What will be Joomla 1.5's killer app?
Mar 25 2008 - Tagged in: joomla 1.5 , joomla 1.0 , components
You may have visited one of the other popular blogs about Joomla at alledia.com. It's written by a fellow Brit living in the US, Steve Burge (he is going to be a fellow instructor at the upcoming Joomla University in Chicago). He recently wrote a post phpBB3 Integration Can Be The Joomla 1.5 Killer App. As we often seem to do, he scooped me on a post I had started to write about the exact same topic, thinking about what Joomla 1.5's Killer "must have" application might be.
I think I might offer some different answers than his thoughts about forums though.
Joomla 1.0's Killer App
To consider this, we can check out the Joomla extensions site and some of the ranking used:
Bearing in mind our working definition of Killer App: "a killer app is an application so compelling that someone will buy the hardware or software components necessary to run it".
Looking through this list, and adding my own experiences, I'd say that the Killer App of Joomla 1.0 might have been any of:
- VirtueMart (a shopping cart)
- Community Builder (a user/community/networking app)
- Fireboard (a forum)
- Docman
- Mosets
Joomla 1.5's Killer App
So as we dust off our crystal ball, what lies ahead for Joomla? There are 1.5 versions of all the 5 extensions listed above. They either have beta versions available for use, or soon will have. The new version of Virtuemart looks especially interesting.
But recently, I have come across another really interesting extension. I found it so intriguing that I am using it on compassdesigns.net for my downloads. It's JoomSuite Content.
I recall a presentation I attended a couple of years ago where the designers of the Porsche Brazil site (it uses Joomla) described how they had to create a custom component to create content. They wanted to lock in content editors into a very specific format.
JoomSuite Content seems quite revolutionary. It allows you to define fields and formats of a content item. You can use it to create specific content articles in a rigid format (like Porsche), or a download manager (like I did), or a directory like Mosets, or a blog like MyBlog. The opportunities seem endless.
Its still in beta, and has some bugs, but I think that if the developer can release a robust and reliable well documented extension that does all these, it must just be Joomla 1.5's killer app.
I am not sure that a forum will be the Killer App of Joomla 1.5, what do you think?
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Paul
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... I think Joomsuite content may well be the way forward, after having a look at it, its very impressive. But I do have one worry and thats its licence, according to their FAQ's it sounds like they are disagreeing with the core joomla team on the whole GPL thing, and so its commercial and encrypted. If the component becomes the success we both think it might, do you think trouble could be brewing as and when more people start wanting to use it!! I definitely think its one to watch. Paul |
Administrator
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... Not to go off topic, but I think he is in the majority. All these guys also disagree with the core team. |
Paul
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... Yeah and I dont want to get into the rights and wrongs. I know of who does and doesnt agree, my point was about it being the next big thing and IF it becomes the next big thing then someone may well make a point of it being non GPL and 'report' it. The issue is still clear as mud to a lot of people and I think it wont be resolved until someone pushes it probably to be sorted out legally. If this is the next big thing, it may well be this one that gets the treatment. Then again who knows  Back to the component, the more I look at it the more I wonder. Its a fantastic component, but I notice the licence is yearly. I cant find what happens to the content if you dont renew the licence, what happens if prices rise, as they will when its out of beta. Whats a 'commercial' licence which is mentioned on the site for people who buy it whilst in Beta. Can you imagine a charity site using it for their news, then finding in a few years its too expensive to buy because the price has gone up, so they are unable to use it any further, what sort of impact that might have. Great product but for me, it needs a little more information/transparency before I think its the next big thing, but i agree when this information is available and im sure it will be then, its going to be killer. |
unleash.it
