I am operating a website that is using pMachine pro (which I purchased way back when...).  I am currently having to force it to behave like a cms.  I have known about ee for quite some time and have put off purchasing, well.... because the price is quite high.  I’ve gone the route of “free” open source cms’s and have been pulling out my hair since they never seem to be “quite” completed projects.  Always a new update or security fix or database restructure or lack of documentation or what have you.  So here I am back looking into Ellislabs because of the quality, support, and documentation.

In a nut shell, here is what I need to achieve within my most challenging section of the site:

The section contains stories written primarily by my wife, without any plans to add user submissions (at this time).

The stories consist of two types: Single (short) Stories and Serialized (chaptered) stories.

The problems I’m having:

1) how to list the chapters associated with a serialized story in a predefined sequence as a result of a db query and display them as a submenu somewhere on the page.

2) list a submenu of a variable (number selected by and changable by the admin) of the latest stories with a “more” link that would move the visitor to a table of content type page listing all stories.

So, the big question is:  Is this easily accomplished with expression engine or will it result in my having to twist its arm the way I’m having to currently do with pMachine?

I’m having a hard time getting a grasp of what can and cannot be done with expression engine.  I’ve seen no examples of anyone attempting what I want.

Thanks in advance.
Herb

The site I’m working on has similar requirements, and I’ve gotten it all to work with EE. Start from the following pages and see if your questions are answered. Just note that the visual design isn’t done yet (it changes from hour to hour, it seems) and that the categories assigned to some stories are more or less random, just enough to test that everything works.

For individual stories: start here.

For a serial: start here.

Thanks for the reply walpow, sorta what I was looking for but not quite.  It seems that your serialized stories are listed based on reverse cronological entry.  I’m specifically looking for a way to designate the sequence of displays based on ordering specified by the poster.  Say for example, chapter 1 was entered, then chapter 3, then chapter 2.  Cronologically they would be out of order.  I want to be able to say insert a chapter between two existing chapters which would automatically renumber the chapters.

I’m not sure if I’m making myself clear here.  The end result would be to have a chapter displayed with a sidebar menu listing all the chapters in sequence and highlighting the current chapter being viewed.  This would also facility the ability to extract a previous chapter by name link as well as a next chapter by name link.

Thanks again,
Herb

I’ve got a custom field with the chapter sequence. Though the chapters appear to be chronological, that’s only because I’ve changed their entry dates so I can use make those dates match when the chapters were posted on the old version of the site. I use the sequence numbers for all ordering. If you made the sequence number non-sequential - 010, 020, 020 rather than 01, 02, 03 like I’ve got them), when you get later chapters that logically fit in-between, you could give them numbers that put them in the right order, like 015, 027, whatever. Then when you display them you could dynamically order them from 1 on up, though off the top of my head - I’m a relative newbie here - I’m not sure if you might need a bit of PHP to make it do that. In any event, if you want to have the chapters renumber according to the order you want, and not according to anything built-in like entry date or entry number, you’d have to use a custom field to tell it where to go.

As far as the sidebar, that’s going to be similar to the index pages for each serial that’s a link on the URL I gave above. (In fact, there’s a mini-version in the sidebar of each installment, though it only lists a few chapters.) I’m sure highlighting the current chapter in that list would be simple.

Sort of a side question - I write my books from the beginning, and every other writer I know does too. I’m having trouble envisioning why you might need to stick chaps in-between already written ones, especially for something that’s ready for (Web) publication.

Also ... what with your wife’s stories, it kind of sounds like a personal site, as opposed to a commercial one. In that case the cost of a license is 99 bucks, and I just don’t see that as “quite high.” And if it is a commercial site, the cost is $249, and I think any business should be able to afford that that for a piece of software like this. Besides, if it is a business, the cost is deductible, and that knocks a hefty chunk off.

In any event ... it all sounds pretty straightforward with EE. Go for it.

Best of luck,
Nathan

Nathan:

Thanks for your reply.  I have downloaded the free core, and am starting to play with the program.  Obviously there will be a learning curve here and just before checking my mail for replies, I had just stubled onto the relationship thing in the docs.  I’m still trying to figure the logic of how I can design the work flow to put this to work for me.

It seems like a lot of steps are required within the process.  I want to make it so that my wife can make entries and with as few steps as possible viola have it ready for the world to see.

I will play some as I dig into how to operate ee.  I guess the jury is still out for now.

As for the price, $99 plus $50 to add a forum and so on, it does run into a bit of money; however, at this jucture I’m so fed up with everything else I’ve tried it will be worth it to leave the headaches behind.

Herb

Yep- I would have suggested trying Core myself.  Depending on her site, she might be fine using that live as well (contact sales if you aren’t sure).  (And note- the forum would require the Personal edition be installed, so if you want the forum, that’s a consideration.)

When I first used pmpro, it was for putting up multi-chaptered fanfic- think I did some minor hacks and then had one weblog for the fics- and another for the chapters.  Was fairly clunky, but the best I could do.  There’s also some ‘story’ software out there- eFiction is a popular one in fanfic circles.  It’s not very flexible- but what it does, it does well.  I’d go with EE myself- I like the flexibility and it’s better in other ways as well.  But might be worth a look as it’s totally geared toward managing stories.

Now- for doing it in EE, I’d either make books categories or use relationships.  Well- I’d use relationships, but categories is the other option I can see.  Pros/cons to each.  Relationships are a bit trickier, but I’d prefer them.  One weblog for the book info- one for the chapters.  Each chapter would have a relationship field- where you select the book it’s associated with.

Can then show all ‘books’ easily- and all ‘chapters’ in the books using reverse relaationship tags.  D.Jones has a nice blog entry on how relationships were using in building this site.  Might give you a better understanding of how things work.

But- we’re wandering pretty far from pre-sales If we dig deeper, I may shift to ‘How to’- or if you want to get into specifics, probably better to post a new thread there.

Oh- and as someone who moved from PMPro->EE?  It’s a real paradigm shift.  It will take a while to really ‘get EE’, but once the lightbulb moment happens, you’ll be very glad you took the plunge.

Thanks ever so much for the responses.

I’ve been cruising around the forum and think I am getting a grasp of the relationships thing.  My understanding is that they provide a 1 to 1 relationship but can, through creativeness be used via multiple weblogs achieve many to many relationships; which is where I guess I need to go.

You are absolutely right about the pardigm shift.  However, the support, quality, and community are why I’m here.  I’m pretty certain that we are going to go with ee, once I get up to speed on how to tap its power.

Thanks,
Herb