Oops

محروم.كوم · #1 06-11-2010, 06:10 PM

The original thought for 2.0 was that it would just be a more advanced version of 1.x. That thought has changed.

It has been over three years since I started 1.x. In the world of tech, it is ancient. After talking with the other developers at ASU (both of them), it is time to stop painting over the water stains and instead build a new house (note: I am the process of moving so I have these type metaphors on the brain).

I suspect people don't want to hear it but we need to face reality. The Internet has changed tremendously in just 5 years and we are falling behind. The main reason is the architecture is lacking. While I went OOP, I didn't -really- understand it as I do now. Too many static classes, too much repetition of effort, and too little logical APIs. AJAX, DOM, JQuery - these things were just starting and I really didn't have a grasp on their functionality back then.

So, 1.7.0 will continue in its current incarnation. Bugs and features will be continued upon it but it won't ever become 2.0. Instead, we are going to start a new project called.... well we aren't sure yet but it will not be called phpWebSite. We are leaning on two names but haven't settled. One is Beanie which has a history with us. The other is Snowbird, but there is already a software project called that, so it probably won't be used.

If you haven't closed this tab in disgust yet, here are the plans for 2.0 so far.
- Better OOP adherence.
- Greater emphasis on Javascript UI.
- Simpler module development model. Easier to program, install and update.
- Modular Javascript. Install functionality and implement into your modules. These would be like submodules that work with your mods. Google Analytics becomes a Javascript submod. Install and go.
- Better connectivity between your site and others whether they share the same web software or not.
- Users have their own "space" on the site.
- Drag and drop content design.
- Expanded user permissions. Item permissions beyond edit, delete, and view. The objects will define the permissions.
- Content workflow.
- Versioning on almost everything for easy rollback.
- Better file management and image editing.
- Better modules. Not looking forward to rewriting calendar for the fifth time, but everything needs cleanup.
- Easier multiple site creation and control (i.e. Branch).
- Authentication modules for users.

Here are some pros or cons, depending on how you look at it:
- Less dependence (if any) on PEAR.
- Single database support. There is much more flexibility in design if we can be assured the database will do the same thing every time. So MySQL will be the only supported database. I'd love to continue to make the software OS independent, but frankly it hasn't been worth the effort in the last eight years or so and most hosting services support LAMP. (Ya blah blah Postgresql rulez, Oracle ownz MySQL etc. Sorry but no).
- New templating. Looking at Smarty and Dwoo.

We aren't blind to the fact that we have fallen behind other projects, especially since our own university picked Drupal. So we need to step up. Hopefully yall can step up with us. We expect the rewrite will take a long time so don't think 1.7.0 will be abandoned completely. But my energy for new development will be piped into 2.0.

Finally, is there something YOU would like to see in 2.0? Now is the time to say so.

Best regards,
Matt McNaney and the phpWebSite/Beanie/Snowbird development team. __DEFINE_LIKE_SHARE__