CMS Made Simple Forums

Hi,

Recent convert to CMSMS, and I want to start by thanking everyone involved in CMSMS for a well thought-out, wonderfully functional product. I found CMSMS after trying several other CMS systems and, in my view, there is no competition when it comes to simplicity and flexibility.

That said, I notice that version 2.0 is in the works, and I wanted to add a few items to the wishlist of new features. As this is my first post, please forgive me if feature requests are supposed to live elsewhere - I didn't see an obviously better place to put them.

OK, based on a couple of months familiarity with CMSMS, here my list. They all pretty much have to do with controlling users and groups:

1. Control default and permissable templates per user. For each user (or perhaps just group) be able to assign a default page
template and define a subset of permissable templates from which pages can be created. My users are accidentally picking incorrect templates and coming up w/some surprising results.

2.
a. Limit user actions to particular node.
b. Control deleting and moving pages per user.

These two are related. Currently, it seems that any user w/editing permissions can move (and possibly delete!) pages anywhere on the site. It would be useful to be able to restrict users and their actions to a node or group of nodes. For example, I'm currently working on an elementary school site. Most of the site is static and should only be changed by a very small number of people. However, the office staff have a page for announcements and each teacher has a node for a set of classroom pages. When those teachers - many of whose skills are pretty shaky - log on, I don't want them to be able to accidentally reorder or delete pages EXCEPT in their own area.

3. Allow group owners. The idea here would be, using my example above:

Main site --
               |
          Teachers' Area (one or more pages editable by all members of teacher's group)
           |                  |
        Teacher A   Teacher B (these nodes only editable by teacher/owner and admins)

4. Show current editors on main page AND when reopening page. I notice that if I assign additional editors to a page, then submit and reopen, the additional editors are no longer highlighted, and there doesn't seem to be any way other than guesswork to remember who they might be. Perhaps a listbox in the near vicinity showing current editors?

5. Default content per user/group. Ability to preset content, allowing pages to be created quickly with default content already in place.

6. Add user automatically as editor to pages created by that user. One of my users discovered accidentally that it's possible to create a page, but not have rights to edit it subsequently, if the page defaults to admin ownership and you forget to assign yourself as editor. Is there a functional reason (can't think of one at the moment) to not have a page's creator automatically assigned editing permissions?

Once again, thanks to everyone involved in CMSMS - it's a great product!

Todobear

The permissions model in 2.0 will be greatly improved.... we've already thought of most (if not all) of this stuff.  In 2.0, groups will be the controlling factor, not users... if you want a single user to be able to control something you'll have to create a group that only that user is a member of.  The owner of the page will be able to control who can change the page, create new pages underneath, etc, etc.  Also, permissions will be hierarchicaly based to allow users to add and delete child pages under a particular page (for example) but not edit the parent page.  Permissions for each page will also be inherited from the parent.  this will handle most of what you've mentioned.

However, permissions, and methods exist in CMS 1.2.x where you can acomplish most of what you want.
1) user groups can be marked as additional editors of pages
2) individual users can be marked as additional editors of pages.
3) Users may not have the permission to create/edit/delete page templates
4) Users don't have to be given the permission to delete/re-order pages

Now.... regarding your point 4).... I tested this, and when I marked a user and/or a group as an additional editor, submitted the page, and then re-opened it things were hilited as they are supposed to be.

Regarding default content per user or group (your #5):
a) The default content should be related to the page template, not to the user or group.  The page template dictates how many content blocks are available, and their options, etc.  it's the only thing that can specify default conent reasonably.
b) I think that even if default content is specifiable, it should be strings like 'Add Content relating to this subject here', or other short, one line description.  The entire point of a website is to present meaningful information, not cookie-cutter, change a string here, or a string there content.    To achieve maximum SEO, and satisfaction of users, the content should be unique, topical, and well worded.  The page editor should be guided as to what type of content to insert, but that is it, not given complete paragraphs, and guided to just change some words.

Calguy1000,

Thanks for your quick response. I didn't expect to see anything so soon!

I got the impression from the discussion of 2.0 that there were going to be major changes in user control, which is why I wanted to get my 2 cents in asap. Sorry if my (lack of) familiarity w/CMSMS is such that I missed the fact that some things are already doable. In any case, it sounds like 2.0 will have the ground covered. I take a look at implementing the approaches you mentioned.

Re; additional editors lacking highlites, I noted it the other day, and was able to repeat it several times. However, it might have been an 'artifact' of my system or something. If others don't see it, I'll assume it's my problem and should come off the list.

Re: default content. I agree with everything you said, and - for text content - I would use it just as you say, basically for instructions and reminders to editors (remember, my editors are not pros, and need all the help they can get!). However, I wasn't thinking so much of text, but of other elements. For example, I'm using content blocks to allow images to be inserted in various places, and here it would be nice to be able to preset an image, so that if my editors forget to set one of their own, there's something more than a box w/an x in the corner when the page is viewed.

Thanks again for your speedy reply. Looking forward to 2.0!

ah, in 2.0 there will be a new feature 'block types' as I call it.... it's like content blocks but for different types of data (images, news, blah blah)..... so yeah, in the case for example of an 'image' block type one should be able to upload an image, select a previously uploaded image, or rely on a 'default'.

There I agree with you 100%.