All entries filed under “News”
A special thank you again to the advertisers, who help keep the lights on here at EE Insider. Each month a handful of wonderful companies in our community share their products and services with you via advertisements on the site. The ads are always relevant to you, tasteful and the products and services trustworthy.
A huge thank you to:
- Might Big Robot - They have been advertising their Profile Edit add-on and just recently released the Field Editor add-on, which makes it very easy to create custom fields in EE2.
- Pixel & Tonic - The longest running advertiser on the site and well-known for the add-ons Assets, Playa, Matrix and Wygwam. They make some of the hottest add-ons for ExpressionEngine.
- Solspace - By far, Solspace has the largest catalog of EE add-ons and is one of the original add-on developers. When an add-on comes from Solspace, you can trust that it’s going to work and that you’ll get the support you need. Their Rating module allows you to easily add rating functionality to your website.
- Vector Media Group - Based in New York City, they are not only experts (and leaders) on ExpressionEngine, they are also experts in SEO. Matt and Lee at Vector Media Group are a valuable part of our community.
- Structure - Travis and Jack have built and supported the easiest way to allow your clients to manage pages (with hierarchy) in ExpressionEngine.
EE Insider just started its fourth year online and it wouldn’t be possible without the help of our advertisers. Would you like to share your product or service with the community? Get in touch.
Today, Devot:ee announced the annual “AcademEE” awards and the winners named in a handful of categories. Devot:ee intern Jacob Russell wrote up a short blog post about the awards:
2011 has been another great year for add-ons in the ExpressionEngine community, as developers around the world continue to write great code for the benefit of all of us. We’re happy to see a mix of add-ons by established developers and a lot of ‘new blood’ creating awesome add-ons.
Developer of the Year was awarded to Rob Sanchez who works for Barrett Newton and Big Mighty Robot. Better Workflow by Electric Putty was named Extension of the Year. Read the entire list of add-ons and you might find one that you haven’t used yet.
Congrats to the winners!
Each week a group of EE users gathers together in a (not at all) secret chat room to help each other with EE issues, problems and questions. There is also a lot of general discussion about ExpressionEngine, web design and development.
Here’s the thing: you’re invited, too. Won’t you join us?
The chat starts at 9 PM EST in the US. Go here to join us: mijingo.com/go-chat
Today the United States Congress begins hearings on a new proposed law called the PROTECT IP Act (how does it work?). This law is aimed at protecting intellectual property and preventing copyright infringement online. Without surprise to you I’m sure, this law has been spearheaded by the entertainment industry. The same people that tried to kill VCRs, MP3 players, DVRs and more. The same people that sued grandmothers and little kids.
To make it worse, the law is also supported by politicians who, to be frank, don’t know shit about how the internet works, what makes it so successful and just how damaging an over-reaching law like PROTECT IP would be.
This video sums it up nicely:
I’m in a unique position because I would actually benefit from this law. The ExpressionEngine training videos I create at Mijingo are widely pirated online. Fighting the people that pirate the videos (and, sadly, those that do are part of our community) would be a full-time job. So, I choose to do everything I can to protect the videos without ruining the experience for legitimate customers (or treating them like criminals). That’s why my videos don’t have DRM or a complicated scheme to protect them from being copied.
I don’t think, however, that it’s worth ruining and censoring the Internet to prevent my videos from being pirated. And that is exactly what the entertainment industry wants to see happen; a nuclear option to protect their latest cream puff blockbuster movie from being pirated online or streamed in parts on video sites.
For those of you who live in the United States, please take the time to learn more about these proposed laws and how they can hurt you and the Internet.
A couple of weeks ago I pushed live a minor tweak to the look of EE Insider. The focus of the change was to eliminate the stuff that was barely used (as deemed so through analytics) and make the site easier to read. I eliminated almost everything on the sidebar of the site and made it the new home for the ads that support the site and share some awesome products and services with the community.
I also eliminated everything but the most useful stuff from the navigation. We’re a savvy bunch, so there was no need to highlight things like the RSS feed. The biggest change was removing navigation access to the EE Insider Tips section of the site. The section is still around and completely functional and you can get a link in the footer on any page of the site.
One complaint I received was that readers had to hunt for the search box. I moved it to the top of the sidebar and simplified it: no submit button and the label is hidden. Again, we’re savvy and can handle buttonless search forms.
So, right now EE Insider is focused on three areas: the blog (this), the how-to articles (have one? you get paid to publish here) and the videos section. It feels better and looks better. What do you think?
More than three years running, The EE Help Chat happens tonight at 9 PM Eastern.
Haven’t joined the EE Help Chat before? It’s easy: go to mijingo.com/go-chat and then fill out the form and you’re in!
