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MediaAttach RC 1 released   (News)

Functional features

With the display and delete hooks file uploads become possible in all hook-capable modules.
Many different file types are supported (images, music, videos, archives, documents, ...)
The most formats can be displayed embedded.
Enhanced file information like for example ID3 tags are read and cached with pnRender.
Also emedding external videos (e.g. YouTube, Google or Dailymotion) is possible.
Users can send files to themselves in mails.


Security

Files can be stored outside the web root, which is advisable absolutely.
If this is not possible, a .htaccess file can be created automatically for protecting direct access.
Therefore all access is handled by module functions and permissions.
A quota support cares for bounded storage limits.


Integration

Users can manage their own files in the profile.
With a Scribite plugin for Xinha media can be inserted in the editor easily.
A support for needles in the MultiHook also provides possibilities to include files in other content.
A Guppy plugin for Pagesetter is enclosed as well to be able to define MediaAttach fields.
Also the Content module is being supported by a flexible plugin.
More profound integration possibilities for special modules exist with create and update hooks.


Migration

An import from the file system is possible.
Moreover import options for Downloads 2, Mediashare, PhotoGallery and pnUpper are ready.


Comfort

Direct support for Categories.
Images can be scaled down.
Space-saving multi uploader if JavaScript is available.
Thumbnails can be cut out individually if desired.
The new search functionality is being supported.
The creation of bit torrents for files is possible.
Comprehensive PDF manual.


MediaAttach can be used as easy as every other display hook module (for example EZComments). But if one engages in it, he quickly perceives that the strengths of this module are it's flexibility and it's adaptability. It not only unifies file management and media integration, but can also be used as a gallery for example. Different annexed template sets illustrate several possible applications.
Also interesting is that one can activate MediaAttach also for MediaAttach itself which leads amongst others to the possibility to attach media to other media items.
The module offers concluding dozens possibilities which can all be used, but may not. For this reason it is excellently suited for being employed in project-specific areas and is furthermore in line with our framework idea why it is going to constitute an enrichment certainly.

Links

Download
Bugtracker
Patches
Feature Requests


Have fun with testing and giving feedback :)

Generated on March 7, 2008.

pnMeeting 2007: Mark West talks about .8/.9   (News)

system information module will make it easier for webmasters to collect the needed information in case they seek help in the forums.

The use of Ajax makes the handling of various modules far easier. You can drag and drop permissions or user information fields. And on the user side you can for example rate a content item using the Ratings hook using an Ajax function and not having to reload the whole page after rating it.

The new URL system add permalinks to .8 and make URLs nice and readable as you can already find them in other systems like Wordpress. The permalinks can be defined by the administrator and can be included into other modules. It already works for example with the News module and the Pages module. The Pages module in the Value Addons package is the successor of Mark's htmlpages.

Included into the new Theme module is a Theme generator that creates all the basic files and file entries you need to start working on a new layout.

A real enhancement compared to .7 can be found in the block control - Blocks can be dragged and dropped into place and various block setups can be set not only for modules but for single content items.

There are still 2 or 3 major bugs in the bugtracker that are already partly fixed but which must be fixed before RC2 can be releast. That shouldn't take too much time.

In his outlook on .9 Mark explained that all Postnuke releases after Feburary next year will at least require PHP 5.2 - so ask your hosting providers early enough for updates. The background of this decision is the move towards object orientation in the Postnuke codebase and the fact that PHP 5 is around long enough now to become standard.

The language system is the last big project on the roadmap towards Postnuke 1.0 - other PHP projects will be evaluated to find the best solution. In the same move the internationalisation of content will be improved. Direct translations for content must be possible - News articles with the same ID in different languages are the result. Again getText was discussed as a possible solution and the move to UTF-8.

One of the most complex parts of Postnuke today is the Permission system. It is powerful yet often to complicated. So soultions have to be found to solve standard permissions requirements.

Axel Guckelsberger requested an addition to the hooks system - hooks don't know the permissions a user has for the item they are hooked into. So if you want to download a files that is attached to a forum post the permissions to download would result from the a) the permission of the user to view the thread and b) the permission of the user to download files. Hooks are today blind for this. Mark agreed that this had to be changed for future releases.

