Beta test available Sep 15
There has been a HUGE lag between my last post and now. By way of explanation, and not excuse (’cause there is no good excuse), I have learned:
1- I’m too much of a perfectionist
2- Without a deadline, ain’t nothin’ happening
There were some major projects that landed in my lap unexpectedly that took up all my time, including one of my best clients needing a full blown custom made calendar. As much as I would have loved grabbing one of the many calendar apps available — theirs needed to read events from an xml data feed. Lots of moving parts, lots of headache, but good money.
But honestly, I’m a bit ashamed at how long it’s been since I posted anything about the CMS which I’ve worked so hard on and which many of you are anxiously awaiting.
So, I’m putting my feet to the fire and announcing that on Sept 15th, I will make a beta test available to all of you that have expressed an interest. I’ll send out an email to the list and post a download page.
Note - although the final release will be 99% source code-viewable, the beta test will be encoded, while I iron out and clean up some of the spots that are less-than-pretty (from a coding perspective).
Special thanks to many of you who have sent me encouraging, enthusiastic emails describing how desperately you want what I’ve described. Now it’s up to me to deliver.
Finally, as we approach launch date, there will be special announcements to the list that might not end up on the blog. These could include special early bird discounts, opportunities to get your website url on my new home page for the cms, contest promotions, and other goodies.
Ben Cope says:
September 6th, 2006 at 9:24 am
Thank you so much for the update on your soon-to-be-released CMS!! I am anxiously awaiting the beta release so I can get started trying it out right away!! I look forward to implementing your CMS on several of my client’s websites …
jackborn says:
September 6th, 2006 at 11:06 am
Hey Ben,
Thanks for the comment. I love getting emails and comments from folks like you that feel the same way I do and your excitement comes through.
Richard says:
September 13th, 2006 at 1:45 am
T minus two and counting…
jackborn says:
September 13th, 2006 at 10:34 pm
You bet. Time’s a tickin’ I’m feeling that deadline creep up fast!
Watson says:
September 15th, 2006 at 7:01 am
Must be something otherworldly going on, because I just ran across this site on 2005-09-15 of all days…
I just came here from your other site 15daysofjquery/ seeking JQuery help, and after perusing that site, I’m pretty much willing to try whatever it is you are selling
But, on a serious, note, I am really intrigued by what you have been saying about the current crop of CMSes and their (legion) flaws, and I am in complete agreement. I have tested several CMSes, with Mambo/Jomla, Typo3 and TikiWiki (a rather powerful CMS masquerading as a wiki, [or vice versa], but way to s…l…o…w and clunky to be useful for either) standing out of the bunch.
Sadly, as a result of all of their far too high learning curves, I have not thought it feasible to give clients access to these products.
But, based on my experiences, here are my
two cents$3.87 on the matter (some of these should probably be left until the product is more mature):1 - AVOID (at all costs) nerd-lingo (no “epherimids”, or other annoying made up names for types of content — what you read/hear should be what it is)
2 - Provide copious in-situ help (What does this do? Let me click the “?” (Help) button next to it and see.)
3 - Have really strict user management, configurable by both groups (i.e. admins can do almost anything, users are limited [and admin can change their perms], and admin can create & configure group “Mocktaugs” to only be able to upload pics), and tasks (i.e. Sally is a user, but I specified that she can edit pages created by others). The ability to import permissions from one user/group to another would be nice, with certain permissions reserved only for users w/high enough authority (like new user creation). I heard you mention users, admins and superadmin[s] in your videos — will one be able to create/secify other groups?
4 - Once a user w/edit permissions logs in, they should be able to browse site as normal, and be able to edit content as they encounter it, without having to switch to the admin view[s].
5 - A (basic, easy to understand, master and setup) workflow system, with notifications by email or at user login. (e.g. admin wants to know (and approve) whenever /articles is updated… the advertising dept group needs to know when the /catalogues page is updated, etc.)
6 - A data import tool (a la MS Access), that is able to parse CSV and Excel files (at a minimum), and create useful tables / pages.
7 - An easy to use menu creation/management tool (think JQuery, and this might just be easy as pie
8 - Automatic sitemap generation
9 - An easy to learn/use form builder/manager, with built in datatypes and customizable (JavaScript & server) validation, with the ability to generate reports, output CSV files, send reports to email, etc. I have yet to see ANY CMS do this right, (if at all), so, if done well, this might be your “killer feature”! (Saw your form mail site… shutting up about this now…)
10 - Automatic code generation based on content type (add an object [java, flash, video, audio, etc], to a page using the editor, and code for displaying/or downloading said object is auto-generated). Have the known content-types and their display settings available (and modifiable), while allowing for the addition of new types via an admin page tool.
11 - And finally, when things are polished, add (easy-to-install) extras/built-ins like a calendar system (w/multiple calendars possible, w/configurable permissions per calendar AND per event), contact management (multiple contact lists, w/permissions configurable for the lists themselves, as well as for the individual contacts) and the like. I would buy the software just for those two alone, as I have had to set such up for several clients — good money, but way to much hassle. Or perhaps, easy integration with existing services (like Google Calendar & Maps).
At the end of the path that suggestion #9 above is leading towards, is probably a plugin/extension system of some sort… And down that path may lie disaster. Any such system should be easy to develop in, and require that the plugins be secure (respect [or be frced to] the permissions system, etc), be easy to use/understand, and come w/documentation/help (most CMSes fail here). However, ensuring that may require some sort of certification program on your part, which complicates things a bit…
I think I’ll stop my rambling now.
But I hope you understand my frustration with other CMSes…
Ready for Beta Test, Cap’n!
tommy says:
September 15th, 2006 at 10:25 am
Hi, ive been waiting for this for sometime now and its now the day of the release but still no email
any news on the release time?
jackborn says:
September 15th, 2006 at 12:04 pm
Tommy,
Great to see you’re so excited. It will be later today. Sorry I can’t be more specific. I’m putting some finishing touches on instructions.
Jack
jackborn says:
September 15th, 2006 at 12:07 pm
Watson,
1- Agreed, done
2, 4, 5, 7, 8 - Agreed, for future release
3- I’ll keep your suggestions in mind for future improvements to the admin system. Those are some good ones.
9 - 12 Are pretty advanced. Can’t say when those will be in.
Great comments. I read your ideas several times. I’ll be referencing them again.
Thank you!
tommy says:
September 15th, 2006 at 4:17 pm
any news yet?
jackborn says:
September 15th, 2006 at 4:31 pm
Yep… you’ve got mail.
tommy says:
September 15th, 2006 at 4:33 pm
yay!
Ill try it out now and ill let you know what i think of it
Bruce says:
December 24th, 2006 at 2:02 am
This is an extremely interesting concept. Having developed sites for a number of years and basically tried them all, I have found only Movable Type and Expression Engine configurable to the degree I want. MT takes first place as being the only one to write static files to disk.
My company motto is :simplicity by Design”
This is for a good reason. Most systems try to do everything and become bloated and unusable to one degree or another.
There is no reason to wrap everything into one package, if the templates are easily accessible and will write anything to disk that is put into them like Movable Type does, then anything wanted can be added by the user/developer.
Much like jQuery, the idea of plugins is best, and is good. The CMS would hopefully be lightweight and not try to be the solution to every single desire, and be configurable.
If it will publish anything one puts into a template to the disk then it’s a winner.
Looking forward to seeing this