Re: Site, apps and CMS (Was: Re: StepTalk blog)

[Stefan Urbanek]

Citát Manuel Guesdon <ml@orange-concept.com>:

> On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 13:10:05 +0200 Stefan Urbanek <stefan@agentfarms.net>
> wrote:
> 
>  >| Citát Rob Burns <foobix@comcast.net>:
>  >| 
>  >| <snip>
>  >| > > 
>  >| > > p.s.: Can we convert GNUstep site to some CMS instead of having it on
> 
>  >| > > CVS?
>  >| > > --
>  >| > 
>  >| > would having blogs aggregated at planet.gnustep.org and an active, 
>  >| > more detailed app database at apps.gnustep.org, along with the 
>  >| > currently well used wiki at wiki.gnustep.org, achieve the same 
>  >| > benefits you're looking for in using the cms, without the upheaval 
>  >| > (and work) of changing the main gnustep site?
>  >| > 
>  >| 
>  >| No, it will not be the same. wiki/apps/planet/forum are "web
> applications" with
>  >| their own purpose. What I had in mind is that we should have home page in
> a CMS
>  >| so it would be editable from anywhere. CVS is a barrier.
>  >| 
>  >| What tools (PHP? MySQL? GNUstep-web?) are available for the GNUstep site
> and
>  >| what is possible to install and maintain? For those tools we can try to
> find a
>  >| CMS, if it would be possible. With CMS one can get features such as
> search, 
>  >| site map, automatic menu maintenance and many others "for free".
> 
> There's php 4.3, mysql and postgresql on the current server.
> 

Looks enough for most of available "products".

> 
>  >| Btw. Ubuntu has nice web forums [1] with plenty of traffic. Also I have
> noted
>  >| that they have a kind of bridge between mailman and the forum [2], so
> every
>  >| post to the ubuntu lists gets published at the forum as a standard
> message.
>  >| Does GNUstep has any resources (machine, time,...) to set up such forum?
> In
>  >| addition, currend trends are that people like to discuss at forums more
> than on
>  >| lists, as the forums are easier accessible.
> 
> I don't know, if you send me requirements for all this, I can see if we can
> install this..
> BTW, web list archives are availables...
> 

1. Forums

The Ubuntu uses vBulletin which looks to be commercial software. If we consider
using phpbb (http://www.phpbb.com/) then the requirements would be:

Installation of phpBB2 requires the following:
- A webserver or web hosting account running on any major Operating System 
- A SQL database system, one of: 
-- MySQL (3.22 or higher) 
-- PostgreSQL 7.0.3 or higher (preferably 7.1.x or 7.2.x) 
-- MS SQL Server (7 or 2000) directly or via ODBC 
-- MS Access (2000 or XP) via ODBC 
- PHP (4.0.3 and above) with support for the database you intend to use above 

2. CMS

For the CMS I have no preference. I am using SPIP (www.spip.net) and I have
tried WebsiteBaker (Google: websitebaker). From my experience I can say, that
SPIP is good for it's original purpose, that is for online newspapers. It
has many neat features and complex templating system. Main advantage of Spip is
the community around and large number of users.

WebsiteBaker is compact, very easy to use and very easy to install. Both use
MySQL databases. WebsiteBaker has more types of pages: content page, links,
external page and news page. Has search engine too. Another nice thing with the
baker is, that it creates pages with their real name as specified in the
control center therefore it can get more hits from search engines as pages with
id's (AFAIK). One problem I had with the WebsiteBaker was migration from one
place to another as it is not built-in and it is not planned. You have to
export/import whole database manually.

Very exhaustive list of opensource CMS can be found here:
http://www.opensourcecms.com/, but it is too long and therefore I would suggest
to try 3-4 with most known names. Choice should be mainly up to the site
administrator.

As for the CMS, what about setting up one or two experimental sites with
templates of current GNUstep page? Something like www.gnustep.org/cms/baker and
www.gnustep.org/cms/another_cms

3. Wiki - we already have one

4. Planet - no idea, can someone with experience with it suggest exact
solution?

5. apps - we have an application, however, it does not work. At
http://www.gnustep.org/GSWeb/GSApps.woa I get: GSApps:1 (213.133.116.130:9001)
doesn't respond. Can be this fixed? And can it be linked to apps.gnustep.org?

In addition I would suggest to have page header similar to current GNUstep home
page header (logo) on all sub-sites. Also the page header should contain
references to all sub-sites. Again, Ubuntu is very good example for that:
http://www.ubuntulinux.org. One has the impression of single site there for
everything, from main site through forums to the wiki.

Regards,

Stefan Urbanek
--
http://stefan.agentfarms.net

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then
you win.
- Mahatma Gandhi