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... Saw this and I just had to write. Yes, I totally agree that at least the idea behind what JoomSuite Content provides can be a mini-revolution for Joomla...only I don't believe it will happen in the form of a 3rd party commercial component. It needs to be implemented in the core. Before I came across your article, I posted a White Paper at the Joomla forum that requests the ability to add custom fields/content types. I've always thought they would be a great addition, and I was further inspired by JoomSuite Content. The problem with JoomSuite as the above poster mentions, is the high cost of each license. A developer must purchase a separate license for every site (there are no unlimited site licenses available), which gets quite expensive and probably out of reach for the average open source developer. The other issue almost more important, is going to be compatibility with other 3rd party extensions. Will it work with an SEF extension for example? Anyways if anyone wants to support the idea of building this type of functionality right into Joomla, why not go to the whitepaper forum and place a comment there. They're in the process of shuffling things, but for now the link to my white paper is: http://forum.joomla.org/viewto...0&t=278577 |
sergeysergey
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... Let me clarify regarding License policy for JoomSuite Content 1.After purchase customer gets lifetime license key and one year support and updated download. After year finish one can continue to use component free for as long as possible 2.Price will be 79EUR as shown on payment button and will rise only with EUR inflation. About 1-2% year. 3.Price may become lower if component get popular down to 29EUR a license if sales reaches big amount. To earn money is not main aim of our project. We strive to make our products afortable and make price as less as possible to have enough funds to continue develop and support our customers. 4.JoomSuite content will have good API and number of events triggers. So 3dp could write plug-ins easily Please, contact me if you have more questions and worries. |
sergeysergey
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... @unleash.it Commercial components do not violate GPL. Joomla claim that they do but they don't. Many people believe that Commercial components for Joomla it is Violation because it is convenient and seems profitable. Just imagine everything for free! Isn't that sounds sweet? But I should tell you I would never create JoomSuite Content if components would be GPL and I believe no one can do that. I invested $20,000.00 USD in to this component. 3 Developers was working on it 6 month and continue. Not only that. If you use it (for free now) we do support as you would pay for it. 2 dedicated people will try to help you to solve every issue you have and will stay with you until component works as you expected. Do you believe any GPL project can offer you this? I think that to get $20,000.00 worth component for 39EUR is almost free. I am greatly apologize if I hurt you in any case by any word of this message. This is only what I am strongly believe to. |
unleash.it
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... Dear Sergeysergey, Lets clarify a few things here. First of all, I'm not the slightest bit hurt by anything you said or really any of this.  But I didn't start the discussion about being for or against commercial. I myself am not really against having commercial commonents in Joomla. However, I don't agree on your views that free is bad or impossible, or even your definition of what free is. Wait a second, isn't Joomla itself...a "component" that took bazillions of man-hours, free (they say "as in beer")? The GPL is a actually a very intelligent system. Within it's boundaries, it's actually very possible to make money (heck of course we need to do that!) for them, for you, or anyone who tries. Yet it encourages something beautiful that ordinary capitalism completely neglects. That is the spirit of giving and trading. Some people may just take from the GPL, but don't forget the numurous others who give a ton back. There are some developers who don't understand or who disagree with this. Joomla did made a final decision on this, but at least in my mind it may be a bit stern. After all, I'm a designer/developer who is allowed to charge money...but not you? Honestly I think it's complicated and don't know exactly what they should do. But having commercial 3rd party developers turn Joomla into another capitolistic beast IS a real concern. I simply think there should be some balance. There you go...my 2 cents on the GPL. As far as my suggestion to add this type of function into the core being out of reach...I will have to respectfully disagree. Drupal basically has it in the form of CCK...for free. The Joomla developers as they state are willing to make some big changes (that's why they created the White Paper idea) and they will recieve lots of volunteer help, including from myself in way that I'm able. Again, Joomla wasn't created over night and it's a free system that works for a lot of people. Lastly, I just want to make sure you're not be misleading by saying: 1.After purchase customer gets lifetime license key and one year support and updated download. After year finish one can continue to use component free for as long as possible Does this mean for UNLIMITED websites, or just one website. I think it means just one, and in that case...nothing I said was off base. That is what I was calling beyond of the reach of many Joomla users. By the way, it's not that I want your business to suffer. It's just that the features you offer (probably in a more refined way) happen to be basic to, in at least my opinion, what should be offered in the core of Joomla. Perhaps you can find a way to work with them that benefits everyone? |
