[imc-melbourne-work] CMS

Thu Jun 14 06:42:44 UTC 2007

I still think it is work exploring the idea of making indymedia into
more of a 'tag' than a site (at least in some sense). One idea might
be that the indymedia 'site' becomes a closed site for editors to
publish and promote quality news stories. These news stories can come
in via the collective, and also other feeds from external sites or
blogs; so someone could subscribe their blog to indymedia, and what
they post to their blog (tagged with indymedia) also comes up in
indymedia. Good posts can be re-published as features.

Given that we have down-time to re-assess indymedia, I'd personally
rather not jump straight back into re-implementing something that is
not substantially different to what it was ten years ago (this was the
main purpose behind the dev site - to implement something which would
tie us over until we could re-assess things).

Cheers,

vik

On 6/14/07, takver <tirin at takver.com> wrote:
> Do you want to take a quick look and assess the dev site, given Vic's
> comments below?
>
> If a meeting is organised I want to present a report on the dev site,
> its status and what may be required to get it to production standard.
> http://dev.melbourne.indymedia.org/
>
> thanks Cam
> Takver
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: victor rajewski <askvictor at gmail.com>
> Date: Jun 14, 2007 4:03 PM
> Subject: Re: [imc-melbourne-work] CMS
> To: ansible at takver.com
>
>
> Hi Takver,
>
> The main sticking point with the dev site was how to handle anonymous
> comments. I had written an ugly hack that would roughly take care of
> it, but it was a hack, and it was ugly. It was roughly working when I
> tried it last year, but due to its ugliness, I have no idea how it
> well it would play with future releases of drupal. And with that in
> mind, if there is no-one around to maintain the ugly hack, then the
> same sort of thing will happen as with other indymedia codebases.
>
> So in short, we could have a working system happening quite quickly,
> but it would not be long term maintainable. I would lean towards
> stepping back, reassessing what features are necessary and desirable,
> then re-appraising what software to use, and what to modify in it, as
> the hacks I've done basically re-create the functionality of the
> existing site, albeit with a couple of extra features.
>
> I also don't think the issue of IP logging was address on the dev site
> - by default drupal logs IPs in a couple of tricky places (tho I think
> one of the IMCs has addressed this with a patch).
>
> It would also be worthwhile talking to sydney as they are running drupal.
>
> Cheers,
>
> vik
>
> On 6/14/07, takver <tirin at takver.com> wrote:
> > Hi Victor
> >
> > If a meeting is held and Melbourne Indymedia is resuscitated back to
> > life, I want some idea of what state the development site is in to
> > report to the meeting.
> >
> > Can you give a status report of where the dev site is up to, what has
> > been implemented, what features you think still needs to be implemented
> > before going to production, whether you are still interested in working
> > on the site either by yourself or with others, if other drupal
> > developers can be found.
> >
> > I am going to try to come up to speed on drupal - I have good
> > html,css,javascript skills, but haven't touched php yet.
> >
> > thanks
> > Takver
> >
> > >  From following the imc-cms and alternatives lists it looking like
> > > drupal is going to be one of the main choices for running an IMC. At
> > > present I'd say there are 15-20 sites using or moving to drupal, the
> > > problem is that there is a real lack of coordination amongst the
> > > sites doing this - no one is really putting up their hand and saying
> > > "i'm going to make this happen!". Additionally imc-cms and
> > > alteratives discussions are still to draw any solid conclusions.
> > >
> > > The problem is linked to the broader organisational disarray in the
> > > network. A different CMS won't solve this issue. At the moment drupal
> > > is the best option in terms of tech support within the network. Once
> > > developers of Mir and Sf-active move to it (or another CMS) things
> > > will start rolling more I feel - Jay from phillyimc seems to have
> > > lots of energy and might be someone who is able to pull people together.
> > >
> > > So perhaps it is just worth waiting another 6 months again for a
> > > proper IMC distro of drupal to emerge, or find a drupal person