While talking about hooks Frank Schummertz requested more hook types. Currently we have display, transform, create, update and delete hooks. A required new type is the init or pageload hook that hooks into the start of the system like the spam prevention system BadBehaviour for example that stops the loading of the page if it detects a spam bot.

Mark Ronchera asked for the use of OpenID in future releases which Mark West answered by explaining the flexibility of the .8

Generated on September 9, 2007.

pnMeeting 2007: Frank Schummertz ports a module to .8 style   (News)

Less lines of code reduce also the risk of errors. And Frank presented the way the result of the SELECT gets filtered through the permissions which is also done in a few standard lines of code.

Of course Formicula 2.0 makes use of pnForms. This reduces for example the edit function for the contacts to 3 lines of code plus the few lines that build the form and automatically validate the inputs. The programmer doesn't have to handle all kinds of wrong inputs - that is all done by the the forms API. The module will only receive validated values.

In a general overview Frank picked out single lines of code from Formicula and pointed out the differences to .7 - Among others were the use of the LogUtil with takes care of occurring errors and the fact that the pnRender object now has a parameter for disabling the caching.

Frank emphasized the fact that the correct use of all .8 APIs reduce the size of a module by 30-50%

Generated on September 8, 2007.

pnMeeting 2007: Robert Gasch on DBUtil and the Object Model in .8   (News)

Only few have heard about DBUtil, even fewer have used it themselves. Robert Gasch aimed at changing this.

DBUtil frees the programmer from the need of writing SQL. You rather work with objects and all your selects will be checked for permissions. So if you fetch a set of 10 articles you will only receive that 10 articles that the users is allowed to see. This alone is a major enhancement and saves lots of code lines.

Robert presented the object library as a powerful yet quite easy to use system for the handling of objects. After the initialization of an object you can select, edit, delete aso the object. For a more detailed look into the ObjectLib you should watch the recorded presentation which we will publish within the next few days. Or watch the other presentations live.

Do you want to see how our location looks like? Look here!

Generated on September 8, 2007.

Jørn Wildt Proposes New Content Module   (News)

For the discussion see: http://community.postnuke.com/module-Forum-viewtopic-topic-53152-start-0.htm

Here is what Jørn has in mind:

[quote=Jørn Wildt]Dear PostNuke community

One of the things that always comes up when comparing PostNuke to other Content Management Systems is its lack of real content management. All we have is some old News, Pages and FAQ (and some more) management modules - nothing really fancy. You can add fancy modules like PagEd, Pagesetter, pnWiki and others but somehow they all lack, well, something - something which I find rather difficult to pinpoint. They are either too complex, too simple, impossible to extend and do not integrate well with each other.

I have been doing some thinking about this issue and would like to present some ideas for a new Content system in PostNuke. A framework that newbies can work with right out of the box, an extensible framework, and a framework with well integrated components that are aware of each other. My ideas are by no means rocket science and most, if not all, have been implemented else where - just not in PostNuke.

If you ask me then PostNuke is going to dwindle away unless something serious is done to add a good content framework. Here is my suggestion.

[b]Content Types[/b]
The core component is the "Content Type". For those of you that knows Pagesetter this is exactly the same as Pagesetter's Publication Type. This will be a separate module that takes care of defining content types, editing and displaying content items - but without user navigation! Think of an Article, with it's title, lead-in text, main text and image, as a content item of the type "Article". The type specifies the fields that are available for a single instance of the type - a single content item - a single Article.

Content Types are management by the site administrator (but can also be created by other modules). The admin can choose from an extensible (through plugins) list of field types. Here are some examples (mostly copied from Pagesetter):

- String (one line text), Text (non-HTML), HTML (using Scribite!)
- Number, checkbox, date
- Media files (using Mediashare)
- File uploads
- URL, email
- Computer code (text displayed with line numbers in mono spaced font)
- Category (using PN .8 categories), both single and multiple select.

Now you can create an article as a title (string), lead-in (text), main text (html) - and many other types of content. But there is still no navigation - neither on the admin side nor the user side. All you have is a Content module that allows you to create content types, content items and then display these - assuming you now the URLs. Navigation is delegated to other modules - more on that later on.

