Despite my little tribulations, on the site that is now running 1.4 successfully it looks a great improvement. Thanks as well for trying to tidy up the CP - though I still think you have a fair way to go with both the layout, articulation of where things lie in the CP and some of the language used (not all of your users are yankees, you know….)

Also may I put in a bid that you open up a single forum thread for EECore (e2C)? For example when I loaded it to a site over the weekend I was surprised to see CP settings for variables that do not exist in that version and, using the standard installation instructions, the use of the firda2 EEtheme causes site-launch to fail; because of an {exp:mailinglist…/} expression included in the template that was explicitily rejected by the index.php page. Removing the {exp:../} sorted the problem leaving a page with member login functionality (that is not suppported?).

I fully understand the no-support position but if your thought is to draw in new users/potential customers something to help over little hurdels like this (or even give pointers for 1.4.1 changes) might help…. especially if (as I suspect) many first time users will first try e2C (maybe in a LAN environment) before trying the full trial-version. Thought I’m sure you’ll be watching for this, right?

Another thought for e2C is that, in the absense of the metablogAPI you might have a word with Elwin at cocoaholic/pMpost (who I understand is now moving into EE development full time) and get an offline editor working again - trying to use the ecto|Marsedit/BloggerAPI combination is all-but pointless, given that, in order to get the entries to point to fields in EE requires marking up the ecto/Marsedit posts in raw HTML (what newbies need - what we all need…..is a WYSiWYG editor…....like pMpost).

Anyway for my part I’m sure the 1.4 development will take you a long way towards your goals for this application and congratulations to all of you at pMachine on a great-job-done. It has certainly increased my confidence in the decision to go with EE, if not my current productivity…;-)

Jules

Also may I put in a bid that you open up a single forum thread for EECore (e2C)? For example when I loaded it to a site over the weekend I was surprised to see CP settings for variables that do not exist in that version and, using the standard installation instructions, the use of the firda2 EEtheme causes site-launch to fail; because of an {exp:mailinglist…/} expression included in the template that was explicitily rejected by the index.php page. Removing the {exp:../} sorted the problem leaving a page with member login functionality (that is not suppported?).

A cleanup of the existing templates wouldn’t be a bad idea.

I’ve installed EECore on two sites, but haven’t tried importing other templates into it. Good catch.

I have one or two templates I’ve modified by hand that I keep around. I pull out any Referrer links in the stats, too.

Julianps - 19 December 2005 01:41 AM

trying to use the ecto|Marsedit/BloggerAPI combination is all-but pointless, given that, in order to get the entries to point to fields in EE requires marking up the ecto/Marsedit posts in raw HTML (what newbies need - what we all need…..is a WYSiWYG editor…....like pMpost).

I agree on the Ecto/Marsedit/BloggerAPI combination but we don’t all need a WYSIWYG editor.
Clients sure could use one, but on the other hand how long would it take a reasonably intelligent person to learn the basic tags of (X)HTML (p, h2-4, ul, ol, a) to write some content?
It’s something that’s puzzled me for years
Oh and Kudos on 1.4 you’ve added a lot of functionality to an already great package.

I have a lot of experience trying to teach incredibly intelligent people very basic xHTML.  I can tell you this - it is not easy.  I am talking about things like ... .  Not even as hard as lists.

As a note: I did technical support with doctors and other health care professionals, full time, for three years.  I think we can agree they’re intelligent.  But they can’t, and more importantly, won’t, learn HTML. 

This is the same for many non-internet type professionals, and is why so many people want a wysiwyg editor.

Back in the late 80’s I worked for one of the largest hotel chains in the world, headquartered out of the UK. Pre Windows 3.1 they were using Amstrad computers, truely “floppy” discs and a horror-show called Wordstar for their main desktop application.

Anyone who has transitioned from all the rings and hoops those people had to jump through to create meaningful, formatted text on the page will know why Word (for win3.1) was such a killer application for MS.

I would like to say I’m stunned people still tolerate working raw (x)HTML, but then every time I look at the source of a page created by web development applications I sort of get it; hand-coding = elegant-simplicity.

No wonder those .doc files were so bloated…;-)

{/exp:off-topic}

Jules

I totally miss Wordstar.  But more importantly, I miss DOS and 4DOS.

And making up funny batch scripts with ASCII art to freak out my folks and make them think their computer was broken.

Lisa - 19 December 2005 05:18 AM

I totally miss Wordstar.  But more importantly, I miss DOS and 4DOS.

You have a point there, 4NT didn’t come close… But my UNIX command line is a good replacement.

Lisa - 19 December 2005 05:18 AM

I totally miss Wordstar.  But more importantly, I miss DOS and 4DOS.

Ah, the good-old-days./J