Hippo CTO blog - Arjé Cahn

Hippo CMS 7.4 preview: version compare

2010-03-19T16:51:03Z

This is work in progress - but I got so excited when I saw it working that I couldn't resist turning it into a quick Friday afternoon demo video. This functionality will be released in Hippo CMS 7.4 which is scheduled for June, so I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you for a bit of patience - but at least you'll have something to look out for :)

Suppose Joe is our author and he's working on a new article that he wants to push live. He requests publication, and sends the article off to his editor, Jane, for review.

I'm logging in as Jane now, and I can see the request that she got. Jane is fine with the article, so she pushes it live.

A couple of days later, Joe the author comes in again, and he changes some of that content he wrote before. And he requests publication again.

Jane logs in, sees the requests and wonders: What's new?

Hold it here - I need to explain some background. Of course we have versioning and history and all that. Every CMS does. But how easy is it to get to that comparison view? How many clicks do you have to perform to compare the current version of the document with the one that's online right now? And what kind of a view does it give you? How often do you do this? And if it would be *super* easy, wouldn't you just want to see that comparison view all the time? All in all, you're working with a team of editors in the same content pool and you need that contextual information about what's going on in the system, and who did what, where.

So that's what we did. We made it uber-super easy!

Click it - and there you go! That's what's new. Hippo CMS shows you the comparison view right there when you view the article. That is, when something has changed. It simply shows you the difference between the current version of the document and the one live on the website. How useful is that? If you need more information - you can of course dive into the version history, but this simple comparison view is probably all you need.

Again - we hope to be releasing this with Hippo CMS 7.4 in June, so hold tight.

In the meantime, let me know what you think - feedback is very much appreciated.

What's wrong with portals?

2010-03-11T08:50:36Z

This post clearly describes the problem that I see with all current portal implementations: they treat content as “just another application running inside a portlet”. When we stick to this paradigm, it will kill Portal. Content behaves very different from legacy apps, and simply offering a contextually disconnected content management portlet is not enough. Content deals with semantics and relationships: users expect a portal to be smart enough to render content that is related to the apps they see right there on their screen, and they expect content to be reused across different sections in a portal, wherever that makes sense. Not to mention user-generated content.

Wikis gave users the possibility to quickly create and collaborate on content, but they don't come with the visual application integration that Portals offer. And they lacked the degree of control of a decent content management system. Integrating Portal and CMS is more than just adding a 'content portlet'. Adding an in-context application to a Wiki page would be more in line with how users think. They navigate your online consumer portal, find a page that answers their question and then they want to act on it directly. The FAQ page on “How to request a new password” should render the “New password” portlet in-line with the article. This is just an example - but this is clearly the direction Wikis are heading as they're maturing towards something that resembles an integration of Portal and CMS, and they're leaving traditional Portals way behind.

Portal vendors need to move towards the Content Driven Portal. At least, this is direction we've chosen to go with Hippo Portal. Users want URLs that make sense, that say something about the information that can be found on a page. They want to pop the URL of a portal page into an email and send it to someone else and it should just work - within the appropriate security constraints of course. What applications are shown on the portal page should follow the context, not the other way around. People got used to this concept during the Wiki revolution, and they'll never want to go back.

2010: the year the E-Reader will become the content managers’ favorite productivity tool

2009-12-31T11:43:41Z

Flipping through my usability notes, I noticed one of our Hippo CMS users mentioned the following about proof-reading:

“There is no printing facility for content in Hippo CMS so everything has to be done on screen. Even if we could print, we can only see a single field, not the whole article, so it's a bit pointless trying to proofread this way. This leads to long periods of time staring at a screen. It's also very difficult to spot typos on screen, leading to potential loss of quality in copy.”

Exactly. Often enough, also I spot typing errors only after having printed out my text (like this blog post), and walking through it again while commuting on the train. The letters start to dance before my eyes when I’m behind a monitor for too long. Sometimes it helps a lot to just put your text aside, do something else for a while, and then return to it on a quiet moment to walk through what you’ve written. So, why not implement a printing functionality in Hippo CMS, to allow authors to take their text with them? Everybody got so used to printing out Word documents anyway, that it baffles me that this idea had never appeared to me before.

So I put the print function on our roadmap.

But somehow, it feels wrong. What happened to the paperless office? It’s almost 2010 (it’s the 31st of December, 11:45 in the morning, as I write this), Kopenhagen happened only a few weeks ago, I’ve been driving the most economical car on earth for years, and I use the printer as little as possible. I don’t want to have a tree cut down for me to be able to proof-read my blog post!

Enter the e-reader. 2009 was the year of the e-reader. A number of those devices already boost a keyboard and the possibility to add annotations to texts, to store them and synchronize them with your PC. And every modern writer nowadays carries an e-reader to read their books anyway, right?