The core framework does also handle input form generation: it will auto-generate input forms (using pnForms in PN .8). These can then be copied to another location and re-designed using the standard Smarty templating system.

The core content module handles a few other things: for instance revision history (who changed what and when).

[b]Content Management[/b]
So far there's nothing new compared to Pagesetter. So lets take a look at the admin side of navigation - how to store and locate your content items. I suggest that all content items are stored in a folder structure identically to your standard disk drive. On the harddisk you manage folders and store files in them. In the CMS you also manage folders - but now you store content items in them - indifferently of the content type.

The first challenge is how to handle user contributed content since normal users don't have access to the administrative folder system. Now remember that the core Content system allows anyone (with the right permissions) to add content, but where should it be stored? I suggest a standard "incoming" folder is created for this purpose (much like your mail system). The editors can then keep an eye on this folder and move new content to the right folders.

Actually there should be one "incoming" folder for each content type and it should be possible to specify which it is. In addition to this the system should have a flexible workflow system a'la Pagesetter (now already in the .8 core). So that different editors and authors and admins can be notified when new submissions arrive.

[b]Content Structure[/b]
But there's still not much difference from Pagesetter. So what's the point? Well, enter CoType - this little module, which I'm rather proud of, has some nice layout features that I would like to copy. First of all you have Boxes - elements that can be floated left/right/top/bottom relative to the current content. In CoType you have boxes for media items, program examples, and general text. I would like to extend this so that you can put any content item inside a box. So you can display and Article and put one or more Media type items in boxes as illustrations.

Another thing to copy from CoType is the use of nested content - sections in sections. This concept should be extended, just like the boxes, with the ability nest any content item inside another item. The only problem here is how nested content should be displayed? In CoType you always have sections in sections (in a document) - and there's a well defined standard way to display this. But what happens if you sudden nest a Music album inside a FAQ inside a Media item ... and then box it? Well, that will have to be solved as we go.

I suggest the Content Type configuration lets the admin specify which types of content you can nest inside another.

The system could also enable boxing of other modules contents - assuming some kind of API/interface the external modules have to implement (just like PostNuke's search API).

[b]Content Layout[/b]
The proposed layout scheme is so far rather fixed - something like this:

- Top content item title is displayed inside ... tags.
- Nested content title is displayed in ... (and so on for further nesting).
- All nested content is displayed on one page.
- A small table-of-content is displayed at the top (linking to sub-content anchors).
- Each (nested) content item is displayed with a standard auto-generated template.
- Boxes floated to the left/right are displayed in 50% width (like CoType)
- Top/bottom boxes are displayed in 100% width (like CoType)

This will allow newbies to quick and easy created new content without having to also design their own templates. Assuming of course that the system comes with a suitable default set of content items.

Experienced users can edit and change the auto-generated templates. But these will be recreated everytime the administrator changes the Content Type configuration. So experienced users must copy the templates to another location and then edit them to fit their own needs.

[b]Navigation[/b]
So far I have ignored the concept of navigation between different content items completely. This is because it can be done in so many different ways - and this is mostly where the different types of PostNuke modules distinguish themselves. A media gallery has a completely different navigation paradigme than a News list, a Wiki and a Weblink collection.

So I propose to delegate navigation to other modules. This has already been done with success with a calendar (pgcalendar) and a news archive (pgarchive) for Pagesetter. These two modules takes a specific Content Type and displays it's items a calendar view and a monthly listing view. This combination is extremely strong - you can add all the fields you want on a Calendar item - and still display it using the standard calendar view. Throw in the nested content and the boxing ability and you get an extremely flexible and yet simple Content Management System.

[b]List Navigation[/b]
The basic navigation is simple a pageable list of items ordered by some criteria. You create different lists and then refer these in the URL. For each list you configure which content type(s) to include, the default sorting order, the display template to use for each item - probably more. Including more than one content type gives some problem with respect to sorting.

This implements the typical News list on the frontpage.

[b]Catalog Navigation (collections)[/b]
This is the typical Weblink and File Up/Download navigation through a collection. The hierarchy is mirrored directly from the content folders.

