Archive for category News and updates
A Sneak Peak at SnowCMS 2.0 Beta’s New Control Panel
Posted by Ian in News and updates on July 4th, 2011
Hey everybody! Yesterday I decided to take a little break from copying and pasting code (switching over to the new theme system), but I still wanted to work on something that had to do with SnowCMS.
I figured that I would work on the new control panel layout slated to be released with SnowCMS 2.0 beta, and now that I am done with the HTML aspect I decided to give everybody a peak. Check it out:
New Log In
Now you will no longer receive an error asking you to go to another page to log in, just to come back again. With 2.0 beta you will be able to log right into your account from the authentication page, if need be (if you are logged in, your user name will be filled in already, and all you will need to do is enter your password).
Redesigned Home Layout
The new starting page for the control panel takes a lot of queues from the current design as seen in SnowCMS 2.0 alpha, but I thought a little reorganization was needed, especially thinking about the possibility of people having a massive amount of plugins adding functionality and other settings within the control panel… So I decided to show navigation options in two places: the sidebar and in the middle with the icons.
As you can see, I also moved “News from SnowCMS” to a more prominent location, instead of having it crammed into the sidebar as it is now.
Right below the header, and above the middle content of the site, there is now a bar which contains two things: a link tree and notifications. Now navigating back out of “corners” in the control panel will be much easier as the link tree will allow you to jump up, if there is one (there will be a new addition to the API to allow plugins to integrate with this).
More Prominent Notifications
Right now in SnowCMS 2.0 alpha notifications are only displayed on the start page of the control panel, which is fine, but it seems logical to be able to view these notifications regardless of location within the control panel.
With 2.0 beta, all a user needs to do to view these notifications is to click “Notifications” on the right side of the link tree, which will then display a window containing current notifications.
I have yet to decide what exactly plugins will be able to display in this notifications area (presumably text and a link), so all I can show you right now is “No Notifications!”
Hope You Like What You See
Well, I hope you like what you see! I certainly look forward to reaching the 2.0 beta milestone, as we will become feature complete at that point, and we will be very close going “gold,” when I can start building plugins (and others, of course — they can be created now, it’s just that a lot things may change until then) to show off what SnowCMS is capable of doing.
Till next time, be sure to follow us on Twitter @SnowCMS, check out our Google Code Project website, along with registering at the SnowCMS Dev Forum.
An update on progress, and the domain renewed
Posted by Ian in Developer updates, News and updates on June 20th, 2011
If anyone was paying attention (which I know no one was…) you may have noticed that the snowcms.com domain had expired, and of course the website then showed a lovely GoDaddy renewal notice. I apologize about that! The domain expired right in the sweet spot where I couldn’t renew it.
Anyways, I just thought I would give an update on the development status of SnowCMS v2 alpha 2, and I have actually been working on it even when the domain was down.
We are actually very close to the completion of SnowCMS v2 alpha 2, in terms of stages. There are three stages, and two of them are already completed. I have started on the third stage, but I there is still quite a bit left to do.
The third stage is converting the system over to the new theme setup, which no longer involves calling theme()->header() and theme()->footer(), but instead calling theme()->render() instead. By doing this, embedded HTML will be removed from the core system and into separate template files, which can be easily replaced by plugins if required.
SnowCMS 2.0 alpha 1 is ready to be tested!
Posted by Ian in News and updates on June 10th, 2011
The SnowCMS Dev Team is more than proud to announce the immediate availability of SnowCMS 2.0 alpha 1, which can be downloaded from Google Code.
Please understand that SnowCMS 2.0 alpha is likely to be very unstable! Therefore it should not be used on any production site whatsoever, as this release is merely a preview.
If you would like to help us out, you can download and install SnowCMS then give it a test run, and if you find any problems please submit a bug on our Google Code project site, or the developer forum. Every little thing helps, especially seeing as right now I am the only developer, though soren121 said that he does plan on helping this summer, so I have a lot of work to do!
Seeing as SnowCMS is designed to be highly modular, there currently isn’t much you can do with the system, except logging in, registering, viewing profiles, along with messing around in the control panel. Due to this, there are no links in the template to the log in form, registration form, or administrative control panel, so for the time being, you will need to enter the URL to them directly. The log in form is available at index.php?action=login, registration at index.php?action=register, and the control panel at index.php?action=admin.
Sorry about that! But hey, it is an alpha!
Follow us on Twitter!
Posted by Ian in News and updates on June 10th, 2011
If you want to be kept up-to-date with all things SnowCMS, you should go ahead and follow us on Twitter, @SnowCMS.
I will still be posting updates to this blog, but I will be posting more tidbits more often on the Twitter account.
Thanks for your interest in SnowCMS!
Yeah, I think we are ready to roll…
Posted by Ian in News and updates on June 10th, 2011
Wow, I can’t believe I am about to say this, but: I think SnowCMS v2.0 alpha is ready-to-go.
