PostNuke

As I stated in the earlier vision statement, one of the things that I considered necessary was to trim down, and reduce the previously bloated development team to a more manageable size. Necessary - because a smaller, more flexible team is far more capable to respond to changes, and far faster and more flexible to implement minor or even drastic enhancements. Historically, this has been demonstrated in PostNuke whereas many of the drastic architecture changes were able to be implemented quickly by individuals.

Fortunately, due to recent events, we are now left with a group of very talented and dedicated individuals, who have significantly contributed to PostNuke, who have given 200% of their time, effort, and themselves to PostNuke during the past few weeks, and whose efforts are reflected in many of the changes to come in the next few weeks.

I plan on setting up separate 'bio' pages for all developers and contributors to the project, but until that module is finished, we have:

Neo / Sam : Sam hails to us from Mexico City, Mexico, where he resides with his lovely wife and son - both of which he loves dearly. I've known Sam for a while, in fact, our friendship extends to long before PostNuke - through his site www.SamsTech.net he has contributed his innovation to the tmda configuration tool, qadmin-tmda, among many other cool things. Being the PHP guru that he is, he has contributed some really cool new technologies to PostNuke, including flexible block positioning under standard themes, and his embedding technology that is currently showcased at the Town hall meeting and with the phpBB integration. He has many other tricks up his sleeve, and I harbor a theory that he doesn't need any sleep. I'm excited to have him aboard.

MagicX / Alex : Having joined us from beautiful Germany, I didn't know him until I was introduced to him via Sam. He is responsible for the www.PortalZine.de site, as well as he has been instrumental in the overhaul of the new PostNuke site's look and navigation aids. As some pointed out, we now have a definite 'MagicX feel' to the site, but hey, that's called 'style', and Alex certainly has his own.

VWorld / Vanessa : Living in San Diego, CA Vanessa certainly gets the bonus of a great climate, which undoubtedly contributes to the sense of style that she brings to her graphic and site design. Vanessa runs and operates a LOT of different sites (I met her via a Big Brother site she operated), and also runs www.distance-educator.com, a site dealing in educational concepts.

There are more, but instead of posting partial information, I would rather just wait to get more bio information and follow-up with a second article for the remaining team members, folks like Stratagem, who decided to stick with PostNuke, and who's invaluable to keep the site and related services running smoothly - and who I wouldn't do justice with just ashort sentence.

Thus this is

--TO BE CONTINUED--

At least that is what I got out of the many comments that have been contributed recently : What the majority of you want are: STABILITY, LEAN CORE, MODULAR DESIGN, A THEME SYSTEM, COMPATIBILITY, EASE OF USE.

With that in mind, while far from being hewn in stone, here's how I see the road that leads us there, and how the various aspects of PostNuke will be affected.

0.721-Phoenix : the recent bug-fix release will also include several enhancements (like new block control using standard pnThemes), as well as provide upwards compatibility for Encompass/Envolution installations (to allow those users to upgrade seamlessly to 0.721-Phoenix.) A changes list will be posted with the release.

0.725-Phoenix : to include the new Phoenix Theme Engine, based on FastTemplates, more bug fixes, more minor improvements to modules, new themes to show off new capabilities. Documentation for new features will accompany release.

0.726-Phoenix : Will include short URLs backported from 0.8, improved AddStory, comments and news system (which needs an overhaul), admin redesign, more user interface improvements throughout the system. Documentation for new features will accompany release

0.727-Phoenix : Permissions UI and functionality overhaul (looking for suggestions and ideas); Download module overhaul, start of the installation overhaul. Documentation for new features will accompany release

0.728 - 0.799 : further finetunings, improvements to the core, improvements and better integration of several modules, improvements to the installation and upgrade system, some kind of WYSIWYG editor solution.

0.8xx - 0.899 : Further Core and module separation, PN modules will be tested and converted to full pnAPI compatibility, XMLRPC in a big way, as well as client apps that allow control, third-party module devs will be assisted with conversions if needed, installation that allows customized installations, Feature requests will be integrated further. Documentation will be tackled in a big way to provide a comprehensive compendium of all information that a user and admin might need. Essential information will be bundled.

0.9xx-0.999 : BETA phase - this is when we can take what we have created up to that point and REALLY throw the book at it, and meticulously iron out any problems and bugs that might still be in there - this is the period that we tie up the loose ends, as well as ALL reported bugs. The goal is a clean, fast running, bug free application for the 1.0 release. Documentation must be in final format, with any last details amended and fixed.

1.00 - Tranquility Release : Pretty much the goal for this is to announce it, sit back, and go on a vacation - of course, that won't happen, as we expect some additional last minute tweaks to probably take us through a handful of additional maintenance releases. Still, with 1.0 I'm hoping that PostNuke will be in a state where a solid core can be configured to 'become anything', based on modules, themes and configurations. This should be the final release, or it can be taken beyond by ether new leadership, or, what the heck, we may discover something new to do with it.

Now, what needs to be understood, coding and writing docs is but a part of what it takes to make the PostNuke effort a success - marketing and promoting PostNuke is an initiative that I consider to be essential to the success of this project. After all, what good is the best project, if no one knows about it.

