August has come and with that, comes the dog days of summer. Its good for a freelancer like me because I can acquire a couple gigs at this time. I have been spending alot of time at home cleaning my workspace and getting ready for the fall season. Rosettes and CSS shall be done by the end of the year, but hopefully sooner.
Joomla was originally going to be my choice for R&C given some of the rich extensions offered for portfolio sites. In addition, I felt it would let me get acquainted with a CMF that I have been feeling very touch and go about. Each CMF is its own beast. Each has its own motivation for its inception and each has its navigation setup for particular website types and from the creator's ideas on how layout might be best optimized.
Due to the latter, I think that is why Joomla continues to confuse me so. I have been open to learning it, as I know there will be a client who desires a Joomla site some day and I want to at least have some facts I can advise them on. Joomla has a method of its madness that I still to this day do not understand. I suppose to many people I speak to, "categories" and "sections" seem to feel like they are the same thing. This forum post shows a good example on how it confuses many not familiar with Joomla's "older cousin", Mambo. I was patient and found myself toiling over it in the last month trying to learn the interface. I cant lie and say that I wont get a client who insists on having a Joomla based website.
That said, I kept an open mind but overall found much disappointment in one of the few well written and opensource portfolio extensions. For some of you who have worried that Joomla is not the most secure CMF, you might be further convinced when I say that I found this portfolio extension to have been taken over by a spam Viagra/Cialis site. At that point, I just simply gave up and searched some more. Sorry, Joomla.
Enter ImpressCMS. It doesnt have nearly the headway that its more known counterparts have, but it is a very promising CMS. Rosettes and CSS does take the mentality of its creator, with the desire to research new solutions and support those creating a road less traveled. A small community develops around it and I am hoping to contribute whatever I can in the near future. Despite its evolution (and seperation) from Xoops in 2007, ImpressCMS has garnered some awards.
A new graphic arts assignment starts this week. A bit of extra pocket money to say the least but Im already finding some fun in the work. Hoping to post more in this blog soon. When I am ready to migrate this blog, I will surely up my blog content quality.
Showing posts with label Joomla. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joomla. Show all posts
Mary's Personal Summer of Code
Among a part time gig as a mascot down at the local ballpark, I am using this summer to start getting a bit back to me. Despite that I had my Drupal project get revoked (again!) I found myself a bit more indifferent to it. Other projects (some overdue) were awaiting me and I had enough of this. Besides, I did gain a contact who may be able to provide a hosting solution for Rosettes and CSS. My week long vacation looms at the end of this month so I can see using it as a time of "breaking character" and rebuilding anew upon a rested mindset.
Due to these things, personal projects are the order of the day when put up against doing work for other people. I wont lie and say that I have enough portfolio material, but I know that if I keep taking on everyone else's projects than none of my stuff gets done and this blog will continue to be stuck on Blogger vs actually having it on my own domain with portfolio.
Im finding out more quirks involved with Joomla modules, components or plugins. In K2, CAPCHA was enabled but without the reCAPCHA registration key set. Thats why stylesheets were being ignored. That still seems like a strange bug rather than human error to me but I guess K2 is that new. I mean, look at the lack of documentation in the backend's Documentation buttion within the K2 sub-sections. Seems the social bookmarking problem also righted itself.
Speaking of K2, 2.0 is officially out. I already was tweaking with the July release and found it to make me feel that much better about using Joomla as my portfolio's site. Stepping outside my comfort zone is important to me, and blogging with Joomla is that much easier with K2 around.
Joomla sure is a different animal. I have done at least one re-install/recovery due to human error. Lots of clunkyness to someone with my background of other programs that I have learned. Joomla must represent a different way of thinking that seems convuluted to other people. It seems that you have to use the Menu system to set what loads in the Front Page (if you dont want to use the standard "load newest article" method of creating the dynamic front page content.
So, all going very well. I have yet to work on a template but I figure Ill do that once I get time in my workweek to put some blog entres there and start on my portfolio. I imagine with Joomla's quirks, that Ill be surprised/confused again and again until I reach the peak of the experience.
Due to these things, personal projects are the order of the day when put up against doing work for other people. I wont lie and say that I have enough portfolio material, but I know that if I keep taking on everyone else's projects than none of my stuff gets done and this blog will continue to be stuck on Blogger vs actually having it on my own domain with portfolio.
