Blog Entry
The latest EE Podcast continues the “Get to Know #eecms” series with special guest Jessica D’Amico! Jess talks about running her own business and being active in the community, including her work with DCEErs. She also shares image management tools and tips she’s picked up from working with a number of photographer clients. Stay tuned ‘til the end for our rapid-fire Ten Questions!
Thanks to Responsive Web Design Summit for sponsoring this episode!
Blog Entry
- Simple Tracker by e-Commerce Consultores
This simple plugin lets you track any entry using the standard view_count fields. Useful to track entries when EE is not aware that a page is a single entry page, for example when using Structure + Freebie.
- Query Redirect by Isaac Raway (Airways)
Redirect when detected query string variables are detected. Assemble new URL based on the current URL + values pulled from Global Vars, GET and POST data.
- Total Days In the Month by Johnathan Waters
This plugin returns the total number of days in a month. This functionality is overlooked in some calendar/event plugins. You can quickly determine the last date of a month.
- Table of Contents Pro ($) by Mark J. Reeves (Clearbold)
Table of Contents Pro generates a nested unordered list of jump links to specified headings in your WYSIWYG field’s output. You specify the tags and the number of heading levels to include.
- BiopsEE ($) by Digital Surgeons
Take a look at each and every step of EE template parsing with syntax highlighting and diffs. Find performance issues and parse order bugs with ease and save hours of time and frustration.
- Metor for Transcribe ($) by 25hweb
Metor allows you to easily see in Control Panel the language associated with each entry.
- Crush by Mark Croxton
CSS Crush is an extensible PHP based CSS preprocessor that aims to alleviate many of the hacks and workarounds necessary in modern CSS development. This plugin is a wrapper for CSS Crush that allows you to use it in ExpressionEngine templates.
- NSM Twitter ($) by Leevi Graham (Newism)
NSM Twitter is an oAuth authenticated ExpressionEngine addon that allows you to post Tweets to one or more Twitter accounts when an entry is modified or from a handy accessory.
- NSM Addon Updater by Leevi Graham (Newism)
NSM Addon Updater is an ExpressionEngine 2.0 accessory that notifies site admins when an installed addon has been updated. It checks developer supplied external RSS feeds for version updates and displays them in the extension admin.
Blog Entry
EllisLab reminded us last week that tomorrow, March 5th, the Twitter API version 1 is being retired and they will start testing blackouts to let people know that any code or add-on using the v1 API will break. This includes the first part Twitter Timeline add-on that a lot of us use.
From Twitter last month:
When API v1 is finally retired, all authenticated and unauthenticated requests to API v1 will return a HTTP 410 Gone status. Older widgets will receive the same response. This status code signifies that all API v1-era resources are gone and not coming back.
Earlier today John Henry Donovan posted a link on Twitter to a good list of ExpressionEngine add-ons using the v1 API and those that use the v1.1 API. Make sure you’re using add-ons that are in the second list.
Blog Entry
It seems like each year fewer and fewer people I know make the trek to Austin for the annual SXSW Interactive conference. My first SXSW was in 2004 when it was still a smallish event that took place only in one corner of Austin Convention Center. You were forced to run into people in the hallway between sessions and as a result I’ve met some real friends.
Now that I live in Austin SXSW isn’t the annual trek that it used to be, but it is still a time when I get to catch up with people I don’t get to see often. This year is shaping up to be no different.
So, is anyone out there in the EE world making the trip to Austin this year for SXSW? If so, let me know on Twitter.
Blog Entry
Jeremy Girard wrote a nice overview of EE’s best tricks in his blog post on how EE makes it easy to update your website.
At Envision, we have selected ExpressionEngine as our CMS of choice. We selected this platform for a number of reasons - one of which is the ease of use for our clients when they need to maintain their own content. Here’s a look at how easy it can be to manage website content when you have the correct tools at your disposal:
Read the whole thing to learn about the features Envision likes best about ExpressionEngine.
Blog Entry
ExpressionEngine’s StackExchange site is quickly turning into the lively place that the forums used to be. Let’s take a minute a see who’s leading the way this week (points are 2/24/13 - the time of this posting):
Nice work, everyone!
Have time to answer a question? Visit the Unanswered Questions page and see where you can help. Here’s one quick way you can help EE StackExchange.
Blog Entry
This made a few waves on Twitter so I thought I would mention it here, too. On Wednesday, EllisLab announced a new trademark use policy, which you can read here.
