Activedition Blog

New advances for Activedition

Ross — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 09:59:00 GMT

The Product Solutions team has been busy working on some new advancements to Activedition, aimed at making the Users life easier. These include the introduction of bookmark anchor tags and draft site portals.

Bookmark anchors are hyperlinks used in web pages to link to another part of the page. They can be particularly useful in long documents to allow users to move around the page without the need for scrolling or to link to particular subject areas. Activedition now has a feature which makes creating bookmarks easy.

Users can insert bookmarks into a page using the current WYSIWYG editor in Activedition. A new option in the toolbar gives the user a pop-up box which allows them to select an ID for the bookmark. The bookmark is then added to the page, represented by a small anchor icon. The user can check the ID of each bookmark on the page by hovering over its icon. Another option in the toolbar allows the user to show or hide the location of all bookmarks on the page.

When a new bookmark is created, a link is automatically created for it and stored in the link library in Activedition. These links can be placed as per other Activedition links. Once placed, each link will take the user to the exact location of its corresponding bookmark. These links can be placed on the same page as its bookmark to allow quick navigation or on any other page in the site to link to specific subject areas.

A new feature in Activedition will allow the draft version of a website to be viewed via the delivery application. This would allow clients to have a current live website but also be able to preview or demo another version of the site which may include new content, new features or even a whole new re-branding of the site. This would be available without the need to log in to the Activedition management application. The user must still be a registered user within the site. They provide login details which will then open the site in draft mode.

Possible Scenario; A client has a website: www.livesite.com The client is developing an all new improved version of the current site to fit in with the re-branding and change of focus of the company. The company’s head of IT is summoned to a meeting with the board who want to see this amazing new website and give their approval. There is internet access but no Activedition or development tools etc. Head of IT can still show off the site as he has either set up a link from the existing site or even better, has set up www.newsite.com which allows the site to be viewed in draft mode.

New image profile feature for Activedition

Derek — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 09:44:00 GMT

As part of the Product Solutions team, I have been working on a new feature for Activedition 4.1, build 8 that deals with image profiles.

Image profiles can be created on a per multimedia library basis. You can set a prefix and/or a suffix to be applied to the image name, the quality of the image and the maximum height and width you want the image to be.

The first profile you create is the pictures ‘main’ profile whereby every image that you upload into Activedition will take on these settings and become the main image. Any other profiles that are created will create sub pictures of the main picture and will be listed so in a treeview structure in the multimedia manager.

Profiles come in handy if you want to display smaller or larger images of the same image in certain parts of your website. Instead of manually editing an image, simply set up the profiles to do all of your resizing for you automatically.

Image profiles can also be used in Content Management Designer Templates where you specify the name of the profile of the library that the image is being held in and that particular image will be displayed on the screen. The same thing can also be used in meta data, whereby you specify an image profile name in an Activedition Meta tag which will display profile picture on screen to the user.

I'm a developer, adopt me!

Phil — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 17:21:00 GMT

I recently attended the Microsoft REMIX08 conference held in Brighton. The main theme of the conference was the user experience.

In the past, the some of the most successful software has offered the best user experience. Bill Buxton said in his keynote speech that he admired some of Microsoft’s most successful competitors including Google and Apple, for their user centric applications and devices.

Why did he admire them? Probably for the same reason that has made many people buy their products. They have turned the focus of the product to User Experience. They make their products a joy for the consumer to use.

From the initial stages of creating a product, it should not just be engineers that are involved in shaping the product, with the designers involved at the end to make it look nice. Designers are the creators of as important a part of the product as any other – creating the interface and thus experience that the user has while using the product. This is not something that can be added at the end, it is intrinsic to the design, specification and implementation of the product.

Successful projects have shown the importance and success that can be obtained from developing a user experience that works.

Apple’s success came from the design of some key products – the iPod and iMac. Before these products were created, Apple was not as successful. However, the designer that created the iPod and iMac was an Apple employee in both eras. So what happened? What happened was the focus of the development of the new products changed to include design from the start – Apple had found a winning formula. Their products were easy to sell as the user experience had been developed as part and parcel of the products.

Microsoft have bought into this idea, and so showcased a variety of new technologies and development tools that can be used to create Rich Application Interfaces (RAI). One of the most talked about ones is Silverlight. Expect lots more on this in the coming months.

At the designer panel, an open discussion was had about the role of Designers and Developers. Developers can gain an understanding of design, but cannot become a designer, just as designers could not develop a technical application. The roles of both are key and equally as important. Developers should work with designers and not think they can do their job!

The room was mostly full of designers. To bridge the standoff, one lead designer said to fellow designers – adopt a developer. I agree! I am a developer, and can develop whatever is wanted.

Go on Mr Designer, I’m a developer, adopt me! Let’s make a great user experience!

.NET Certification: What's the point?

John — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 10:27:00 GMT

When I started at C2 Software a little over a year ago I set myself a personal goal; to pass at least one Microsoft certification before the end of 2008.

Now one year on and I have exceeded this, passing two exams, 70-536 and 70-528. Together these exams combine to qualify me as a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist (MCTS) in .NET Framework 2.0 Web Applications.

The MCTS credentials are designed to enable I.T. professionals to target specific technologies, in my case Web Development.

The exam format is multiple choice and at the end of the exam you are given the opportunity to review your answers prior to finishing. The results are provided there and then and I can tell you it's a great feeling when you see the “Passed” message.

Along with the processes and services that C2 Software offers, certification also counts towards C2 Software’s membership as a Microsoft partner. This is an accreditation that we are all proud of as it shows that we have proven abilities to provide our clients with the solutions they require. For clients it provides reassurance on the level of capability provided by the organisation and the company’s area of expertise.

For me the next step is to sit more exams. 70-547 is the next one. This course concentrates on designing and developing Web based applications. On completion of this I will achieve the Microsoft Certified Professional Developer (MCPD) certification and following on from this I will be looking towards sitting an upgrade exam to move to .NET 3.5. Given that the Activedition CMS has moved to support the .NET 3.5 platform this can’t come soon enough for me.

Being a developer is more than just a job for me, I find it a very rewarding career, giving me the opportunity to push myself further and ultimately provide me with the skills required to continue to offer our clients new and innovative solutions. I suppose this is the main reason for sitting these exams.

The rise of the community...

admin — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 01:28:00 GMT

I've had a great time getting to know Community Server. It represents a new approach for us here at C2 as it is a third party product that we have integrated with Activedition.

The good news is that it has a great interface for blogging and forums and that's the key issue that it will solve for clients.

This is just a first short post to get the new site up and running. We are planning a once to twice weekly update on the Activedition blog to keep you up to date with the latest updates and the new ideas.

We hope you enjoy!

Finlay