> > > willing to take up Vik's work. Might be worth asking Kam as Syd imc
> > > is still down - he might have some time on his hands.
> > >
> > > Some thoughts.
> > > And.
> > >
> > > On 18/02/2007, at 10:32 PM, victor rajewski wrote:
> > >
> > > > On 2/18/07, rory <zeroworkethic at riseup.net> wrote:
> > > >> there seem to be a few questions we need to consider here:
> > > >>
> > > >> if vic is too busy to finish the coding can we do it any other way?
> > > >> if it is just a matter of waiting a while to finish it, can we
> > > >> wait, or
> > > >> do we need to start moving now to remain viable?
> > > >> how well does scoop fit our needs; is it a viable indymedia platform?
> > > >> how difficult is the transition to scoop?
> > > >
> > > > First up, if there are so many other imc's moving to drupal, have they
> > > > implemented the features we need - if so, how and why are we not going
> > > > with those mods; if not, why not and why do we need those features?
> > > >
> > > > The transition would probably not be over hard. Drupal would be easier
> > > > as I've already written scripts to move the data from sf-active to
> > > > drupal, but that means half the functionality of moving to any other
> > > > CMS already exists.
> > > >
> > > >> its  a question of viability/do-ability/effort/time of drupal v's the
> > > >> same of scoop. there don't seem to be enough answers to these
> > > >> questions
> > > >> yet.
> > > >
> > > > I think the question comes down to what features we need, and what
> > > > features are available ready-to-go in the CMS's in question. I haven't
> > > > extensively looked at scoop for some time; the sole reason I'm pushing
> > > > it right now is that kuro5hin seems to produce high quality news
> > > > content from a roughly democratic process using this software - and
> > > > that is the goal we are trying to achieve. In terms of actually using
> > > > it and what features we need/want for day-to-day running of the site,
> > > > I don't know how well it would go.
> > > >
> > > > On 2/18/07, Nigel W <changeling_au_2004 at yahoo.com.au> wrote:
> > > >> Scoop looks like it could be nice, however I don't think we should
> > > >> make any
> > > >> snap decisions. I looked at some of the Scoop sites linked from
> > > >> <http://scoop.kuro5hin.org/special/sites> - some of them
> > > >> are pretty rockin' sites but some seem to be having issues.
> > > >> <http://www.shouldexist.org/> is down and they're saying "The
> > > >> engine we were
> > > >> using was being attacked by spammers and exploit script kids, and
> > > >> the site
> > > >> was languishing. We've taken the site down until these issues can be
> > > >> resolved, most likely by migrating to a new engine / architecture."
> > > >> The Mormans at <http://www.mahonri.org/> are "undergoing
> > > >> maintenance" and
> > > >> <http://www.insid3r.org/> and <http://www.vegdot.org> no longer
> > > >> exist.
> > > >>     I think we should find out if Scoop has anything to do with
> > > >> the issues
> > > >> they've been having before we make any decisions.
> > > >
> > > > This is definitely cause for concern. Drupal has a much larger user
> > > > base than scoop; so these sorts of issues are more likely to be dealt
> > > > with faster. On the other hand, kuro5hin has quite a large following
> > > > has had to deal with these issues as well, and has hung around to tell
> > > > the tale. It may be worth finding out the cause of these problems
> > > > (forums and such).
> > > >
> > > > I'm not advocating snap decisions; quite the opposite. I'm trying to
> > > > look at the long-term viability of any system so that we don't have to
> > > > repeat this process in a couple of years.
> > > >
> > > > Having said that, I'm not going to be able to play an active role in
> > > > whatever happens (at least not for the next half a year to be
> > > > realistic; maybe longer). So I don't want to be a distraction from any
> > > > actual movement on this issue. I just haven't seen any movement of
> > > > late.
> > > >
> > > > vik
> > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > imc-melbourne-work mailing list
> > > > imc-melbourne-work at indymedia.org.au
> > > > http://lists.indymedia.org.au/mailman/listinfo/imc-melbourne-work
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
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> > > imc-melbourne-work at indymedia.org.au
> > > http://lists.indymedia.org.au/mailman/listinfo/imc-melbourne-work
> > >
> > >
> >
> > --
> > in solidarity
> > Takver
> >
> >
>