[b]Calendar Navigation[/b]
Displays content items by date in a calendar (see for instance [url=http://www.fgc.dk/index.php?module=pgcalendar&tid=40]http://www.fgc.dk/index.php?module=pgcalendar&tid=40[/url]). You need to specify which date fields to use as start/end date of the entries.

[b]Archive Navigation[/b]
Displays content in lists organized by month (see for instance [url=http://www.fjeldgruppen.dk/arkiv.html]http://www.fjeldgruppen.dk/arkiv.html[/url]).

[b]Menu Navigation[/b]
On thing that frustrates me with PostNuke is the horrible way you edit menus through the Block interface. No - lets allocate a complete module for menu editing and then just select which menu to display in which box (I believe Content Express does this). With the integrated content framework you can now let the editor select content items from dropdown lists or similar - and avoid having to copy/paste raw URLs into the menu editor (this has always been a intellectual bottleneck for the people I have created websites for).

I would also like to see editing of the menu directly in the front-end. The editor should always have an "add current page to menu" icon in the menu. He should also be able to drag and drop menu items without having to jump to the admin interface.

[b]Frontpage Setup[/b]
This is just another idea of what you can do - not necessarily something to actually implement. But the frontpage need not necessarily be a list of latest items as on most portal websites. It might also be a fixed setup based on a grid where you can assign different content items to different locations. For instance Articles to the left, Banners to the right, and a few images at the bottom.


[b]Where to go now?[/b]
Now who's going to implement all this? Good question considering the speed of the core development. I would love to be on the team (and will be) but my time is restricted (especially now that I got my first kid) so I work rather slowly.

Any volunteers?

There's also the question of organizing the code - we cannot have much more than one or maybe two developers on the core Content module. But as soon as that is ready we can take more people in - one for each kind of navigational scheme. Other people can then work on the default content types.

We also need to consider how a system like this fits into the PostNuke distribution. Does it have it's own release cycle? Is it integrated with the core?

Enjoy 8-)

/Jørn[/quote]

Generated on September 4, 2007.

PostNuke Recovery Console - Additional Feature Requests   (News)

then perform any repair operations by visiting the file in your browser and following the onscreen instructions, same as the PSAK.

One major improvement over the PSAK is that the Recovery Console has a countdown timer built into it which will only allow the application to be used for xyz amount of time, after which the file automatically locks out further access to the code therein. A realtime graphical timer (Javascript-based) visually shows you how much time you have left to use the Recovery Console. (The Javascript is purely for display purposes, and not relied upon for security.) As the PostNuke system does not make any checks for this Recovery Console, it could easily be left on one's server accidentally and thus, misused. To this end, the lockdown feature might be of some comfort.

A few other items of interest about the Recovery Console:
Aesthetic, CSS-based layout. Nothing hacky, very straight-forward classes.
Consistent navigation.
Fixes that require database, when no database present, are visually disabled for clarity.
Each utility shows the current status of what it's about to fix, before it fixes it, and after.
Inline explanatory texts help you make the proper fixes.
Overview of recovery-related site settings.
Informational page about the application.
Status messages tell you exactly what's going on.
Large countdown timer lets you know how long you have left to use the application.
Self-contained.
Works with PostNuke .8+ (including MS2+)
Highly accessible.

Specific fixes onboard at this time mirror those of the PSAK:
Encode Database Credentials
Toggle Intranet/Internet Usage
Broken Theme Recovery
Permissions Recovery
Disabled Site Recovery / Turning Site Back On
Modules module Recovery

The code is written so that other fixes can easily be added and thus, if you have any suggestions for other utilities to incorporate into the PostNuke Recovery Console, please share them! I'm at a point where I am commenting the file now, and that will take me a least a week more to finalize I suspect, so please post any ideas for fixes you'd like to see and I'll try to get them in for the first release.

Note that this application can be downloaded from here at the NOC, but that it will take a week or 10 days for me to get the first release uploaded.

Cheers,

- Ala

Generated on April 20, 2007.

