*** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
38 posts by 19 authors in: Forums > CMS Builder
Last Post: January 13, 2014 (RSS)
By Dave - October 3, 2012 - edited: October 3, 2012
We've had a lot of people asking for us to pre-announce upcoming features. Here's what we're working on for the next few versions:
Note: We'll also be doing maintenance releases between planned releases where we release bug fixes, minor changes, and features that were added through consulting or custom programming. People sometimes ask why a previously unrequested feature was added before a planned one, it's usually because a customer paid for it through a consulting project and wanted us to add it to the codebase for the benefit of the community. Since the work has already been done it's free and easy for us to do these releases and it benefits everyone.
Here's what we have planned:
Improved Multi-lingual Support - Automatic and improved translation libraries for CMS, Admin Menus, and Plugins along with a simple method for plugin developers to make their plugins multi-lingual.
Shared Asset Library - A way to "share" uploads between records so you don't need to upload the same file over and over again when multiple records require it.
Ratings Plugin - Works with website membership to allow users to select a rating (0 - 5 stars) and display that rating on any type of page, record, or item.
User Requests - Beyond the previously listed items we plan to address as many user requests as possible in the next few releases. We won't be able to get them all, but we'll tackle as many as we can. We've complied a list of these below:
User Feature Requests:
Field Editor: Support color picker field
Djulia, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83021#83021
Section Editors: Accordion feature for long sections
Djulia, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83021#83021
Field Editor: Be able to control the appearance of date fields in list views.
InHouse, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83299#83299
Field Editor: Multi-record within a single record
Zip222, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83026#83026
CMSB home page: Add common links to homepage.
zip222 - http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83059#83059
Code Generator/Field Editor: A tick box to designate a field as HTML free, which then wraps htmlspecialchars() around the output in the code generator.
Kenny, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83226#83226
Field Editor/Input Validation: Designate a text field as a website so that it automatically inserts
[url]http://
Kenny, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83226#83226
Field Editor: A visual way to show fields are required.
Zip222 - http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83306#83306
Field Editor: Drag and drop fields into order (already implemented?)
isdoo, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83312#83312
Field Editor/Editor: Allow users to add new fields to a list while editing it.
sidcam, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83572#83572
Field Editor: autocomplete list text box
lexmooz, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83871#83871
Field Editor: Dynamic fields: If one field is used then another relevant one is displayed.
brownleather, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84225#84225
Field Editor: Dynamic fields: If one field is used then another relevant one is displayed.
aev, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84322#84322
website comments: See all posts a user has made on the site by clicking on there name
rez, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84723#84723
Editor uploads: The ability to replace an image file with an updated version
zaba, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84848#84848
Editor uploads: The ability to replace an image file with an updated version
aev, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84853#84853
Field Editor: The ability to add a class to a field so that it can be styled differently
zip222, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=84969#84969
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
zaba, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=85236#85236
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
nkerschgens, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=85342#85342
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
deborah, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=85395#85395
Field Editor: Have an information page editor section type.
toledoh, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=86041#86041
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
zick, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=86072#86072
Plug-ins: Form plugin: Make it easy to create forms for the homepage.
twocans, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=86077#86077
Field Editor: The ability to add a class to a field so that it can be styled differently
InHouse, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=86858#86858
plugin: shared Asset Library
Perchpole, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=87531#87531
File Upload: If only one file can be uploaded remove the Tip about using ctrl to select multiple files.
gkornbluth, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=88624#88624
Automatic upgrade: Press a button on the site and it upgrades automatically
kcmedia, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=88986#88986
Automatic upgrade: Press a button on the site and it upgrades automatically
zip222, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=88995#88995
website comments: Create a website comments plugin.
avrom, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=89385#89385
Automatic upgrade: Press a button in the cmsAdmin area and the site downloads an upgrade and installs it automatically.
maurice, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=88986#88986
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
zaba, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=89739#89739
Site map generator:
quinox69, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=89755#89755
Section Editor entries list: Have a hide button next to modify and erase for quick hiding of batch of entries.
perchpole, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=89797#89797
Ratings plug-in: Works with website membership to allow a rating agains various sections.
sublmnl, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=89890#89890
Field Editor: The ability to add a class to a field so that it can be styled differently
InHouse, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=90652#90652
Section Editor list: Have a hide button next to modify and erase for quick hiding of batch of entries.
InHouse, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=90653#90653
CmsAdmin: CSS styling for smartphones or an iphone/android application.
zaba, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=90877#90877
Field Editor: wysiwyg editor. PDF a default for file upload in validation
toledoh, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=92116#92116
General Settings: Require HTTPS. Redirect to https page as opposed to message being displayed.