Administrator
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... Hi Guys, Please keep on topic (killer apps) and not start on GPL merits here If you *do* want to revisit that discussion, feel free to comment on any of these. |
casey
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... I think jxtended (zine) will rule them all. I had the opportunity to work with it on a client site and was blown away. fwiw - they will be operating under the service model in compliance with the GPL so I think it's safe to say when it comes out that it will be the most "killer" app we've seen yet. |
stell
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... This is very interesting. We are using a Component we made called bContent. It is very similar to JoomSuite Content. I think the main difference is that bContent uses Standard Joomla Content Architecture and no proprietary stuff. All the special fields are plugins which can be extended and frontend presentation is based on templates. Simply said it stacks a lot extra stuff on top of Joomla standard Content. We are porting it to J1.5 atm. There are also some Screencasts allready, but there are in german. The last project we did based on bContent was www.kinotraum.de. If someone is interested i can do a english screencast soon. |
jim
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... @ stell / casey: Care to share where to learn more about jxtended (www.jxtended.com is currently a placeholder) or bContent (if it is made avail. to others?) Thanks! |
Krishnan Unni
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... Interesting discussion. Joomsuite Content, in my humble opinion has the potential to be the killer app for Joomla. There are many reasons for this and you'd know some of these, if you have some knowledge of Drupal and it's Content Construction Kit, feature. Joomsuite Content is the closest thing that comes to offering the versatility of CCK in Joomla. Drupal's CCK has the ability to create different types of Content in your CMS. For eg, you may want a recipe content type, a photogallery content type, a blog content type, etc in your site. Through the CCK features, you can create the forms and structure needed for each of these content types. And then using other modules such as Views and Contemplate [all Drupal], you can shape the content's display and style. In Joomla on the other hand, content structure is rigid. if you want a gallery, you have to use a gallery component. If you want a recipe, you need a recipe component, and so on for each content type you want on the site. That is Joomla does not natively support, through any mechanism, creation of different content types. This is where the real power of something like Joomsuite Content is apparent. Using it, you can create different types of content, without the help of components. The number of content types is limited by your imagination only. When I read about Sergey's creation at Joomsuite, I was extremely happy that such a feature was now available in Joomla too. It is the CCK equivalent Views equivalent module that Drupal users are already using. The other big thing that Joomsuite does is that it makes the site creator really think about the different content types and their styling upfront. This is the way it happens in Drupal, but it is different from the normal Joomla way of thinking where the mindset is geared to searching for extensions/ plugins which do the job of different content types best. The last reason is that once Joomsuite gets popular, the versatility of the component should put a whole bunch of plugins out of business. I have not really used Joomsuite on any site yet, but I like the direction it's going in. I have used CCK and Drupal and Joomla for years now. Just my 2 cents worth. Unni |
sergeysergey
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... Thank you Unni, I have never used Drupal and I did not oriented on it when developed Content. I based on our many year experience of building live Joomla based projects and knowledges of what customer really need to be done, and what tool would solve 80% of problems. To be true we did not developed it just another component for sale. We developed it for our selfs and happy to share. I believe that when Content become more popular component there will be a lot of 3dp plugins and modules for this component which will make it even more attractive.  |
unleash.it
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... Umi, don't forget...CCK doesn't cost Drupal users because it isn't a commercial extension. Some it it is now even built into the core: http://drupal.org/project/cck. On the other hand Joomsuite Content costs 79 euros per site. That's $125 PER SITE ladies and gentlemen! Not cheap for just an add-on. For myself, I'd pay that (possibly even a bit more) if it was for a lifetime developer's license. But never per site, especially since its going to severely limit what other extensions you can use with it. I think we all agree that the custom fields can add a lot to Joomla. All of the suggested extensions seem promising, but all of them are extensions and will limit you in the end when it comes to living with other important extensions. Joomsuite Content overrides Joomla's com_content component which is a pretty big deal. If you see my point, why not go over to the white paper board to show your support for adding it to the core. It may or may not go into 1.6, but it will be on their mind if enough people write about it. |