I have no idea if this is related to the settlement with EngineHosting but the timing certainly makes it seem like it is. One of EllisLab’s claims in the original lawsuit was trademark related (the lawsuit documents are publicly available).
I know some people are annoyed by this. I get it. I think it’s a necessary move that EllisLab has to make to give guidance on how they expect their trademarks are to be used. Don’t get too bent out of shape about it.
Here’s why:
You get the idea.
I’m not a lawyer but you should refer to the policy if you’re thinking about creating a product or service around ExpressionEngine. You need to do that with any company, not just EllisLab.
Also: read my footer.
Blog Entry
My friends at A List Apart recently launched a site redesign and as part of the new ALA they added embeddable comments. Embeddable comments? Yes. It’s like embedded tweets but for comments.
Here’s a blog post on ALA as an example. Scroll down to the comments and see the small Embed buttons. Click it and you get a code snippet that lets you embed the comment elsewhere, like this:
Terrific article. Your assessment of UCD’s ignorance to business realities is often one of its most frustrating aspects. As a business manager, I’m trying to bridge the gap between those realities and what I want to accomplish (a usable design). Thanks.
— Shane Adams on Looking Beyond User-Centered Design
The ALA team is now making this code available so anyone can use it. You can also see a an example of how to use this with ExpressionEngine comments (which is what ALA runs).
Very nice!
Blog Entry
- Random Between by Gents Agency (Diederik Van Hoorebeke)
This plugin returns a random number between two optional values.
- Extract Image by Yuri Salimovskiy (IntoEEtive)
This plugin parses anything that’s between its opening and closing tags and returns URLs for images in <img> html tags that are found in the text.
- NSM Live Look ($) by Leevi Graham (Newism)
Preview channel entries and pages in context before publishing. NSM Live Look is a Multi-Site Manager compatible ExpressionEngine addon that expands on the built-in Live Look functionality and allows you to see saved entries in template context directly in the CP. View the page as it will appear on the website and be confident that when you set the entry’s status to ‘open’ it will look just you expected. Please note: This add-on does not enable live WYSIWYG editing of templates or live updates.
- NSM Channels ($) by Leevi Graham (Newism)
Group channel entries on any attribute or any custom field.
- Explode by Isaac Raway (Airways)
Explode splits a given string by a given separator and provides two modes for using the resulting values.
- Escort ($) by Derek Hogue (Amphibian Design)
Let your site’s email get sent by the pros! Escort seamlessly routes all emails generated by your site through any of five third-party transactional email services, all using their HTTP APIs.
- Smart Cache ($) by Dave Freidel
Smart Cache will allow you to modify any .js or .css files while in development or production, and force the browser to fetch the file anew. No more will you have clients saying the site is not working, only to find out they needed to delete their cache.
Blog Entry
In an announcement today, EllisLab and Gippy’s Internet Solution (DBA EngineHosting) revealed that they have settled lawsuits between the two companies.
From EngineHosting:
As has been reported in the trade press, we have been involved in a business dispute with EllisLab, Inc. for some period of time, which led to lawsuits in Oregon and Minnesota. Today, we are happy to announce that we have resolved all of our differences with EllisLab, and ended all litigation between the companies.
We are pleased to have reached an amicable resolution with EllisLab so that we can move forward with business as usual at enginehosting.com. We wish EllisLab success in their future business endeavors.
From EllisLab:
As many in our community are aware, we have been involved in a business dispute with Gippy’s Internet Solutions, LLC/EngineHosting.com, and we are happy to announce that we have resolved all of our differences.
We are thrilled to have reached an amicable resolution with Gippy’s, and can retain undiluted focus on the things we make for you. Both EllisLab and Gippy’s remain strong companies and wish the other continued success as we move forward to best serve the needs of our community.
How-to Article
Has a client ever said to you, “Why didn’t I get that reset password email?” Have you ever had to wait patiently for like ten minutes to get a new member activation email? Ever lose sleep wondering if your contact form is really working? If so, let me introduce you to the wonderful world of transactional email delivery services.
Read the Article
Blog Entry
In a reversal of a previous decision to end the support trial offer at the end of this month, EllisLab is now extending the offer for existing license holders.
That’s great news for anyone (like me) who wants to try the support but doesn’t have the need yet.
Now there’s no rush: feel free to wait until you need some help before signing up for your support trial, whenever that comes. And when it does, just log into the account that holds your license, add Silver Support to your cart, and complete your order as usual.
Blog Entry
This is a on-going series of entries where I highlight EE experiences.