8bit pixel, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=92124#92124
Editor uploads: The ability to crop an image before it is uploaded.
equinox69, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=92691#92691
Field Editor: Assign a field to a left or right hand column for editing.
zick, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=93140#93140
Field Editor: Assign a field to a left or right hand column for editing.
aev, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=93223#93223
Editor uploads: The ability to crop and image before it is uploaded + the ability to constrain proportions/ratios.
deborah, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=93230#93230
Field Editor: Ability to choose more than one column for a checkbox list.
InHouse, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=93368#93368
Field Editor: Ability to choose more than one column for a checkbox list.
Djulia, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=83227#83227
Table manipulation: An add-on that uses something like jeditable to edit data in tables like Excel.
usadomains, http://www.interactivetools.com/forum/gforum.cgi?post=93967#93967
Thanks, please post any feedback, comments or suggestions in the thread below.
interactivetools.com
Re: [Dave] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By gleert - October 11, 2012
Great list of planned improvements!
I would like the "Shared Asset Library" to be an option, as we use a lot of fields that don´t need this option and would translate into more clicks and more confusion for the end users.. So please make it an option!
How do you want to implement the "Improved Multi-lingual Support" ?
Hope to hear from you soon!
Re: [gleert] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By Dave - October 11, 2012
>I would like the "Shared Asset Library" to be an option
Absolutely, we'll find a way to keep it as simple as possible so it's not in the way for users who don't want/need it.
>How do you want to implement the "Improved Multi-lingual Support"?
There's a few issues right, there's lots of text in CMSB that currently can't be translated, there's lots of "admin menu" text that would add a lot of work for translators who don't need the admin menu translated (if there clients can see it), there's no support for translation in plugins, and no easy way for 3rd party programmers to translate strings.
We're addressing these for the next version by:
- Splitting up the language files into cms, cms admin, and plugin specific, so you don't ever have to translate more than you want to.
- We've added some instructions for programmers on some simple code they can use to make their text translatable and added option in CMSB to automatically add new text (that programmers add) to the language files
- We've added support for language files in plugins in a way that doesn't require re-writing of any plugins.
So for the next version you'll be able to translate everything, and future plugins we release will be able to be easily translated as well.
Hope that helps, let me know any questions.
interactivetools.com
Re: [Dave] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By InHouse - November 9, 2012
Fingers crossed to see this coming down the pipe in 2013.
By zaba - December 20, 2012
Just another one, looking at a better wysiwyg editor than TinyMCE, this one is smaller and leaner and visually looks more professional with good cross platform support. http://imperavi.com/redactor/
Ive no idea what the impact would be to fully replace TinyMCE, ive never liked it and it looks dated.
Re: [gleert] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By Deborah - January 30, 2013
Hi.
Just wondering if the "shared asset library" as part of CMSB or as a plugin is on the near horizon.
Thanks.
Deborah
Re: [gleert] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By Dave - January 30, 2013
Hi Deborah,
Thanks for the check-in. Shared asset library is still a ways off, to do that properly we need to rewrite the entire field libraries and that's a work in progress.
interactivetools.com
Re: [gleert] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By Deborah - January 30, 2013
Thanks for the reply and explanation, Dave.
For many CMSB accounts, I have them uploading all docs to a list that displays on a web page. They can then copy/paste the document link into the WYSIWYG editor text wherever needed throughout the site. Of course, the problem is that even though I forewarn them, they forget to update all of the links when they update or delete the PDF.
I can't think of a good workaround idea, but would be interested in any suggestions. I have thought of asking a client to install/run a link checker software after making a document change, but I doubt many would follow through with that every time they update/delete a doc.
Meanwhile, the CMSB improvements with each new version release are always appreciated here.
Deborah
Re: [gleert] *** Upcoming Features & Development Plan (Updated Oct 2012)
By Dave - February 7, 2013
Hi Deborah,
Sorry for the delay in getting back to you on this one.
I think even with the hypothetical media library you'd still have issues because you have users modifying or deleting the source files and we need to determine what to do when that happens.
I don't know all the requirements but the simplest way I can think of to associate or link documents that may or may not be modified or removed would be to have them in a list below the WYSIWYG. You have have a "documents" section, and then you have a multi-value pulldown (or some other means) below your wysiwyg that lets them select documents, then dynamically load them on the viewer page. If it would work with the page design to have the documents listed below the content there's a lot more options.
Feel free to email me direct or call and I'd be happy to get some more details and brainstorm some ideas with you. I'm dave@interactivetools.com and we're at 1-800-752-0455.
Hope that helps!
interactivetools.com