Development Update, March 2007   (News)

Dot 8 evolving: language files progression and legacy functionality
Thanks to the testing of the community users (yes, YOU!), some legacy functions (residing in /includes/legacy/ have been updated by Simon to solve some bugs. This is another proof that we do need everyone to test the releases and help not only yourself to make this release a success! The following files have also been marked 'deprecated', with an accompanying comment in the DocBlock: admin.php, backend.php, banners.php, error.php, modules.php, print.php and user.php. These files shall be removed in the next (post-dot8) major release.
The overhaul of language files has also applied to the Groups, Theme, Users and Profile modules. These modules now have better multilingual options and (by using the pnML function), making it a lot easier to translate the package and showing better logic in grammar for localisations. Furthermore, lots of open bugs have been solved and the templates have been revised also. For example, the emails sent by the Users module can now be adjusted by just editing a template!
David Nelson has offered to completely review the language files for dot8, and we all have to thank Olaf Fichtner for helping revamp the current language constants. The PostNuke Languages Project is actively following the development!
Important change in the language strings is the use of the _CREATEDBY / _CREATEDON and the _UPDATEDBY / _UPDATEDON constants. For better support in other languages, these are replaced by the following:

'_CREATEDBY', 'Created by %username%'
'_CREATEDON', 'Created on %date%'
'_CREATEDBYON', 'Created by %username% on %date%'
'_UPDATEDBY', 'Last updated by %username%'
'_UPDATEDON', 'Updated on %date%'
'_UPDATEDBYON', 'Last updated by %username% on %date%'

and can now be accessed through the normal pnml plugin in the templates.

System modules: pnForm and PageLock
Jørn has moved the pnForm framework to it's own module location within the system directory. Major reason for this is to properly save some pnForm specific javascript and style files. Usage of the module should be quite the same. In addition, some new context menu plugins have been added. These plugins create a popup menu to be used as a right-click context menu. More information can be found in the added files in the pnForm plugin directory, and at the pnForm Wiki Pages.
Also introduced by Jørn is a new system module. The PageLock module is a module that helps enforcing single user access to a specific page, by blocking access to other users when one has it open.
Example: User A opens article X for editing. This is registered on the server. User B tries to open article X for editing too. But as soon as the article editing window is opened, it is overlayed with a transparent dark film and a box in the middle tells the user "Sorry this page has been locked by user A - please wait or come back later".
Functionality: The lock is maintained by an Ajax plugin that keeps pinging the server as long as user A keeps the editing page open. When user A closes the window then the pinging stops and the lock times out. If user B chooses to wait then his page keeps pinging the server for the release of the lock (also Ajax) - and when that happens he gains access to the page. The module can be used on all pages that edites a single item - articles, user data, news items, book pages, permissions settings - you name it.
To use this system, a module author has to use API calls in their own code for adding or releasing a block: pnModAPIFunc('PageLock', 'user', 'pageLock', ...) and pnModAPIFunc('PageLock', 'user', 'releaseLock', ...). To see al this in action, grab the latest nightly snapshot and play around with the HowtoPnForm module: edit a recipe in one browser, and try to edit the same in another browser.

ValueAddons modules: Members_List and EZComments
The Members_List module has been revised by Mark West, with some added configuration options. It is now possible to set the number of (allowed) registered users, and some new blocks (featured user last seen and last x users) have been added. Check out the latest nightly build to see the functionality and options.
Mark has now finished the integration of categories into the user side of the Reviews, Pages, FAQ and News modules. This way, migration of .7x categories into the new Categories module is now supported and can be tested by our users who want to upgrade their .7 site to .8.
Finally, there have been added configuration options for categorization and category titles in the permalinks with these modules.
One hot issue at the moment is the increasing amount of spam that is on lots of websites at this moment. More and more features are to be found on the internet to prevent spam showing on your site. Akismet / Bad Behaviour are one of these. As some already know, Akismet has been applied in EZCommnents for a while. For testing purposes, Mark has implemented a bad behaviour (http://www.bad-behavior.ioerror.us/) function also for testing purposes (as Steffen has found that this could also be a good application). It does need some code hacking to pnApi.php at this moment, so only advanmced users willing to help integreating this feature are invited to test this and report any iussues to the EZComments tracker at the EZComments NOC project page.