Blog Entry
In a rare sale, Pixel & Tonic is celebrating their third anniversary by offering a generous 50% off everything in their store.
Go get ‘em.
Blog Entry
Whoa, where did the weekend go? Let’s this week wrapped up before we start another week. Before we get to the news, can you do me a favor? The next EECI conference is happening this October and the folks behind it are looking for your feedback on session topics. Can you take 5 minutes and fill out the survey? It’ll help them decide what to choose as topics.
If you have news you want to be included in the Weekly Wrap, please tag it on Twitter with the #eenews hashtag or email us: info@eeinsider.com We like to share the news, give the links and help promote the great stuff you’re working on!
Okay, let’s get to it.
Tweet of the Week
Chosen by me, shared with you.
This Week on EE Insider
That’s a wrrrrraaaap!
Blog Entry
Oh no! Your files have mysteriously disappeared, someone pressed the wrong button, your hard drive or host crashed spectacularly, or your client just went AWOL. All of the above are just some of the various scenarios where a rock-solid backup plan would have helped!
In this week’s podcast, Eric Lamb stops by to exchange horror stories and contingency planning. We chat about various backup options and pricing, what you should and shouldn’t back up for security reasons, and how a small dose of paranoia will actually save you and your clients in the long run. Tune in now!
Thanks to Responsive Web Design Summit for sponsoring this episode!
Blog Entry
- Video Length by Michael Leigeber
Return MM:SS from inputted seconds.
- String Explode Tag by Tom Burr
Allows you to use the PHP explode function from a template tag without enabling PHP on the template.
- Reefine ($) by Ralph
Reefine allows your users to easily filter, search and refine your entries, in the familiar way of many major ecommerce websites.
- Structure URL Alias ($) by Rein de Vries
Structure URL Alias is a module that will create one or more aliases of your Structure Page or Listings. This may handy in times when you need two or more URLs pointing to the same Page.
- Dukt Videos ($) by Benjamin David
Empower your ExpressionEngine website with social videos from YouTube & Vimeo. Here is a snapshot of Dukt Videos features : Search videos online, connect to your accounts, retrieve your videos & favorites, access meta data, compatible with matrix.
- Language variables ($) by Digital Natives srl
Access everything in the $lang array without using PHP.
- Dandy Cat by EpicVoyage
It has been said that when it comes to categories in ExpressionEngine, you can do AND -or- OR, but not both. This module changes that.
- Pages - Nested Menu by Nathan Pitman (Nine Four Ltd)
This is a port of the fantastic ‘Pages - nested menu’ plug-in for EE2.x. It was originally written by Mark Huot for ExpressionEngine 1.x.
- Admin Auto Cookie Consent by EpicVoyage
Make it clear that cookies are required to log in to the CP. If someone disagrees, they can go find an administrative interface on another server.
Blog Entry
EE add-on developer (of the year!) Low Schutte is teaching a class at EEUK on add-on development. The class takes place the day before the main conference. Here’s the description:
You’ve built your fair share of EE sites and have used third party add–ons on multiple occasions. You’re pretty sure what the difference is between an Extension and a Module. Perhaps you’ve read a “Hello World” plugin tutorial online somewhere, and maybe you’ve even downloaded a template package from pkg.io. But, as you might have found out, one does not simply build an add–on.
Following his EECI talk and recent screencast, Low will explain the thought process behind building an add–on. What choices have to be made, what resources can be used and how to write clean and efficient code. We will build an add–on from scratch, covering the basics and slightly more advanced topics.
I worked with Low on his ExpressionEngine add-on development screencast and I can vouch for his excellence as a teacher. Low can organize and explain difficult concepts with ease. If his video and past conference talks are any indication this class at EEUK should be a must-attend class for anyone that is interested in learning about ExpressionEngine development.
You can attend the conference and learn from Low for only £399. It included lunch during Low’s class and during the conference plus the after-party fun.
Learn more and register at EEUK.org.
Blog Entry
John Henry Donovan shared how he sets up a hand-rolled a developer performance toolbar to help him build faster and more efficient ExpressionEngine-powered websites.
I recently saw a tweet in the #eecms hashtag linking to an older article from Rob at Bluedreamer entitled ‘ExpressionEngine - measuring performance during development’. I thought I would share with you my version of this developer toolbar as I call it.
Read John Henry’s full write-up for the code he uses to build the toolbar.
Blog Entry
This is a on-going series of entries where I highlight EE experiences.
Get to it, everyone! Let’s make this effort a success.
Add Your Comment
Share on Twitter