. However, I really liked the fact that my users would feel comfortable with the change since it was built around phpBB. Feature for feature, cpg-nuke was almost identical to what I could currently offer my users in the latest version phpBB at the time. However, a few years have passed and nothing has changed at all in terms of features available to the end users in the forums in dragonfly. If I would have stayed on phpBB, I could have upgraded and received all the latest and greatest. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad we're using a full CMS system and not just phpBB, but it is frustrating to see such a core part (95% of the utilization of our site is in the forums), of dragonfly stagnate. Hopefully, this will change in future releases, but I also hope those future releases come soon.

This is what I was also trying to suggest on one of my sites its had over 277134 forum posts in around one year of using dragonfly which is a busy enough forum, its probably the largest hit section and the users basically demanded more features to the forums, certainly they wanted the who is online part back, and complained quite vociferously about it, so I installed forumspro which seemed to appease them, however a split of such an integral part of a system like forums is still foreign to me and forumspro is not supported in features like discuss this, I would say I'm having around 5 posts a week onto the news system which would create huge discussions but can't get them to the forums automatically unless I either link them, or tell users about it, it sometimes defeats the purpose of the news section as its creating more work.

[DJ Maze]

I'm currently working on a very advanced installer for MOO CMS which is using metadata so that you can choose which components get installed at install.
If it all works it will be integrated into Dragonfly as well.

This works similar to RedHat/Fedora/Mandriva/Ubuntu GNU/Linux installers or even better, like YumExtended/Synaptics.

That way you have a very tight core download (<1 MB?) and then at install:
- choose themes
- choose modules
- choose blocks
After that they get downloaded and installled right away.

So basically it becomes:
- easier
- less bloated
- free to choose which gallery, forum, etc. to use

Therefore i think you shouldn't think negatively but positively about the future and the shrink

[Anaxent]

DJ Maze wrote:

I'm currently working on a very advanced installer for MOO CMS which is using metadata so that you can choose which components get installed at install. If it all works it will be integrated into Dragonfly as well. This works similar to RedHat/Fedora/Mandriva/Ubuntu GNU/Linux installers or even better, like YumExtended/Synaptics. That way you have a very tight core download (<1 MB?) and then at install: - choose themes - choose modules - choose blocks After that they get downloaded and installled right away. So basically it becomes: - easier - less bloated - free to choose which gallery, forum, etc. to use Therefore i think you shouldn't think negativly but positivly about the future and the shrink

Well I have to say this idea really rocks! Granted im on the same page as the other guys on the options available in the default forums but I do understand the labor involved and better the direction you are plannig on moving. keep up the great work guys I know I have tied just about every cms out there and yes they all have there own pros and cons but for some reason(pushed in the above post) I stick with DF and also try to get many of the users at my wowroster.net to join the band wagon and get into DF.

(wowroster.net just hit 22200 users today since july of last yr)