Core and API: ThemeUtil and Categories
The pnTheme system has now been converted to the ThemeUtil class. With this conversion, all occurences in the core were updated too. Both the old and the new file are loaded in pnInit for backwards compatibility, but the old file (onTheme) and its functions are now marked as 'deprecated' and will be removed in the next major release.
Also added to the new ThemeUtil is a getModuleStylesheet method which contains the logic from the modulestylesheet plugin. You can do PageUtil::addVar('stylesheet', ThemeUtil::getModuleStylesheet('modulename')) to include the value of pnModGetVar('modulename', 'modulestylesheet') or style.css (in this order) or PageUtil::addVar('stylesheet', ThemeUtil::getModuleStylesheet('modulename', 'special.css)) to include the special.css file in your rendered page.
While unnecessary for correct functioning of the website, one is now allowed to turn off session regeneration completely. This is added because it may be helpful with a couple of undecided bugs in the tracker at the moment.

Module Development: information for 3rd party Devs!
Axel introduced a very nice application called EasyDist. This allows you to create your own PostNuke package easily. You can find it at modulestudio.de. It is still in a very early stage, but you should get the idea. This is all still in development fase and is just for testing purposes at this moment.
A preliminary for the (automatic) creation of packages using EasyDist is that module authors package their modules in a standard way. Right now, there are different file structures in the ZIPs or TGZs the authors distribute. We came to the conclusion that the preferred file structure inside the archive should be - modules - MyModule - pnuser.php etc so that an unpacked archive could be copied inside the pnroot. More information is in t

Generated on March 21, 2007.

Development Update, February 2007-02   (News)

release, and some is part of the current nightly build from SVN. The items that are part of the MS3 package are indicated with a (*).

Installer and upgrade path
The installer for .8 now also checks for a web-user writable pnTemp directory. Before, only it's subdirectories had to be writable. However, more and more modules need a (temporary) writable directory of their own (for example cache directories for image creation or rss feeds). With a writable pnTemp, these modules are now easily allowed to create that directory themselves if it does not exist. (*)
The upgrade path from the historic .7 family has been updated: Some code has been added to migrate blocks placements into the new block_placements table. (*)
Furthermore, old style (legacy) blocks can now be stored in the /config/blocks directory. The specific files do need to be copied manually from the old /includes/blocks directory to it's new location. (*)

Core (API) and environment variables
In the core pnAPI, get_magic_quotes_runtime() was called lots of times for different purposes. With an internal caching method, the result is stored in the global PNRuntime array. Big advantage is that the site's speed has been significantly improved. (*)
Robert has added an enhancement to allow the pnSessionGet/Set/DelVar functions to accept an (optional) path argument (arguments 'autocreate' and 'overwriteExistingVar'). This will allow for easy setting of complex array structures. The change only adds extra arguments to the existing functions and are backwards compatible. At this moment, no direct usage has been committed yet.

PostNuke Object library
At this stage of development, a lot of changes are (and have been) made to the object library. Most of them are 'simple' bug fixes, but some changes are worth mentioning here (additional functionality or changed methods).
In the DBUtil class, there now exists a new method to increment a field with the function incrementObjectFieldByID. This can be used by module authors for updating read counts of content items for example. (*)
Additionally, the function selectScalar has been added (which takes a SQL quesry as argument). This is mostly useful for places where you want to do a "select count(*)" or similar scalar selection.
The utf8 conversion functions (convertFromUTF8 and convertToUTF8) have moved from AjaxUtil to DataUtil when solving a bug to keep the users input in Ajax driven fields as they are intended.
While solving a Google AdSense script bug, where the script tags were automatically cleaned by the safeHTL output filter, a new feature has been added to FormUtil: Before cleaning posted input on an already installed site, the FormUtil now checks if the current user has overall admin permissions. This allows site admins to input potentially harmful tags (javascript for example), but it's their site after all!
Jörn has improved CSS style handling in pnForm plugins, as he has changed some pnForm classes to be derived from pnFormStyledPlugin, which in itself is derived from the original pnFormPlugin.
Because it's better to read the languages directory first for available languages and compare that result against the full list of languages in stead of the other way around, the LanguageUtil has a new function getInstalledLanguages. This now significantly reduces the number of directory checks.
To ensure that most commonly used plugins are found as early as possible, the order in the pnRender class, where the system is searching for plugins, has been modified. The current correct order for the 0.8 distribution is:

system/pnRender/plugins
system/Theme/plugins
config/plugins
current theme-directory/templates/modules/$module/plugins
current theme-directory/plugins
current module-directory/pntemplates/plugins