So here’s the thought: let’s make a tool that allows you, after a long day of writing, to take all the texts you’ve worked on with you on your e-reader. You grab your reader again when you sit on the train, where you walk through all passages for typos and make annotations. The following day, you import all those changes back into Hippo, or maybe you’ve already sent them to the content repository over wireless email.

I don’t know whether the latest generation of e-readers are already open enough to share annotations with a content management system. Maybe we’ll have to wait for that to happen in 2010. But at least I found a very good excuse to rush downtown and treat myself with another gadget to go try it out!

Work in progress: Vijay's Easy Forms Plugin

2009-12-04T09:45:27Z

via vimeo.com

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

Observations from a Mega CMS project: content migration at the Dutch government @geebee

2009-12-02T13:04:54Z

via slideshare.net

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

#hippo screenshots - Google Analytics / Hippo CMS 7.2 integration by @superhick

2009-12-02T12:52:42Z

via machak.com

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

#hippo screenshots @vijaykiran Forms support for Hippo CMS !

2009-11-30T12:17:13Z

Now onto adding more field types and other whizzbang fields and stuff.

via vijaykiran.com

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

#hippo screenshots: Jasha's YouTube video player

2009-11-30T12:15:30Z

via flickr.com

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

#hippo screenshots: Jasha's Robots.txt editor

2009-11-30T12:14:25Z

via flickr.com

Posted via web from Arje's posterous

A #Hippo screenshot competition: first contribution

2009-11-26T14:22:23Z

By Goran. Nice!

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Don't think we've left our version 6 users out in the blind: Hippo CMS v6.05.08 released #hippo

2009-11-25T16:39:51Z

Good to see that Jasha is still cranking out releases! :)

---------oOo----------

Hippo is proud to announce the latest release of Hippo CMS 6. This
release contains improvements and several bug fixes.

Some highlights of this release:
* References view loads faster
* new HTML Cleaner version
* fixes in Xinha plugins for MSIE

For a full list of changes see the release notes:
Hippo CMS v6.05.08 Release notes [1]

For the details for upgrading see:
Hippo CMS v6.05.07 to v6.05.08 upgrade path [2]

The source code is available under the Apache Source License 2.0 from
our public SVN repository:
http://svn.hippocms.org/repos/hippo/hippo-cms/tags/Release-CMS-v6_05_08/

Kudos to all who helped to make the Hippo CMS 6 even better!

The Hippo CMS 6 development team

[1] http://wiki.onehippo.com/display/CMS/Hippo+CMS+v6.05.08+Release+notes
[2] http://wiki.onehippo.com/display/CMS/Hippo+CMS+v6.05.07+to+v6.05.08+upgrade+path

Posted via email from Arje's posterous

A #Hippo screenshot competition

2009-11-25T15:34:53Z

Alright. Let's see if I can initiate a mini-meme here.
I'm working my way through our mailinglist archives, and once again
I'm struck by the inspiring ideas folks on the list have. Sometimes
it's something they need for a website, sometimes a CMS plugin - and
they need a bit of help from the list. Almost without exception, that
person asks a question, gets an answer, and then leaves the list
without showing us the final result. That's sooo frustrating because
we'd love to see the cool stuff you make with Hippo!! :)

Let me give you an example. This was a question from a couple of weeks
ago (my apologies for abusing your post, Goran!):

"The plugin should have 3 fields. First 2 fields should be text fields
and user would enter numbers in those fields. Third field should be a
list of radio buttons with operations: "+", "-", "*" and "/". This, of
course, is not a plugin that I am trying to create, but a
simplification of the real problem I'm trying to solve."
http://n2.nabble.com/Best-practice-for-relatively-simple-plugin-tp4012582ef2274273.html

Now I'm all curious! What is that thing he's building??

I can understand not everyone has the time nor the ability to show off
their code and share it with the rest of the world. But I'd be very
interested in seeing at least a little screenshot of that single
plugin to see what it does :)

So here's my challenge.

When you've built something with Hippo and you don't mind sharing it
with the world - make a screenshot, post it somewhere on the web
(Flickr, Facebook, blog, anywhere), and Tweet me the URL of the image
(@arjecahn #hippo).

I'll collect those screenshots and put them in a future blogpost.
Looking forward to it :)

Posted via email from Arje's posterous

Crosspost Tweets, Photo's and blogpost by using email: giving www.posterous.com a spin

2009-11-19T12:47:00Z

Posted via email from Arje's posterous

ApacheCon US 09 Evening Meet-ups - Free for all

2009-10-26T13:01:18Z

Monday 2nd, Tuesday 3rd and Thursday 5th of November
Oakland, CA
Content Tech, Hadoop, Lucene, NoSql, OSGi/Felix, SocialAndWidgets, Subversion, Tomcat, Traffic Server Podling, WebCrawlers, WebServices

Join us for a third year of Apache Meetups! Users, committers, managers and developers will come together on the evenings of Monday 2nd, Tuesday 3rd, Thursday 5th of November .

