Finding the answer

[Monkofdoom]

I've been playing around with CMSMS for a while now and recently took on a more involved project which I thought would be a good further learning website for CMSMS.

Upon working out what I needed I entered the modules section to find a members system. After browsing through the various letters I thought of I resorted to going through every page in alphabetical order until finding Front End Users.

I then moved on to noticing it didn't include a front end registration process, so again looking for a module to do this I took the letters I assumed and found no module. Back to the alphabetical reading until I found Self Registration.

I guess the thought here is, is this how people are meant to find modules? Is there going to be some sort of categorised / browse by tag system ever implemented into the module system.

For the past 6 months I've had to use Joomla for a lot of projects, I'm not a massive fan of Joomla in anyway and much prefer CMSMS. But I must say, when I'm looking for a module it takes far less time and reduces the stress using their categorised system.

Just my 2 cence anyways.

- Monk

[Jeff]

http://dev.cmsmadesimple.org has a search (isn't great but works) and a basic tag system.

[replytomk3]

Time for me to gripe as well: many modules do not have any description at all, or it is in a foreign language and not translated. Also, there was a mentioning of an idea to test every module as being active and able to run on latest version. I did not hear any progress on that.

[Connie]

The problem is that there are tags for the modules, but you will find them only after the first (mostly unsuccessful search)

I do not understand why the tag-list is not available at the start - module - page
And I do not understand why nearly 45% of projects (my experience) which have not published at least one  file

I whish it would be possible to arrange the  modules section like wordpress.org does that.
It is simple, plain and works.

I asked about these problems many times and I think this is a big problem for CMSMS, which is one of the best systems I know, just the organisation of the modules is really not transparent for beginners and non-beginners

I whish this could be better, because it can be done with no big work  at all, just a little bit editing of the first page and a small modification of the query and we would have better usability.

[Dr.CSS]

@replytomk3

You are here by nominated to test every module in the forge for compatibility, don't forget to test them for the last 3 versions of CMS Made Simple...

[replytomk3]

@replytomk3

You are here by nominated to test every module in the forge for compatibility, don't forget to test them for the last 3 versions of CMS Made Simple...

OK

[tyman00]

How many times do we have to go through this? We don't have enough time or man power. Would you rather we worked on the forge or worked on 2.0? If we work on one we take away time from the other.

Until we get more sincere volunteers it just CAN'T happen. It's not that we don't want to... we want to (we do). We know it's not perfect and needs attention, but we just can't do the needed changes with the limited amount of true, honest ans sincere volunteers that follow through. For all of you that continue to complain the ball is in your court we have told you time and again what we need and we haven't seen any changes. Quit complaining and start stepping up and following through.

Instead of blaming us for having a "won't" attitude start thinking it's a "can't" and start thinking how you can contribute in any way possible so it frees up our time so we can start putting more times into things like the forge, documentation, etc.

[replytomk3]

How many times do we have to go through this? We don't have enough time or man power. Would you rather we worked on the forge or worked on 2.0? If we work on one we take away time from the other.

Until we get more sincere volunteers it just CAN'T happen. It's not that we don't want to... we want to (we do). We know it's not perfect and needs attention, but we just can't do the needed changes with the limited amount of true, honest ans sincere volunteers that follow through. For all of you that continue to complain the ball is in your court we have told you time and again what we need and we haven't seen any changes. Quit complaining and start stepping up and following through.

Instead of blaming us for having a "won't" attitude start thinking it's a "can't" and start thinking how you can contribute in any way possible so it frees up our time so we can start putting more times into things like the forge, documentation, etc.

I was thinking of doing the following:

create a table on wiki listing all modules
test-install all modules
contact authors of all modules without a description
document in the table all modules that do not seem to work

other than that, only the authors of modules can do further work.

[replytomk3]

@replytomk3

You are here by nominated to test every module in the forge for compatibility, don't forget to test them for the last 3 versions of CMS Made Simple...

http://forum.cmsmadesimple.org/index.php/topic,39095.msg185173.html#msg185173

[Avantart]

As long as you ban possible volunteers from the forum, you will not succeed.... 

Connie was willing to take part, that's why she listed weak points etc.

Bud all you did was to ban her (without any trace of humour or irony)

Cheers, Maxim

(Connie's webdesign collegue)

[Dr.CSS]

I'm not sure I've ever seen any post of hers that said I tested this module and it works fine in 1.whatever but not so good in this ver., just this doesn't work, I can't find this etc., etc...