Krishnan Unni
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... Unleash it... point noted. From what I can see Joomsuite is currently priced at 39 Euro. If it becomes a popular tool, you can bet that a whole bunch of folks are going to come up with an extension like this, or even improve on it. So my worry was not the current costs, as much as what such a trend promises for Joomla. It would be ideal to have CCK like functionality in the the Joomla Core itself and I shall head over to the white paper forum to lend more muscle to the idea:-) Thank you unleash it and thank you Sergey. Unni |
HansNL
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... On Joomla.org I saw an Editor's note stating that one needs "ionCube PHP Encoder". On the Joomsuite website no mention of it is made, or any way the search function didn't come up with something. This seems an extra price tag, isn't it? Any Comments, please? Cheers, HansNL |
unleash.it
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... Yes, you'll need ioncube installed for it to work. You should be fine with most shared hosts, but you might want to check with them first. If you want to test it locally like I did, it's free to download but you have to install it on your server. Unni, I think you pretty much have the right idea. It may take some time before people see the value in this. Right now it looks like Joomla's not really interested in it seeing that my white paper hasn't even made it to the up for consideration forum. Or it may also be that Jextended (coincidentally by Andrew Edie, the whitepaper moderator) is the plan for this. This could be a good thing, we'll see. |
Krishnan Unni
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... Unleash.it, I think many of the developers on the Joomla Core are torn between what they should do for free vs what they should develop and sell commercially, GPL or otherwise. There is nothing morally right or wrong about this. Programmers too have to earn a living. It is an individual's choice finally and the market will decide who succeeds and who doesn't. The moot thing here is that in the Drupal community, the Core seems to be much more evolved and mature than in Joomla. This too shall pass:-) Unni |
unleash.it
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... Yes I completely agree that they deserve to make money. And I believe the extension system can be a good way to do it, as not everyone needs every type of functionality. Charging for them isn't something I have an issue with, and I have no problem paying for something that's useful. However, a problem arises when it gets in the way of the evolution of the CMS as a whole. I believe more thought/planning is needed in this area. Extensions that override large parts of the CMS (like the section/category/article system...even if it isn't a great one) are almost like creating new forks of Joomla that need to be maintained separately. Besides the incompatibility and updating hassles, you wind up with an unprofessional, useless bunch of menus in the back end that you have to explain to your non-technical clients (the users of the CMS). If you have to spend huge amounts of time patching your CMS together and figuring out what works and what doesn't...you might as well invest in a real professional system. Then again with really clean tools like Wordpress and Magento coming out, the future looks bright for open source. That said and done, Joomla! ain't perfect, but I still love it. I can see that their priorities are not really that of the end user, but compared to the alternatives for a mom and pop site designer...it's the best there is right now. Plus there's always that bonus entrainment value of watching the drama and politics... |
Taras Mankovski
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... I found this post then I googled for CCK for Joomla. I've been working on a component that would do what CCK does for Joomla. I finished it a few days ago. It's very raw, but it works. Right now all content definition is done in a file and you need to create a copy of a view directory to apply unique style to custom content type, but it works. I'm going to release it open source and hopefully people in the community will help out. I'm creating demo sites and rebuilding oscandy.com with the new component. I call it JMC - Joomla Media Component If anyone interested in trying out the beta or giving me a hand, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks, Taras |
Krishnan Unni
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... Taras, this is very good news for the Joomla Community. I'd love to test the component and give you feedback on it. I have filled up the form on oscandy with my details. Let me know. Unni |
Taras Mankovski
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... Hey Unni, Can you please email me directly: tarasm@gmail.com If anyone else is interested in trying out the app email me directly. thanks, taras |