Furthermore, two new variables can be added to the rendered output page using the PageUtil class. First is 'description', which is default set to the current site slogan. Second is 'footer', with the ability to add custom content just prior to the closing body tag. The latter function is applied as an outputfilter.
Finally, an additional parameter 'display' is added to the pager plugin, which can be set to either 'page' or 'offset'. This is (why am I explaning, isn't this rather self-explanatory?) to allow paging by pages, rather than offsets. It also mirrors the 'show' parameter that exists in many templates (based on the example module) but was never actually implemented.
Last but not least, the Theme class has now added support for a filters section in a page configuration file. This allows for loading of, in the first instance, custom output filters. Note there is no user interface to the functionality the moment.And, why not, the Atom theme has been updated to Atom 1.0

Module modifications
The following modules have been updated for improved .8 compatibility, or just to make administering those modules easier.
The User module now has the long awaited alpha pager for browsing users. (*)
All occurences of the block rendering APIs (read by the Blocks module) have changed from the old style call "return themesideblock" to "return pnBlockThemeBlock". (*)
To the Settings module there has been added a configurable separator for permalinks (*)Furthermore, a switch to globally disable JS Quicktags (which adds a set of buttons for common html tags to enabled textareas) is now part of the Settings module. (*)
Both the Ratings and the Multisites module are modified to meet the new standards of coding and templating. Work still needs to be done to both modules, so testing functionality for these modules may not be that worthwhile as yet. (*)
The Theme module takes over from the Xanthia module in an upgrade. This doesn't mean that it is not Xanthia anymore: it still is actually the Xanthia 3.0 engine (*).
To the Recommend_Us module a display hook has been added. This will add a list of social bookmark links, like the Diggers plugin also does.

Language files overhaul
The language defines in some modules have been reviewed and adjusted to the naming conventions of .8 (see also Dev Update 2006-06). This means that module-specific language defines start with a module-name specific prefix. Additionally, some new general language strings (using the pnML function) have been added to the core language file. The major effect this will have is to subtantially reduce the number of strings that need translating.These changes are applied to the following system modules: Admin, Admin_Messages, AuthPN, Blocks, Mailer, legal, Settings and SysInfo. ValueAddons modules will follow later.

PostgreSQL DBMS testers wanted
The .8 DBUtil class, as mentioned many times before, makes it possible to run PostNuke on different DBMS platforms, like PostgreSQL,

Generated on February 20, 2007.

Development Update, October 2006-04   (News)

PostNuke and the aim regarding ValueAddons
There have been a lot of discussion about what release structure there will be in any future versions of PostNuke. Let us clarify this a bit.
As soon as the core codebase of PostNuke .8 is stable, it will be released as a core application framework, from which advanced users can create their own custom module set. Also available will be a package containing basic content modules, a simple page manager (Pages) and an News article manager.
Eventually, the aim is to build different distributions for different purposes. A good example of a (very very) extended .76x package is the current OpenStar distribution.
At this moment, there exist a few modules in the ValueAddons repository that have third party equivalents with improvements and better functionality than the historic ones. And even more important, these module developers have taken good thought about importing historic data from the original modules, so this does not mean you lose any when deciding to switch to an other module. Some examples are Downloads 2.0 to replace Downloads, MultiHook to replace AutoLinks, pnMessages to replace Messages and Advanced_Polls to replace Polls.
Maintenance of the 'old' ValueAddons modules is a lot of extra work for the core development team, which will not only delay any future releases of the core framework, but also increases the timeframe for functionality and feature improvements in these modules. So, the less there is to maintain for the core development team, the better they can work on security, stability and finetuning the core framework codebase.
We to make clear that adoption of old-style modules is encouraged! Please remember that there do not (and will not) exist 'official' ValueAddons modules. While we'd urge all third party developers to maintain high standards in their code (pnAPI compliancy, using hooks for better integration of existing functionality), this can't be enforced.

