I currently have a hacked build of 2.3 and BlueDragon 6.2 RC working quite well. A lot of functionality hasn't been tested, so I'm still debugging, but most of the core concepts have been fixed/tested. I will, in the next couple of weekends, have several patches to come back from this effort. BD is actually holding the large amount of code pretty well, just some undocumented assumptions that CFMX makes that BD doesn't that causes a few errors, and a few minor bugs on each side of the equation.
So I should have BD functionality within the next couple of weekends, if everything goes right. I do need to know the patch process (including wanted patch type) for FarCry, there will be quite a few of them. (approx 260 diffs currently)
I'll hold off on commenting on the main options as I haven't really done much on actually using FarCry, but I've worked with the code quite a bit.
This one I would have to 100% disagree
-integrate FourQ package directly into the Core code base
During the Breeze presentation we've discussed this swiftly, however I'll re mention it again. I needed a quick metadata hook and bait system a few months back that didn't need the full FarCry stack, but it used fourq pretty well. Now while I was under that cycle, I had some time to port it over to three additional databases.
SAP, Firebird, and CloudScape. I also have a few unit tests for it, so I could verify that compat was kept as well as possible.
Then I go looking towards farcry_core and I must applaud those who built the PG and MySQL support, because the wide spread nature of the sql throughout the core was immense. Something I didn't have time to dive into. Although, I would love to get into it, but it'll just add bloat in the way it has to be done.
So before you mentioned 2.4 and the roadmap I was going to suggest a total refactor release, but since we're headed in the UI for a direction, I'll just say what I had in mind and then I'll work into it as time permits and keep in sync with the cvs latest.
Rather than integrate a pretty solid package into the core, let's start building the core out in a package heavy format.
farcry.util.*
farcry.fourq.*
farcry.ntm.*
farcry.security.*
etc
Most of the stuff in farcry can be refactored into a format that would keep it from being farcry specific, (ntm, fourq for example) and would allow toolkits to be developed off of work already been done.
Now, while I'm saying this, I know that there will be others who simply don't agree, but we've got to refactor at some point, maybe not for this specific release, but sometime. There's CFMX specific workarounds throughout the code (note : no updater) that can be removed - FarCry requires 6.1. There's four different cffunction style <cfdump>s throughout the code base, cfimports which never have a custom tag being used (I don't know if that's a perf hit or not) etc.
To end, I'm not AT ALL knocking on anyones implementation that is currently in the code, nor am I discounting the effort behind it. But at some point we're going to have to look at future-proofing the code, which is on the top of my personal list. Adding a database, or working in BD would be a lot easier to do so.
Either way, my bit has been said.
I'll say though that I think it's pretty badass that BD is getting there when it comes to BD + FarCry, to think, we now have a total "free" stack for situations that a free CMS is needed.
Geoff Bowers wrote:
Folks,
We're building our plans for the next milestone release of FarCry. This should be considered a work in progress and has not been finalised. I put this out to the community to really get some feedback on what people are eager to see and spark some discussion about the priorities we need to give to various areas of the code base.
************************************** * FarCry 2.4 is codenamed "Glamour" * **************************************
--/ Mission Statement /-- *Glamour* is all about the users. We must overhaul the UI of FarCry administration, and surface as much hidden functionality as possible. FarCry will become an elegant and beautiful thing to behold.
--/ Reality Check /-- Although the FarCry administration interfaces are generally good and maintain a particular look and feel across all interfaces they are not ideal. There are many features that exist under the hood that are really only acessible to power users of the system -- and by that we mean developers who have an intimate understanding of the core. This will be changed.
FarCry provides for sophisticated content management scenarios. We need to provide more intuitive interfaces for non-technical authors to get the most from the system. On the flip-side we need to somehow accommodate the least experienced users in our community and more easily allow admins to "dumb down" the admin interfaces.
A rough list of desired outcomes includes:
** Overhaul of UI
- work to a single set of CSS styles to allow for complete admin
customisations
- standardise all FORMs and wizards to admin styles
- introduce Crystal SVG icon library throughout
- Standardise on cross browser support for Safari, Firefox, Mozilla and IE
- improve rich text editor integration for popular editors (refactor
editor integration to make this easier for developers wanting to plugin
in new editors)
- improve media management of files and images for all content types
(including custom types)
** Functional Changes to Core - add basic image manipulations (eg. auto thumb generation) - add file archiving - add generic interface for container reflection - add generic admin interfaces for ALL core content types (including tree content types) - replace the SECURITY interfaces completely (include profile management, and multi directory management options) - statistics aggregation and purging options - updates to FriendlyURL servlet
** Architecture Changes - integrate FourQ package directly into the Core code base - extend FourQ array properties to include data beyond object references - improve error handling options (including URL 404 and developer debugging)
** Installation - new installer to make life easier for new members to the community - more comprehensive sample site templates to show off more functionality and give better guidance - out of the box support for context roots - J2EE deployment options for CF7 installations
--/ Rough TimeLines /--
We are aiming for a beta release of the *Glamour* code base for end of
May 2005, with a final production release end of June 2005. This is
ambitious and we're going to need help from the community to achieve this.
--/ System Requirements /-- We've decided to hold off any CF7 specific enhancements in core for the *Glamour* release. However, CF7 features and functionality can certainly be leveraged in FarCry projects and extensions.
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