From: Ken Pooley <kpooley@sewanee.edu> To: "'midgard@greywolves.org'" <midgard@greywolves.org>, To: "'jeff@linux.com'" <jeff@linux.com> Subject: MWS, 11th of October, 2000 (#49) Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 14:33:39 -0500 Greetings! There is a lot going on behind the scenes in the world of Midgard. The first version of the Midgard 2.0 requirements document has been released along with a rewrite of the documents for 1.4. The final touches of 1.4 are being finished as David Guerizec rewrites the Admin interface. We should see one last beta release of 1.4 before the final candidate is released. Contents: Editor's Note 1.4 documentation, 2.0 requirements, and your contributions.. - Two new documents and a place for your input. Asgard is almost ready for public preview. - Most of us will have to do it eventually, planning a roadmap from 1.2.x to 1.4 ============================ 1.4 documentation, 2.0 requirements, and your contributions. ---------------------------- Over the last few weeks two new important documents have been released on the Midgard-project.org website, along with a new Midgard feature which, in addition to being very cool, allows the user community to contribute directly to the development and editing process. All of these can be found at the link on the homepage called Annotation Forum, http://www.midgard-project.org/topic/352.html Jean-Phillipe Brunon, of Aurora, released the Midgard 2.0 requirements document. While those who have followed the various discussions of the wants and needs will find few surprises in the requirements documents, the big picture provided by a comprehensive overview is invaluable. The document is a good summary of where we are at this point with Midgard. There are early sections devoted to what 1.4 is, as well as a good assessment of the limitations inherent in Midgard 1.*. In response to the limitations of 1.4, Brunon offers a point-by-point series of requirements that 2.0 must meet to be successful, as well as a concise table of technical requirements. The requirements document provides contextual landmarks by which progress and quality can be measured over the course of the development life cycle. That same context also provides a framework into which feedback from the extended Midgard community can find meaningful and useful placement...but more about that later. Last week, Ron Parker released the first version of the new complete documentation for version 1.4. The Midgard project has suffered from incomplete documentation almost from the start. Over the last few months, though, Ron Cedric Musso, Simon Kerr and Armand Verstappen have all done a great job of putting together a comprehensive framework for a complete set of documents as well a function reference which covers all of the new functionality of 1.4. Ron, and the other writers, as been working at following a fairly disciplined work flow with a goal of arriving at a document which is easy to use, predictably structured, and, most important, easily answers the questions put to it. Notable in this document are a number of contextual documents that provide a better basic understanding of why Midgard does what it does and how it gets the job done. Combined with a complete function reference, the 1.4 manual is a much more comprehensive document and should prove much more useful to new users. In both cases these documents represent a lot of work for the authors but also the work of the extended Midgard community. A lot of what we are seeing in 1.4 and in the plans for 2.0 comes in response to the suggestions and demands of the list serve over the last year. The annotation feature in the new website is a direct response to the integral role of the community in the development process. Annotation is a feature written by Emile in response to the need for enduser participation in development. This feature is an easy add-on script and is applicable to 1.2.* and 1.4. The goal of this addition is to solicit feedback and input from endusers as they work with the docuements. Suggestions, input, and corrections will be considered by the editorial staff and included as appropriate into the main body of the work. ============================ Asgard will be available for public preview soon. ---------------------------- The first beta version of the new administrative interface will soon be available for preview. David Guerizec has been working away on a ground-up rewrite of the admin site. The site implements the all of the new features of Midgard 1.4 but also adds a number of new features which build on 1.4's new functionality. A clean look and more navigation aids should make running a Midgard installation even more efficient. Asgard also includes a number of customization features which will make the end user experience smoother. Asgard is one of the last major parts of 1.4 to be finished before work on a final candidate release is started. We should expect that one more beta version will be released. ============================ About Midgard Midgard 1.4 is a content publishing tool for small and medium sized sites. It is based on Apache, MySQL and PHP. The application and its documentation are licensed GPL, LGPL and GFDL. This licensing strategy guarantees that developers, webmasters, ISPs, and business managers are investing in a strategy where they're free to share solutions and participate in the application design. -> http://www.midgard-project.org ---------------------------- About MWS The Midgard Weekly Summary is a bi-weekly newsletter for the Midgard user and developer community, as well as the extended web community. If you would like to release it or publish it, please contact Ken Pooley (kpooley@sewanee.edu). Previous issues of Midgard Weekly Summary can be found archived at the Midgard web site. -> http://www.midgard-project.org/topic/169.html Midgard mailing list. The Midgard mailing list is one of the most vital and visible aspects of the Midgard Community. Questions get answered, suggestions debated and work gets done. E-mail:midgard@greywolves.org ---------------------------- Places to see Midgard in Action: http://www.midgard-project.org http://www.hklc.com http://www.5fthigh.com/ http://www.linuxde.org/ http://www.hec.nl/ http://www.stonejobs.com/ -More to come ============================