Im finding out more quirks involved with Joomla modules, components or plugins. In K2, CAPCHA was enabled but without the reCAPCHA registration key set. Thats why stylesheets were being ignored. That still seems like a strange bug rather than human error to me but I guess K2 is that new. I mean, look at the lack of documentation in the backend's Documentation buttion within the K2 sub-sections. Seems the social bookmarking problem also righted itself.
Speaking of K2, 2.0 is officially out. I already was tweaking with the July release and found it to make me feel that much better about using Joomla as my portfolio's site. Stepping outside my comfort zone is important to me, and blogging with Joomla is that much easier with K2 around.
Joomla sure is a different animal. I have done at least one re-install/recovery due to human error. Lots of clunkyness to someone with my background of other programs that I have learned. Joomla must represent a different way of thinking that seems convuluted to other people. It seems that you have to use the Menu system to set what loads in the Front Page (if you dont want to use the standard "load newest article" method of creating the dynamic front page content.
So, all going very well. I have yet to work on a template but I figure Ill do that once I get time in my workweek to put some blog entres there and start on my portfolio. I imagine with Joomla's quirks, that Ill be surprised/confused again and again until I reach the peak of the experience.
K2 Extension for Joomla
Yesterday I got an answer in the Joomla forums that recommended K2 as a solution for the personalized blog aspect ot my site. The demo video on the K2 site got me intrigued. It had all the kinds of things most blogs need such as socialbookmarking, tag clouds (although not as nifty looking as Joomulous), and commentary complete with CAPCHA. Overall, K2 acts like a mini-Joomla inside Joomla.
Speaking of that, it was nice that the categories I could set for my blogs could be seperate from the sections/category madness of the original in-the-box Joomla. Overall, it helped me decrypt some of the logic behind the Joomla interface that drives me crazy. Yes, Drupal spoiled me with how changes for something are always in one single place.
I am still left with a few questions and things to troubleshoot:
Speaking of that, it was nice that the categories I could set for my blogs could be seperate from the sections/category madness of the original in-the-box Joomla. Overall, it helped me decrypt some of the logic behind the Joomla interface that drives me crazy. Yes, Drupal spoiled me with how changes for something are always in one single place.
I am still left with a few questions and things to troubleshoot:
- Can I promote featured K2 items to the front page? Where does the category template "blog" comes from? How do I add more? (see screenshot below)
- Glitch: Social bookmarking symbols dont show up even if I have enabled them
- Glitch: Clicking on a K2 item's individual page leaves me with an entry devoid of a stylesheet. This happens no matter which of the Joomla starter templates that I use. (see screenshot below)
Still want to give this extension a chance. It might be the closest to blogging Im going to get.
Choosing A CMS For My Professional Site: Decisions...decisions....
While Im not short on projects to speak of, I want to still get myself into working on something related to the website that this blog is named after. Rosettes and CSS shouldnt be stuck on Blogspot forever. Since my hosting (when I have the $$ for it) is going to have database capabilities, I want to use a CMS.
....but which one??
Wordpress seems to be the easy choice these days. For sites that are just about blogging and posting a few pages here and there, why wouldnt you use such an easy CMS? However, I am always having desire to step outside the box and go with something else.
Joomla is another CMS installed on my computer after seeing a few friends who used it for thier company website. Since Rosettes and CSS is the company/professional website (between another domain that I own), that seems perfect. On the other hand, some might say that Joomla is overkill for something as simple as a portfolio website.
Showing a big change in skillset by using Joomla or keeping a portfolio site simple with Wordpres (a simple CMS)....
Of course, I have both installed on my localhost so I suppose I could do both and find out from there. Feedback is encouraged.
....but which one??
Wordpress seems to be the easy choice these days. For sites that are just about blogging and posting a few pages here and there, why wouldnt you use such an easy CMS? However, I am always having desire to step outside the box and go with something else.
Joomla is another CMS installed on my computer after seeing a few friends who used it for thier company website. Since Rosettes and CSS is the company/professional website (between another domain that I own), that seems perfect. On the other hand, some might say that Joomla is overkill for something as simple as a portfolio website.
Showing a big change in skillset by using Joomla or keeping a portfolio site simple with Wordpres (a simple CMS)....
Of course, I have both installed on my localhost so I suppose I could do both and find out from there. Feedback is encouraged.