There is a cap on attendees, so be sure to get there early.
Go chat!
Before (and sometimes during) breakfast every morning, I sort through a pile of links to find stuff to post to the site. I do this using a combination of feeds, searches and good ol’ fashioned email. I sometimes miss stuff because it didn’t cross my radar. That bums me out.
So, here are the top 10 ways to get your news announced on EE Insider:
- Write or create something helpful or awesome and send it to me: info@eeinsider.com
- Did I say 10 ways? I meant one.
That’s it. Have you launched a cool, new site, created a great tutorial, built and released an add-on or done anything else related to ExpressionEngine and CodeIgniter? Email me and let me know.
It’s that easy!
I thought I’d take a moment to welcome a new member to our community. I heard about her grand entrance into the world the other day while chatting with Matt Weinberg.
It’s a new plant at the Vector office.
I begged Matt (okay, I actually just scoffed at the name) not to use the name “LeafEE” but he did. He actually did it. Next up, it’ll sell its little seedlings at Devot:ee.
On the bright side, if we can contain the -ee naming convention to just plants, we might just save the world. Think of the children.
I thank thEE.
This isn’t exactly related to ExpressionEngine, but I wanted to let everyone know that I’ve been making a brief appearance again in the podcasting world.
Since last week, I’ve been filling in at 5by5 (this is where the EE Podcast was hosted before Lea and Emily took over) for Dan Benjamin while he’s out on paternity leave. My stint continues through the end of this week.
Here are the shows I’m co-hosting:
If you’re not familiar with the shows at 5by5, please browse the listings. I’m certainly biased but it is a network full of some great content and people.
Back in March I posted about my beginners ExpressionEngine article in the May print issue of Net Magazine. The article is a guide to building a simple portfolio website with ExpressionEngine. My description of the article:
The article is definitely aimed at people newer to EE, who are looking for a real-world application of this ExpressionEngine CMS they’ve heard so much about. It includes all of the template code and assets you need to build the simple site on your own. But there’s certainly something there for everyone, even if you wanted to reaffirm how you approach building EE sites.
Up until now you could only get the article by buying a print copy or their digital version of the magazine, which is only available through Zinio. Today Net Magazine graciously published the article on their website for everyone to enjoy.
As web workers, we need to have a portfolio that puts on display our website designs and development projects. One of the best CMSes for handling this type of content is ExpressionEngine 2. Its flexible data containers (‘channels’) and customisable input fields enable you to use it to power just about any data-driven website.
For old hands at ExpressionEngine, this article won’t do much for you, but if you’re new to EE you might find it helpful. The project includes all of the templates and assets you need to follow along as you build the portfolio site in ExpressionEngine.
Read the entire article: Build a portfolio with ExpressionEngine
This week only, you can get the ExpressionEngine 2: A Quick-Start Guide (written by yours truly) for 40% off. My publisher for the book, Pragmatic Programmers, is celebrating “Agile Week” and offering 40% off all of their titles. This includes my book on ExpressionEngine.
To get the discount (on the print or ebook version) use the coupon code AGILEWEEK when you check out. The discount is good through Friday, August 12, 2011.
To learn more about the book visit the official website: ExpressionEngine 2: A Quick-Start Guide.
In the latest edition of the EE Podcast, Lea and Emily talk to EllisLab CCO James Mathias. They spent about 30 minutes talking to James about various things related to ExpressionEngine and his work at EllisLab.
James talked about how the user voting for features works and how they solicit and listen to community feedback. He even talked about some features that will be coming in the future (but you’ll have to listen to the podcast to find out). All in all, it was good insight into the work that he’s doing in his first month as the Chief Creative Officer at EllisLab.
About 15 minutes into the podcast they talked about the built-in file manger and the Assets module from Pixel & Tonic. As is fairly well-known, Assets was released to much acclaim and the native file manager in EE was (justly or unjustly, depending on your viewpoint) heavily criticized online, especially on Twitter. Some of the criticism, I think, went too far. People forgot what it is like to be civilized and constructive.
With that in mind, it was interesting to hear James talk about how EllisLab views Assets (they think it’s really nice) and their approach to the file manager now that the expectations for it have been raised by the release of Assets (this isn’t just my conjecture, James says as much in the podcast).
Here are a couple of choice quotes from James during the podcast (these happen between 15 and 18 minutes into the episode). In reference to their work on the file manager for EE 2.2, James bluntly said:
Brandon Kelly’s Assets set us back a little bit.
James acknowleged that the bar has been raised but then softened that stance a little by lobbing some criticism about the user experience (UX) of Assets:
I think the way that Assets was approached is a good UX. I think there are some inherently wrong things about it, like mimicking Finder. Finder is a great tool and great UX but it’s unfamiliar to a large portion of computer users. So it’s not necessarily the best solution.
