a ramblings

Making Berylium Simpler

Well, it's time for another big round of development, and one of the big goals is going to be simplifying berylium-- call it Be-Lite-- so that someone who is new to web publishing can show up, create a functional site, and get started. The idea is that once they get used to the system, or need more powerful features, or customization or whatever, they will upgrade to full-fledged version.

In no particular order, here's some concepts for Be-Lite:

  • No optional fields, no publishing settings, no flavors

  • Base document/image name on Title

  • Simplify editorial control (hide rank/status details):
    Click to feature
    Click to unfeature
    Click to archive
    Click to delete (are you sure?)
  • Allow HTML so that existing content can be incorporated

  • Rethink interface to create a more conversational format-- content should run together into comments

  • Beef up email interface-- subscribe to folders, submit via email
    This is a natural outgrowth of the Blogger API I think
  • Fewer icons, more flow.

  • Drastically less customization: stylesheets + labels + icons only, webadmin'd

  • Pushbutton policy changes:
    Members can add: nothing | private items | public items
    Non-members can add: nothing | private comments | public comments
    Click here to allow HTML in member posts
    Click here to allow HTML in non-member posts

    A default site should consist of a main-page (renderable as newsfeed), archive (pseudo folder), projects folder (with projects addable as subfolders), member directory (pseudo folder), and image gallery (with a few icons). Also a control panel for admins. All of which is completely editable later, of course.

    Objects should also track their own statistics, we can't give the server *too* much of a break. :-)
  • By Chris Snyder on November 8, 2002 at 4:52pm

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