It has been over 1 year and 7 months since development on SnowCMS v2.0 alpha began, and probably about 3 years since the SnowCMS project first began some time in early 2008, but it appears as though SnowCMS 2.0 is one step closer to “going gold.”
I will be releasing a download for SnowCMS 2.0 alpha sometime this weekend, and will begin working on SnowCMS 2.0 alpha 2 shortly thereafter. There is still a lot of ground to cover, and alpha 2 will be a big one. The alpha 2 release will comprise of under-the-hood changes, so when the update does come, don’t expect to see any changes to the way the system looks — or any new features, for that matter. If you want to see what is planned for alpha 2 more specifically, check out our road map.
Before I do release SnowCMS 2.0 alpha, I just want to test it out a little bit to make sure there are no huge problems that really need to be fixed. Sure, it’s an alpha, not even beta, but still.
For those wondering, the update process for alpha 2 will be fairly straightforward, as you will be able to upgrade through the Update component accessible in the control panel — so long as everything goes off without a hitch. I have tested the update mechanism many times, but you never know! 
More soon!
Now we really are getting close!
Posted by Ian in News and updates on June 20th, 2010
As of last night, I have committed r991, which completes plugin management. That means now plugins can be installed, uninstalled, enabled, disabled and updated… Something I have been waiting to complete for quite some time
So now we are really close! I hope to have an alpha release soon… You can always discuss at the SnowCMS Dev Forum.
Getting closer day by day, of course…
Posted by Ian in News and updates on May 23rd, 2010
I have been doing quite a bit of work on SnowCMS lately, getting quite a bit done, of course.
Today I got quite a bit of plugin management done, so they can now be activated, deactivated and deleted, though updating them is not yet supported. I would like to get adding plugins done tomorrow as well.
All I can say is I am getting really close and I can’t wait until it’s time to release SnowCMS to the world!
Sorry, no dev release
Posted by Ian in News and updates on May 5th, 2010
Sorry everybody, but we have decided not to have a SnowCMS v2.0 dev release anymore. This is because once we get the things that need to be done, well, done, it would be more appropriate to label it as a beta release. Though we still do have quite a few things to do, I really wish not to release SnowCMS v2.0 without the plugin manager (as it would have been done in the dev release… Plugins could still be added and enabled, however through phpMyAdmin).
So keep an eye out, but as always, you can check out the dev forum, but also Google Code, where you can check out the source if you are interested.
Surprise! There could be a dev release soon!
Posted by Ian in News and updates on April 17th, 2010
I have finally got the updating system operational 
Which means we are very close to having a dev release of SnowCMS available for public download.
Why will it only be a dev release? Anyone will be able to download it, of course, however, the plugin manager won’t work. You can still develop and install plugins, but it has to be done via phpMyAdmin (or whatever you use). Why? Because the SnowCMS site will provide plugin services, and as of yet, I don’t know how it will be setup until I make it.
As long as I have the time, there could be a dev release coming next week! However, here is what still needs doing:
- Installer
- Admin account approval (it can be done, however, the members don’t receive emails saying they can now log in)
- Maybe get most of the filed issues done or at least started.
Just incase you were wondering, it is more than likely updates will be available via the update system, as long as it works (as I said, I tested it, such as making new files, new folders, editing files and even executing a PHP file for anything else that needs doing, but you never know! There could be issues!).
Anyways, I myself am getting pretty excited, as SnowCMS finally becomes a reality 
SnowCMS not to be distributed with plugins
Posted by Ian in News and updates on April 3rd, 2010
Yesterday as I was listening to a podcast (Windows Weekly, if I remember right), they were talking about how some browsers are distributed with certain plugins built in and ready to go, such as Flash. We all know how many issues Flash has, right?
So I began thinking, hold on… If any plugins in the default SnowCMS package have any vulnerabilities, an entirely new version of SnowCMS would have to be released because that installation package would need updating (I don’t want to update it without a version change…), but all existing installations would merely get the plugins update through the plugin manager, and their SnowCMS version would be different, and a fake update would need to be sent out to change it.
To me, that is quite pointless. So the idea of distributing SnowCMS with plugins is out. The plugins folder will be completely empty when you download the installation package 
. Plus, this allows other plugins which aren’t first party to have just as much chance to be picked as ours.
But of course! When you setup SnowCMS the very last step will mention the fact that SnowCMS, by default, comes with very little functionality, and there will likely be a list of plugins (such as link managers, page managers, stuff most people would intend to use SnowCMS for) with the most popular ones.
Just thought I would let you know
If you are wondering what’s currently going on, right now I am working on member management, which will require a new tool (the Table class, but more on that later), once the new tool and member management are done, I will start on an error log viewer (completely slipped my mind!!!). After that, work on the SnowCMS site will begin! So soon enough, SnowCMS.com will actually be powered by SnowCMS Why you may ask..? Because! Until the site is setup, I won’t know exactly how the plugin site will be setup, which is quite important to do before plugin management can be done
Till next time, cya!