Marketing Initiative
To that effect, throughout all phases of this roadmap, I will supervise aggressive marketing approach to make sure that PostNuke is well-known, to assure us from getting the prerequiste coverage, and to make sure that we grow our user base by creating more awareness of the project. Some of this will be achieved via technological alliances, some of it via ancilliary services, some of it via aggressive promotion, and some of it via means we haven't even thought of yet. I have some pretty good ideas how to go about doing that, but that's for another article. Consider this a call for volunteers.

Developer Rewards
In addition, since any good project is based on the fruits of equally good developers, I strongly believe that there ought to be ways and means to compensate those hard-working souls for their effort - it is therefore a priority to me, to create an environment and an atmosphere that provides appropriate means for the userbase to show their appreciation of both he project, or the individual developer. I have a system all worked out to achieve that, but, again, that's for another article.

Community Focus
Lastly, the community focus of this project will always be at the forefront, so expect full communication, op-ed pieces, town meetings, and more details about 'PostNuke events & news', not just from me, but others on the development team.

Oh, you ask "Who the heck is on the dev team???"

Read on - next article

Harry

Where we have been:

The original PostNuke project split from php-nuke because of ideological differences, notably the isolationist development style of its developer, and his rather negative attitude towards his community. The breaking point that caused the split was the infamous posting that directly resulted in the creation of PostNuke. In many ways the parallels are striking, as *I* felt that PostNuke had been in a similar down-spiral with regards to its commitment and attitude towards the community.

Due to changed circumstances, myself and other like-minded folks will hopefully be able to return PostNuke to its community based, as well as techno-ideological roots.

I'd like to remind some of the more impatient folks in the user community of John Cox' original words during that initial organizational phase, specifically :"We spent the next month or so planning where we wanted to go. We also worked on some things that we knew could be done in the short term, and tried to get those together while we talked about the project. We also looked at some of the things that others were working on, to get even more ideas. All of this time was spent planning. We would be no where near the point we are now if we hadn't used this time wisely. "

Assessing the present situation, evaluating what needs to be done, selecting the proper direction and making decisions that will not just be a stop-gap measure, but will provide long-term growth are not easy tasks - and I will NOT be rushed into dumping out some half-asses statement just to satisfy some impatients, only to have to revise it a half a dozen times.


So, Where are we now:

The project has lost 100% of its core developers - which mnay might see as a point of crisis, but I saw it as quite the opportunity (as a matter of fact, in Japanese, I believe, the words for 'crisis' and 'opportunity' are the same).

Let's face it, the project had grown a lot of bloat, and had become very top-heavy - and grew increasingly detached from the userbase and community that supported it - a massive pruning of the org chart would have been necessary anyway, and the mass exodus that took place conveniently saved me hassle of having to deal with that.

It was also an opportunity to create a far leaner organizational structure, with less bloat, and populated with participants that are more concerned and more in touch with the community, since community is an important focuse for us (but, rest assured, it is not the sole focus). Again, I am reminded of the original vision statement, which stil applies:

"We are trying to also build a community. Everyone is welcome here. Although, the current climate might be more suitable for some one that is accustom to a development atmosphere, I think that we are also doing our best to build up the community. Without the support of everyone that reads this document, we could well loose focus of where we want to go, and in the end we would all loose out. We want to build a better website. Obviously you want to see if there is something better on the horizon, or you would never visit. "

It is worth noticing that a redesign of the website was thus, far from the fluff that some claimed it is. In order to show you where we want to go, it is necessary for us to show you what that looks like, and work together with you in refining and finetuning it. The redesign of the new PostNuke website was a great illustration of the community coming together and working with the developers to create something better than we originally envisioned - and that process is far from over.


Where Are We Going:

Now we're getting to the juicy part, and the one that everyone is curious about - the future. Again, I need to refer back to the original vision statement:

"Well, here it is in a nutshell of where we want to get to. We want a division of Core to Plugin files (...). We want a system that installs without a hitch, that allows you to choose what you want to install to make your website run better and faster. That is what is on our mind. We also want to maintain some semblance to PHP-Nuke in terms of adding abstraction layers to allow you to be able to use all of its add-ons and themes if you so desire. "

Originally, the vision for PostNuke was simple - create a stable, lean and small core, and build upon that core with modules. This went well, as many past developers have done an admirable job removing clutter from the core, streamlining it, and making it lean and mean. In addition, much of the original functionality has been agressively moved to modules, all the while making efforts to maintain legacy compatibility with themes and modules.

So, those of you concerned about the vision can rest assure that *nothing* about it has changed - in fact, as I said in the beginning, it's startling how much our present condition mirrors those that existed when the original vision was committed by John Cox.

What we want:

* a lean and stable core
* functional and flexible modules
* flexible and easy to use themes
* a stable API system to provide future stability and
compatibility.

Where you might perceive changes is in with the roadmap, but only by virtue of the circumstances that gave rise to where we are now - yet, again, I saw our situation as an opportunity to streamline the roadmap, and provide what it set out to, a bit 'earlier' (i.e. under the 0.72 tree) than laid out back then.

But that is what I will be dealing with in the next article, as this is already plenty to digest (and I'm starting to type the 'Road Map' as soon as I hit 'post' on this one, which will then be followed by the new org chart, and new dev team).

Harry

For example translations of english articles of your site are explained at http://www.kaintech.net

I think little by little this site can help us French people to live the long live of postnuke in our language!

axelem

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Forermly known as 'The Telecom Tech', then as 'Seven Guys Telecom', the network generalist is back on the wire with technical tips on the often quoted but seldom understood concepts of telephony and networking.

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