Jonathan Shroyer
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... Great discussion! We have a surprise coming VERY soon that will definitely rock the Joomla! 1.5 world. We here at corephp.com are putting the finishing touches on a new ACL component that DOES NOT HACK JOOMLA! It will have frontend and backend acl levels with the ability to give permissions by groups, individuals, etc. to content, modules and components. You will also be able to limit by url string which gives very fine control. As an added benefit we included a site sync so you can sync all users and acl between multiple sites. We are including a plug-in architecture so more features will be able to be added later. The next addition will be a subscription plug-in that will be able to control any access level. We are really looking forward to it since so many people have been asking for a solid ACL component, but since they all hack the core it makes upgrading risky at best. Oh... it also automatically ties into CB if you have it installed :-) As far as other killer releases... I am looking forward to the new Zoom Gallery, anything new with JCE, sh404 SEF, and I would love to see Extended Menu moved to 1.5 since I use it on all my sites. |
Taras Mankovski
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... Hey Jonathan Shroyer, You guys do great work ! Is it going to be open source? GPL? Commercial? If it's open source and free and I would like to integrate it with JMC. Taras |
Wade O
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... I would love to try this new app out I'm currently redoing the consumercowboy site in joomla 1.5. So far it has been great. this new app sounds very interesting. you can send me any info you may have at austinfd1@gmail and I will get back to you about trying this new CCK.. Thanks in advance to all the developers working on great modules and add ons for Joomla 1.5 |
Jonathan Shroyer
said:
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... Thanks for the compliment! We don't like to have day jobs, so we are releasing it as commercial. We do have some GPL stuff coming out as well. We have been growing so fast that it's hard to keep up with the products, but we keep pushing forward. Expect big things from us this year! |
Taras Mankovski
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... Hey Jonathan Shroyer, Can you please email me tarasm@gmail.com? Even it's commercial, there might be a benefit to promote your component, I would like to talk to you about that. Thanks, Taras |
Tom Bohacek (stell)
said:
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... I finaly managed to write a small Blog Entry about our custom content component called bContent (mentioned above). http://www.bohacek.de/b01-joom...ement.html There is also a feature tour where you can get a picture of what its all about. The only problem is, its i german. Maybe a site translator might help. |
sergeysergey
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... @Tom This topic is Joomla 1.5 killer not Joomla 1.0. Looking on your component it is Joomla 1.0 Native and maximum Joomla 1.5 Legacy. I mean it is good though looks little complicated, but completely different from JoomSuite Content. JoomSuite Content now have fields like plugins. That means anyone acn write any additional custom field, like for example docman latest. This field can show latest docman items in category chosen. Another Idea is to create Bill field that send user directly to bill page or what ever you can imagine. Yet it is 100% J! 1.5 native. Custom templates can be installed for list views and rating of articles. And much more. Looks like your bContent extend core content but JoomSuite Content replace core content. |
stell
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... I wrote in the article a 1.5 native version follows and as someone asked for a docu my post should be fine here. bContent is atm meant for advanced users, who want full controll over the content structure. Its not meant as a competition, you know  |
aravot
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... I had a look at JoomSuite content a while back, it rocks but it has one big disadvantage it is Encrypted, I hate encrypted extensions I won’t even consider them and joomsuite extensions fall under this category, however I would pay extra 100euro for unencrypted version. 1.After purchase customer gets lifetime license key and one year support and updated download. After year finish one can continue to use component free for as long as possible After a year how much update and support would cost? |
unleash.it
said:
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... Tom: killer article on the subject. Good work...even if I had to rely on Google Translator. Danke! I agree that extending as opposed to replacing com_content seems like the way to go for the reasons you mention. But one thing I didn't quite understand was your templating scheme. I would like to have the ability to completely customize the layout of fields and even interchange them with existing fields like author and created date. The Fireboard site does something like that: http://www.bestofjoomla.com/co...54/id,984/ Jxtended (Content/Magazine) uses template overrides which should allow this level of customization. However, Joomla modules (like most popular), 3rd parties, etc. are incompatible with it since it replaces com_content. I may be mistaken, but you may be limited to a single override (template) for your custom fields, as that is how standard Joomla functions. I've sure I've probably stated my opinion about licenses enough... I agree w/Aravot and the others. GPL is the Joomla way, like it or not. I'll pay for something good, but not $100 for each extension for each site. A reasonable multi-site license is needed. Also, since developers are the ones who will usually buy, don't you think they are going to want to tinker?? Yet thanks to Joomsuite for turning on the spotlight about this obvious need and to Barrie and Alledia for writing about it. Hopefully some of this good work will eventually make it into the Joomla core. Then you folks can focus on making/selling extensions for specialized uses rather than extensions that should be part of a basic CMS... |
Tom Bohacek
said:
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... @unleash.it I'm glad you liked it and hope I understood your question about Templating. As I wrote in the article there is no template customisation thru the backend possible atm. You can however customise the apperiance of every bField in the template. Every so called bTable needs its own template file. So you could create three bTables like "skin care", "fragrances" and "cosmetics" and map them to the joomla category "clothing". You can customise every template of each bTable like you whish. In the article it is described under "Frontend and Templates". There is also a good example if you click on the thumbnail to the left. I dont think we will do some backend template customisation editor as i think customizing templates should be done in some proper editor. bContent is atm. refactored for J1.5 and we dont have decisions about licencing models as bContent is (atm) used only on project basis. |
unleash.it
said:
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... Hi Tom, I'm not in need of a control panel for templating. I'm comfortable enough with PHP/HTML/CSS for this. What I would like to see (in a perfect world), is a way to keep Joomla's existing article fields but extend them. Then I'd like to be able to (in the code) combine and do layout how I like. Even if your's doesn't do this, I like that in your system it is possible to associate field sets with categories (and template them differently). Are you familiar with Joomla 1.5 overrides? 1.5 uses them to override the output of native components/modules. With the com_content override for example, one can put "created date" or "author name" under or to the side of the article if they prefer. You can have some fields above the article, some below, etc... I imagine different people will need different features. I'm sure there will be room for several different ways of accomplishing this. |
C. Puffer
said:
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... So, while working on a small handful of joomla sites over the past few years, and particularly intensively since 1.5 was released, I am no by no means a hardcore joomla developer. However, since 1.5 I am relying more and more on joomla, and see more possibilities for building in joomla, beginning to understand joomla on a deeper level . So I've read this I've been pondering it. I agree, the "killer app" is definitely not going to be encrypted. I think it could well be commercial, but there is too strong an aversion by too many people against encryption (copy-protection). Developers especially, those not afraid to crack the code when necessary, will stay away, no matter how useful. I'll leave it at that before I go too far off topic. *Moreover...* I think that what joomla needs for a killer app is the few actively developed, open-source components that it already has: Community Builder, Fireboard, VirtueMart, JCE, MyBlog, Jom Comment, et al. If these can continue to make the transition over to joomla 1.5 native and continue to integrate with each other, then developers will continue to migrate to joomla. Not bridges, not hacks; those will be useful to some as their needs dictate. But when my customer wants a board that integrates with user profiles and product shots, if I can promise them that that is no problem and I don't need to unundate them with a whole lot of options, and need to update/maintain 2 core software packages/databases (as opposed to just updating extensions). |
Tom Bohacek
said:
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... Hi there, i hope it's ok to post that the closed beta for bContent has startet. Today i put an english screencast online which the beta testers allready got. So, if yozu are familiar with HTML and a little PHP or even can do a SVN checkout feel free to contact me for beta testing. http://www.bohacek.de/b01-joom...start.html P.S. excuse my bad english |
Seattle inspector
said:
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... Making the change to 1.5 was a job but worth it... Now I need a component made and can not find anyone; preferably local to Seattle area. Anyone know where I can get help on this? |
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