Registration is free of charge, and everyone is invited. Register on the meetup wiki pages:

Monday 2nd (BarCamp Apache during the day)

20:00 - 22:00 NoSqlMeetup Room 1&2
20:00 - 22:00 Tomcat Room 6

Tuesday 3rd (BarCamp Apache during the day)

20:00 - 22:00 Lucene Room 1&2
20:00 - 22:00 OSGi/Felix Room 3
20:00 - 22:00 Traffic Server Podling Room 4

Thursday 5th

20:00 - 22:00 Content Tech 1&2
20:00 - 22:00 Web Services 3
20:00 - 22:00 SocialAndWidgetsMeetup
20:00 - 22:00 Web Crawlers Room 5
20:00 - 22:00 Hadoop Room 6
20:00 - 22:00 Subversion Room 7

If you're interested in any of these popular open source projects, come join us for an evening of presentations and discussion with the creators and committers working on the projects themselves.

Hosted by and located at the ApacheCon, these five special community meetings are taking taking place on the days before the ApacheCon conference in Amsterdam. Entrance is FREE for everyone, so sign up quick!

Location
Marriott Oakland City Center
1001 Broadway | Oakland, CA 94607 | +1 510 451-4000

What is a Meetup?

A MeetUp has a number of key attributes:

Focused on a single Apache project
Organized by the members of the project community itself
Open agenda, anyone can propose a talk, covering a wide range of subjects related to the core project
An opportunity for users, interested people and committers to get together

MeetUps generally happen during the evening, and, most importantly, are supposed to be fun (as well as useful).

ApacheCon is the official conference of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF), drawing ASF Members, innovators, developers, vendors, and users to experience the future of Open Source development. Drawing internationally-renowned thought-leaders, contributors, influencers, and organizations in the Open Source community, ApacheCon offers insight into the culture and community that develops and shepherds industry-leading Open Source projects, including Apache HTTP Server - the world's most popular Web server software for ten years running.

About ApacheCon US 2009

These special Apache Meetups are organized as free side events next to their bigger sister conference, the ApacheCon US 2009.

ApacheCon is the official user conference, trainings, and expo of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF). Celebrating its landmark 10th Anniversary, ApacheCon US takes place November 2 - 6 at the Marriott Oakland City Center, California.

The global conference series gives attendees a 360-degree view into the highly lauded community that develops and shepherds industry-leading Open Source projects, including Apache HTTP Server - the world's most popular Web server software. ApacheCon offers participants the opportunity to deepen their understanding of Open Source methodologies and further advance their participation with like-minded peers in a relaxed, community-focused environment. More than 500 users, developers, and thought leaders are expected to attend.

With engaging keynote addresses, technical presentations, informal networking, Birds-of-a-Feather discussions, and entertaining social events, ApacheCon US 2009 gives participants the opportunity to choose from more than 60 sessions at the beginner, intermediate, and expert level. From mission-critical implementations to groundbreaking technologies, incubating projects, and collaborative development, ApacheCon presenters and faculty are passionate about some of the hottest issues at the heart of the industry.

Hippo Forge Friday: October 30

2009-10-22T09:08:02Z

Get your hands dirty with Hippo, the open source Java CMS and Portal framework that everybody talks about. Join us for this free Hippo Forge Friday plugfest! We've scheduled an afternoon of free flow Hippo coding on Friday, October 30 in our offices in Amsterdam and San Francisco.

Build a CMS plugin, a portlet, a repository addon, an HST component, or something else that you think is cool enough to turn into an open source Hippo Forge project. The core Hippo developers will be there to help build the Hippo component you always dreamed of! A Google Analytics plugin, an image resizer, a Jira portlet, a Lightbox HST Component, you name it. You can sign up here.

Whether you're an experienced Hippo hacker or a complete newbie, come join us for some proper coding fun, beers and food. If you don't know where to start - we'll help you get on track :)

We'll spend half a day on pure hacking galore, a big BBQ, beers, and of course: geeky prizes! Bring your laptop and we'll take care of the rest.

What: First international Hippo Forge Friday

When: October 30th from 14.00 until 21.00

Where:
Hippo Office Amsterdam: Oosteinde 11, 1017 WT Amsterdam
Hippo Office San Francisco: 185 H Street, Suite B, Petaluma, CA 94952

Why: A fast paced, hands-on introduction to Hippo. Get to know Hippo by writing plug-ins, HST components, portlets, and all things Hippo-like. Gain eternal fame by winning one of our prestigious prizes!

Who: All Java developers and web enthousiasts.

Registration: Make sure you sign up early by filling in the Forge Friday sign up form.

More info: Read Tjeerd's blogpost about the last Forge Friday and keep an eye on the Wiki page.