Hi all,

I know it has taken some time, but I have managed to secure some funds for
the future development of Aegir or an Aegir like interface.  We have now
over 100 users looking after content using this system so it would be a real
shame and a major headache if it disappeared entirely. 

We would like to propose some changes and bug fixes to Aegir and to see its
reinstatement for active development.  You comments and additions to Aegir
would be most appreciated and if the developers are happy to do this, we may
be able to fund some of your changes as well as the ones listed as well.

Of the new features we need:

- The HTML Area interface to be brought up to date and to be XHTML compliant
(and to be given a bit of an aesthetic makeover)

- Site wide defined maximum age for news and articles i.e. when a page is
created or updated a date is stored that reflects when the page will be out
of date as defined by a configuration setting (rather than through approve).
Out of date pages would be automatically suspended and a holding page put in
place.  The owner of the page and the site administrator would be
automatically emailed a set number of days before the page is suspended and
again when the page is suspended.  Keeps people on their toes and the
content of the site up to date.

- The option to make mandatory the input of defined user details - e.g.
name, email address etc.  When mandatory, the user details page would pop up
on first login into the site and wont go away until details are filled in.

- Word html filter/squasher.  Most of our users use MS Word and like to copy
word content directly into the htmlarea.  This results in no end of issues
and headaches as we all know that Word's implementation of html is far from
perfect.  We really need a way of simplifying, cleaning up and making xhtml
compliant the word html, or a way/option of getting rid of the html all
together and treating the cut and paste from word as a plain text file.

- Image and document management needs to be refined a bit.  At the moment we
treat all documents as images and this poses some issues, especially with
the renaming and organisation of documents.

- The tables property body could do with a lick of paint as well.  Maybe
reorganising how the table is created to make it easier for users to
understand. - cols, rows, width, spacing, border etc all as individual
entries on the page with drop down lists of options for some?  A selected
table should also be able to be edited though the same means.  If a table is
presented as a percentage width, when it is resized in htmlarea, can it
maintain its percentage width rather than reverting to a fixed width?

- Table cells - can they be manually resized as well?  Maybe as a percentage
rather than a fixed width?

- Providing easier facilities to ensure that content is standards and WIA
compliant? For example that inserting an image asks for an alt tag, and a
table for a description etc.

- Applying stylesheet elements to html tags though the UI?  These sort of
changes could be implemented with a user defined stylesheet element stored
by a special name in styles for example.  The htmlarea would read and list
these styles for the user to use?  Or perhaps a list of defined styles could
be added that can be changed though the use of a stylesheet?

- Easier way to link between internal pages to avoid duplication of a page.
Page links at the moment have bee depreciated haven't they?

- Improve the efficiency and speed of the Aegir core? Faster ways of
displaying the lists of pages and site groups etc?

-  Anyway to take ownership to the granularity of a single page, rather than
a topic?

- Documentation for users and developers

Ok that's enough for now.  Your comments on these would be most appreciated
and any additional features to be added.  With the good graces of the
development team, Aegir might be given a new breath of life :-)  

Cheers

Mike


 
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Michael Ross - Pan Leeds Web Developer

Health Informatics Service����� Tel: (0113) 305 7416
2nd Floor������ ������� ������� Fax: (0113) 305 7398
North West House
West Park Ring Road
West Park
Leeds
LS16 6QG 


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