In a response to the podcast, add-on developer Lodewijk (“Low”) Schutte very eloquently described why unfamiliar doesn’t mean bad:
Lack of familiarity does not mean bad UX. It just means unfamiliar. If you take the two extreme positions, you could make a file interface either like Windows Explorer or Mac OS X Finder. Choosing either of the two will exclude the other, so no good choice could be made, according to that stance. Trying to come up with something entirely new is very difficult indeed and will very certainly be unfamiliar to all of your users. And this idea is true for any kind of interface, not just a file manager.
Low is correct here and I would agree with him that “it’s wrong to dismiss an interface/design/UX, just because it’s unfamiliar to a certain portion of your users.”
While I did describe it as “Finder-like” in my Assets First Look video, I think the calling it flawed because it mimics parts of the Mac OS X Finder is misleading and generally incorrect. There are indeed elements of the Assets “window” that do look “Finder-ish,” but the general interaction with the folders on the left and the files on the right isn’t anything specific to OS X (just take a look at this screenshot of Windows 7 ).
I would argue (and, yes, I realize I’m being pedantic) that there’s not even a lack of familiarity with the UX in Assets. The general function of a list of folders or groupings in a left pane and a detail list of files in the right pane is a common UI and UX across both Windows and Mac (and even some flavors of GUIs on Linux).
All that being said, this is only a small part of what they discussed on the show. James had a lot more to talk about new features, some things to expect and what his job entails. Please go listen to the entire EE Podcast episode over at the podcast website.
Disclosure: We are an Official Community Partner of EllisLab and Pixel & Tonic is an advertiser on EE Insider.
EE Insider is fortunate to have and have had the support several companies in our community. These businesses (add-on developers and client services shops) have been around to help keep EE Insider running and to share their products and services with the community.
To be frank, the money earned from advertising helps pay for associated site costs, including the time it takes to maintain the site. In the past I’ve had people help me write for the site and they were paid directly from advertising. I am also looking (in the very near future) to add a new person to the site (paid, part-time position), so stay tuned for that announcement.
In no particular order, I would like to thank the following advertisers:
- Pixel & Tonic - The longest running advertiser on the site and well-known for the add-ons Assets, Playa, Matrix and Wygwam. They make some of the hottest add-ons for ExpressionEngine.
- Solspace - By far, Solspace has the largest catalog of EE add-ons and is one of the original add-on developers. When an add-on comes from Solspace, you can trust that it’s going to work and that you’ll get the support you need. Their Rating module allows you to easily add rating functionality to your website.
- Vector Media Group - Based in New York City, they are not only experts (and leaders) on ExpressionEngine, they are also experts in SEO. Matt and Lee at Vector Media Group are a valuable part of our community.
- Structure - Travis and Jack have built and supported the easiest way to allow your clients to manage pages (with hierarchy) in ExpressionEngine.
EE Insider is halfway through its third year online and it wouldn’t be possible without the help of our advertisers. Would you like to share your product or service with the community? Get in touch.
Do you have a cool technique, idea or approach to building EE sites that you would like to share with the community? You can publish your short article here on EE Insider.
While I’m regularly reaching out privately to people I think could write great articles for EE Insider, I have neglected to mention it here often enough. For the last 2 1/2 years I have been publishing ExpressionEngine how-to articles. I am always looking for more articles and for the last year and a half I have been paying $100 for every article published. You can get full credit, a bio on the page and you get paid.
There are some classics like Securing ExpressionEngine 2 (which resulted in Mark’s popular ebook of the same name), Matt Weinberg’s Multi-server Setup for EE2 and Erik Reagan’s The Dreaded Documentation.
Interested in writing and have an idea? Contact me and let’s get started!
The site starting making the round this morning on Twitter and before the day was halfway over it was already returning a blank page. Share-ee was the early stages of a forum that hosted pirated copies of ExpressionEngine and commercial add-ons.
I didn’t write about it until now because as someone who also faces constant pirating of my products, I didn’t want to give free publicity to the site. I did, however, snap some screenshots of the site before it was taken down.
I don’t know exactly how the site was taken down but I’m assuming one or more people contacted their host (Bluehost) and complained. Apparently, the idea of sharing commercial software didn’t seem wrong to the person running the site, who commented via the site’s Twitter account (from Twitter for iPad) that they wanted to do something “useful for the poor devs like myself” and asking why we don’t “want some free code?”
Sites pirating ExpressionEngine software and related materials are out there and it’s nothing new. The only thing new here is that the site was completely public and the blatant promotion of it on Twitter using the very common #eecms hashtag.
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