Darren Ferguson - Blog
20 July 2009 at 21:41
Umbraco Dashboard RSS package available to download
I've released a package allows you to display RSS feeds on your Umbraco dashboard. The package is available to dowload from my Umbraco packages page or the our.umbraco project page. Features of this package include:
- Full PDF documentation
- Source code available
- Refreshes feeds using AJAX on a configurable interval
- Fully customisable CSS
- Use your own XSLT to transform feeds
- Retrieve feeds from URL or local cache.
This initial release is relatively simple and just renders RSS. The next release will allow you to build customisable filters on top of RSS feeds by implementing some simple interfaces. This will allow you to do simple things like display most recent content from Umbraco and add edit/delete buttons.
Please feel free to send your feedback, comments or suggestions.
15 July 2009 at 20:40
Creating a license provider that interfaces with the Umbraco store
At codegarden 09 I attended an open space session that discussed the three current package repositories - our.umbraco projects, the Umbraco package repository and the Umbraco store. My action point from this discussion was to write up some information on how to create a license provider that works with the Umbraco store. With this in mind I've released my framework for creating licenses on our.umbraco.org and also created a wiki page which explains how to configure the application.
The application is written around spring.net and is easy to get up and quickly. It is also very flexible allowing you to implement some simple interfaces in several areas of the application where you may want to customise functionality. Integration testing is already completed and my framework already provides licenses for two products in the Umbraco store.
13 July 2009 at 22:07
Tweet on publish for Umbraco – available to download
I've released a new version of my Umbraco package that sends tweets when you publish a content node. The package is available to download from my Umbraco packages page or the our.umbraco project page.
Features include:
- Complete rewrite of my previous twitter package
- Configure multiple twitter accounts.
- Send multiple tweets per publish.
- Ensure documents are not tweeted on re-publish.
- Support direct messages and @mentions
- Send different tweets per document type.
- Filter tweets by domain.
- Includes full PDF manual.
So why is this useful? I use the package to publicise blog posts and to send me a direct message when a comment is left on my blog so that I can quickly check whether or not it is a spam comment and act accordingly.
I'll provide a demonstration screen-cast shortly. In the meantime I'd love to hear your feedback.
10 July 2009 at 13:37
UK Umbraco meetup is on 6th august @ LBi, London
We have a confirmed venue for a UK meetup LBi will host us in London on August 6th. It is a pretty cool space - here is the break room.
We have an event wiki page with all of the details here. You can sign up to attend by leaving your details on this wiki page or if you are not comfortable leaving your details on a public URL then just drop me a mail. Spaces are limited so please don't leave it until the last minute. Please sign up on the page rather than just commenting in the forum as I need to provide a list of people to the venue on the day.
We need your help!
Although most of the practical details are in place there is plenty the Umbraco community can do to support this event.
Give a presentation
If you think that you have a compelling talk/presentation to give at the event, please leave some details on this wiki page or contact me by email.
Tweet/Blog/Email your friends
Be sure to let any UK Umbraco users know about the event by sending links to the wiki pages above. Use the hashtag #umbracouk.
Non Umbracians are welcome there will be plenty of beginner focused material. If you know any CMS professionals who may be interested in Umbraco get them to come along.
Come along prepared to participate
We don't want the meet-up to be a bunch of guys standing up and talking we want to have group sessions and may be some open space. Come along prepared to speak up, with questions and topics around Umbraco in mind.
Finally
Without community partcipation this event will just be some tech guys in a room. By contributing to the wiki pages above and throwing your suggestions into the ring we can make it something much more than that.
07 July 2009 at 20:20
Umbraco UK meetup survey results are in and a date is set
The Umbraco UK meetup survey results are in and available to download from this page at our.umbraco.org
Following on from the results there is now likely to be a meetup in London on Thursday 6th August 2009.
The meetup only happens if people commit to coming and we find some quality people to talk/present.
The day will run from 11.30am until 4.30pm - moving to a pub/bar after 4.30 for informal drinks networking. you can just attend the drinks if you don't want to do a whole day.
Please support this event by blogging and tweeting a link to the our.umbraco.org page, signing up to attend here (just add your name to the wiki page), and most importantly contributing to the agenda. You can contibute by either emailing me a topic that you'd like to present or listing it on the topics wiki page. You can also edit the agenda on this wiki page.
I cannot stress enough that this is everyone's event. I am just getting the ball rolling here by setting a date and a venue. The people will ultimately make or break the day. Please get involved!
06 July 2009 at 21:06
Quick tip: jQuery to replace lists with selects when your lists are getting long
My list of archived content by month in the right hand side navigation of this page was getting a little long. The following jQuery script replaces the un-ordered list with a select input which takes up much less page real estate.
The page still looks the same to any passing search engines though.
var archiveContent = '';
$("li[class='archive']").each(function() {
archiveContent += '<option value="'+$('a:first', this).attr('href')
+'">'+$('a:first', this).html()+'</option>\n';
$(this).remove();
});
archiveContent = '<li>\n<form id="archiveForm"><select
id="archiveSelect">\n'+archiveContent;
archiveContent += '</select><input type="submit" value="go"
class="submit" id="archiveSubmit"/></form></li>';
$('#archiveHeader').after(archiveContent);
$('#archiveSubmit').click(function() {
window.location.href = $('#archiveSelect').val();
return false;
});
03 July 2009 at 08:05
New version of Google maps Umbraco datatype released
I've released a new version of my Google maps datatype for Umbraco. The new package and the documentation are available from the our.umbraco project page.
Here is a summary of the new features and enhancements:
- Added a clear button to remove a stored location.
- Moved all CSS from user control to external CSS file to allow user to alter map appearance.
- Added support for default map locations on a per domain basis.
- GUI based configuration of datatype, no need to edit XML config files any more.
- Config GUI can be added to Umbraco dashboard.
- General code/markup cleanup.
For me, the datatype is now pretty much feature complete. If you'd like to see anything else added, you can submit a request in the package feature request forum. Bugs can be reported in the package Bug report forum.
Over the next few weeks I'll blog more on displaying maps on the front end of your web site and share a little more information on calculating the distance between stored points.
02 July 2009 at 09:19
What kind of UK Umbraco meetup do you want.
If you are interested in attending an Umbraco UK meet up please fill out the following survey. I'll let this survey run for another 5 days and then make the results public in the forum at our.umbraco.org.
I'm not necessarily committing to organise a meet up here, just trying to get a sense for where/when and what should happen according to the UK community.