Secunia's vulnerability advisory on the core Downloads module
Secunia anounced a flaw which has status 'less critical'. The ability to exploit this flaw is limited, since it can only be exploited by administrative users: specifically, you need admin permissions to the downloads module . A new release for the 0.7x codebase is planned for next week, together with some other bug fixes. People who want to patch earlier can download modules/Downloads/admin.php from the SubVersion repository and replace their existing file.

Legal module
The German PostNuke community has hired a lawyer to update the German terms of use, because translations into foreign languages of the original legal module only work on a linguistic basis (and if at all they only apply to US-American laws). In some countries, maybe it is even better to not at all use the legals module, than to apply one that doesn't fit your country's laws. Every user should keep this in mind when using or activating this module for his / her site.

Sneak preview: Wendell's Admin theme
Wendell is currently working on a design for the PN Admin area. This is a first setup to make the administration interface much more user friendly and productive.

Code update for .8 Installation
Do you have a personal_config.php included in your installation of .8? That could be the reason for an MS2 installation problem. If you are having problems installing, try removing this file. Furthermore, lots of enhancements have been made to the installer routine. One can test it by pulling the latest nightly builds.

System Changes / Updates
In the Settings module, a link to the w3school page on each allowable HTML tag has been added to inform a user about the available tags.
The Modules module now shows a (more logical) indicator of a module's status: not initialised is red; installed but inactive is yellow; installed and good to go is green.
In the pnRender plugins, some additions and changes have been committed: The pnbutton plugin now utilises the button tag, and a suitable style for the button tag was added. On can add parameters like id, class, name and value. Furthermore, the date input validation was refactured, moving the parser into the DateUtil class. All pnForm* plugins have been reviewed and optimized by Jörn.
More information on the PostNuke Forms Framework can be found in the Wiki.

Miscellanious updates
Within the complete codebase, all occurences of extract($args) will be (or already have been) removed and replaced it with $args['myvar']. The reason for this change is that you should not use variables that are not expected within the function. We encourage module developers to not use extract also.
Error handling and Status reporting has been improved to also display module, file and line information depending on permission l

Generated on October 10, 2006.

Development Update, September 2006-03   (News)

From the team
Mark West has been moving house recently. Since Mark usually takes holidays just after each new release, some of the devs thought this was just a new kind of "holiday" he was taking before new releases. This is now confirmed :) but this type of holidays comes with far more debt than the other type and isn't anywhere near as much fun. However, the joy of a new home came with consequences: no proper internet connection at home... But, Mark is not the only one moving. Also Wendell, Frank and Vanessa have moved or will move in 2006.
Another milestone has been reached: On September 7, 2006 (10:25:52), Mark committed revision 20000 to the repository. A celebration and big party still needs to be organised.

PostNuke.eu
For about a month, the domain name postnuke.eu is in hands of the German PostNuke foundation. This domain and the accompanied website aims to be an informative portal with information in several languages, and links to the various communities. This a call for translations and links, you can send them to pnteam (at) pn-cms (dot) de.

Status on release(s)
Read this article now, as this one is probably moving a bit downwards on the portal page quite soon. MS2 is scheduled for release by the end of the week, and if this is announced, nobody will be interested anymore in this article... So read on now, while you can! :)

Date Format change
Discussed in the team, and committed to the repository, is a better structured way of date formatting and display. First, the date formatting in the DateUtil class was changed. Default formatting is the same as before, but it is now generated using strftime() instead of date(). Furthermore, the behaviour of the smarty modifier has been changed: Instead of defaulting to Y-M-D format, it now defaults to the language constant _DATEBRIEF which is like "Sep 29, 2006" in english. Finally, both smarty plugins "pndate_format" (modifier) and "dateformat" (function) are now using DateUtil::formatDatetime. This makes both plugins consistent.
Module authors are encouraged to use the DateUtil functions in their modules, and the smarty plugins in their templates.

Categories, plugins and core system changes
On the categories system, the mainCat parameter has been renamed to a more common rootCat parameter. To summarize all the commits last weeks by Robert Gash and some team members, the categories integration code has been finalized for testing and the Quotes module serves as the categories example (and has been configured to allow multi-categorization). One item can belong to more than 1 category.
The footer meassage (see

Generated on September 28, 2006.

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