We all know the forge is lacking in some very important ways but it isn't some module one of us made and it would involve some serious code hacking/changes to get it the way that even the Devs want it, hell I've got a dead module in there from way back and can't even delete it...

So for the sake of everyone's sanity please stop saying how screwed up it is...

[jmcgin51]

We all know the forge is lacking in some very important ways but it isn't some module one of us made and it would involve some serious code hacking/changes to get it the way that even the Devs want it, hell I've got a dead module in there from way back and can't even delete it...

Ok, so let's hear from the dev team.  What are we looking at, in terms of time, to do one of two things:
1. hack the existing Forge to add some essential functions like better search, better backend mgmt, and categories?

2. implement a completely new Forge structure that will better serve the needs of the community.

I agree that work on 2.0 is very important, but if potential users are turned off by the state of the current Forge, we're shooting ourselves in the foot.  We're losing market share while trying to create a better project.  Would it not make more sense to take a short break from 2.0 development to fix the Forge issues, then dive back in to 2.0.

Everyone in marketing knows that it is much easier to keep an existing customer than to attract a new one.  If we can fix the Forge, I really think it will help to retain users.

I personally would be comfortable accepting a 1 or 2 month delay in 2.0 work, if it meant that we can get some of the Forge issues fixed.  I think it's that important.

[tyman00]

It's tough to appease everyone. While some would argue that they are fine waiting a little more for 2.0 the others are saying they'd rather have 2.0 than the forge updates.

Then there's those that want their cake, to be able to eat it and put their own sprinkles and cherries on top 

It's been discussed within the dev team, so please don't think we are ignoring the situation. Another factor to consider the the forge isn't written in PHP so not every dev team member that programs can work on it. It's written in Rails which only a few members know and to top it off those members are so swamped in their work and personal lives that it leaves little time for programming anything... period.

I don't disagree with many of the issues outlined about the forum... most of the devs don't either. I've even personally tried to find a way to justify sponsoring some of these changes (some simple, some complex) to the forge because I know it would even assist me and I have a pretty good grasp of what modules exist and which ones are good for what. I think the major changes would be improved navigation, search and putting an inactive state on modules that go X amount of days with out modifications or updates. This will help remove the modules that are no longer supported or don't have any files released.

It really is tough being on our side knowing and understanding there are multiple areas that need to be addressed (not limited to the Forge and 2.0) and only being able to handle such a limited amount.

[Avantart]

I'm not sure I've ever seen any post of hers that said I tested this module and it works fine in 1.whatever but not so good in this ver., just this doesn't work, I can't find this etc., etc...

so check her postings, she did. She also helped others giving tips and solved questions, she wrote long letters to developers of modules with realistic lists of suggestions, mistakes and solutons, but

the evil that man do lives after them, the good is often interred with their bones.

Shakespeare was right.

[Sonya]

How many times do we have to go through this? We don't have enough time or man power. Would you rather we worked on the forge or worked on 2.0? If we work on one we take away time from the other.

tyman00, I have suggested my time more than once.

I have many times suggested my help with quality assuarance on 3rd party modules. I have written a 10-step-suggestion (about 3 pages) on how I would do it (not only one time cleanup, but defining processes to keep forge clean consequently). I do not  only make suggestions but offer my time as well. I have sent these 10 points to Ted and hope to get any feedback from him.

http://forum.cmsmadesimple.org/index.ph ... #msg168460 I have never heard any answer from Ted after sending him my suggestion list. Still I can make the list available here in board for discussion, if someone really interested in.

It looks like the dev team is not interested to involve new members to help them. Sorry, it is not a critic, but just a feeling. I think, you need a simple statement like: "Yes, we aware of the problem, no, we have no time to do it and no, we will not ask for help, as we are going to do it ourselves sometimes."

Until we get more sincere volunteers it just CAN'T happen. It's not that we don't want to... we want to (we do). We know it's not perfect and needs attention, but we just can't do the needed changes with the limited amount of true, honest ans sincere volunteers that follow through. For all of you that continue to complain the ball is in your court we have told you time and again what we need and we haven't seen any changes. Quit complaining and start stepping up and following through.

Well, probably I not sincere enough  ;D Yes, I am woman. But seriously, I am not complaining, I make suggestion and offer my time. What can I do more?