Lightquick Web Design - High Quality, Low Cost

Joomla is a pain in the ar%e to work with in many ways, but it also a wonderful CMS when you get around its idiosynchrasies. You need to understand the relationship between menu items, content items, files, images, table entries, PHP scripts, CSS layouts and client side scripting. The order and methods in which these things are created are important and a lot of the approaches you use to create a Joomla site differ from those you would use when creating a normal HTML website.

One issue I have with Joomla is its continuing failure to grasp the mettle of what a content management system should do. The current CMS only really handles text, links and images. The text is stored within the joomla database and the references to the images are html tags pointing to flat files stored in the host's file system. The links are contained as straight text in tables or as hrefs in the content. Joomla itself has no knowledge of images or files, just the textual components stored within its database.

At the moment Joomla allows you to create menu links that point to pre-existing content articles. However, when you want to link a menu to anything other than a piece of Joomla database content this requires an 'external' link, a complete URL link to a location on your site that is not served by Joomla, for example, a link to a file in the file system on the host. This means that Joomla is limited to serving only textual content with images and links. This sounds fine but you would be safe to assume that on the presentation side this is no more than a HTML website can do.

This base functionality appears a little primitive and if you want a more mature handling of content such as a utility to act as a download manager or to serve PDF documents within Joomla content you have to resort to contrivances that seem out of place and 'bolted on' the outside as it were. Joomla can do this sort of thing but only with the help of 3rd party additions that are designed by 3rd party designers to their own rules and agendas.

Now, if Joomla was able to load objects instead of just textual content into Joomla tables, the objects being anything you want: files; images; links; text &c then you could display and manage these resources using standard Joomla functionality and there would be no need for all the extra plugins and components. Joomla would become a real content management system, managing anything that you can define within the database tables.

The objects that refer to files need not be stored within tables, but merely exist as references to their real location along with other pertinent information that is added at upload time. This information comprises the 'object'. Then whenever you want to link  to an object or a category of objects you just do so using core Joomla functionality. As a result, in one page you could have flatfiles, images, text, PDFs, links and rich text documents along with simple descriptive text all handled in one joomla blog listing extracted from one Joomla content category.

At the moment Joomla is still clunky due to the need to install a load of extra add-ons and sometimes you can find yourself bending through hoops to achieve even something quite simple.

Let us think of a fairly simple requirement: Let us assume you require a simple text page with some descriptive text and some links to PDF documents. The text and attached PDFs need to appear on a certain date as a press release.

If Joomla were object based I could create six or seven of these PDF objects, allocate them to a Joomla category and give them summary text along with a publishing start and end date. Then I could create a joomla list style blog and attach it to a menu. The result would be that each object would appear on a blog page as a linkable PDF complete with a summary description. The object would publish itself automatically using Joomla's own functionality and my latest PDF would appear on the page at the time required. The page would look like a Joomla page complete with styling inherited from the site template and not interfered with in any way by an interfering 3rd party download component. As the functionality I am describing would be part of core Joomla then it would be managed and maintained using standard joomla Access Control Lists, controls and plugins. The content could also be edited, managed and changed from the front end using a common interface.

At the moment, to achieve this I have to find a download component that is suitable, I have to search for and trial one of fifteen contenders to find just one that offers scheduled publishing of downloads (I haven't found one yet), one that integrates into the Joomla ACL structure, allows Joomla core and 3rd party plugins to function as per core content, that allows removal of all the extra 'fudge' and screen stuff that comes with every 3rd party component, that allows styling as per core content. When found I then have to train my clients to use another component just to maintain just a single page. Finally, I may have to train them to access the administrator back end just to make simple changes... This is plain wrong and this is where current versions of Joomla fall over.

Joomla is undergoing structural changes, playing catch-up with other competing Content Management Systems. I think it is time to look to the future where Joomla starts managing real content whilst making the mindset change that content is more than just text.

Widgipedia was one of those solid widget galleries that you could rely on to feed your newly designed widgets to the world. It wasn't a stunning site nor was it a great performer in the download stakes but it was solid and it was there...

However, despite not being anything in particular to look at visitors will have noticed one major change, the site isn't there any more! The site has been dead for at least four days now and returns a blank screen, no error message, nothing. This worries me. I don't like it when a previously solid bit of the web closes, the web is like your favourite high street with those familiar shops closing. My local town is Steyning in Sussex, an olde Worlde bit of England, pretty and familiar, resistant to the economic downturn being an affluent area and a pleasant place to be. A sweetshop, two good butchers, a first class greengrocer and fishmonger, how many small towns can offer that?

However, one butcher is gone, the sweetshop has a sign over the door saying closed for renovation and my reasons for shopping there have gone.  If you can't buy licquorice catherine wheels what reason is there for living? 

Recently the yahoo widget gallery closed for good and now widgipedia. I was properly sad about the Yahoo widget gallery closing not least because I was getting a thousand downloads a day there. Widgipedia is a mere trickle in comparison providing 10-20 downloads at most but it is still not good to see a site go down in these trying economic times. Let us hope it is just a technical error although four days is a long time to fix a fault on a big website.

PS - I spoke to soon - it is back again! You can see it here.

This is a simple guide to skinning your Windows o/s in a Steampunk fashion.

I always keep away from Windows themes, they can be dodgy, sometimes you need to hack part of windows to make them 'stick'. Microsoft is not really interested in themes as they have made the GUI deeply incorporated into the front end. It is not in their interest to have people theme the o/s as the look and feel of windows is one of the main differentiators between one version of windows and another. Not much else changes beneath the hood so they add a new GUI to make it look as if things have changed significantly. NT and Windows XP are NT5, Vista and Windows 7 are simply NT6 versions - a new GUI for each and some tweaks is the norm. Fundamentally the o/s is still NT. See here for the version numbers and you'll see what you are really running: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_NT

You may be running Windows XP/Vista but I assume you are running windows 7, correct? In which case I can help you even less as I don't run it myself... I have no need to run it as XP is a fine o/s and my system is fully-skinned so you'd never know it was XP in any case - Nevertheless, some of my suggestions should still apply to windows 7. Another reason for avoiding windows themes is that they seem to be version specific, when you upgrade they may be useless. That is why I don't create themes.

This is my desktop and as you can see there is very little of Windows about it, yet it is the very same interface that I run on my NT5 and NT6 systems.

To skin your system accordingly I suggest you need items that are independent of Windows, a background, a menu bar, icons and widgets if you want, perhaps a screensaver. You can use one of the re-skinning programs but I find they aren't quite to my liking being a bit OTT and sometimes the skinning can be a tadge painful to look at. They can also interfere with normal operation of windows start bar/menu. The main one, Window Blinds is a commercial offering so costs money. It is available as a trial here http://www.stardock.com/products/windowblinds/ - I found it interfered with normal operation but more importantly I didn't like the look of the steampunk themes, they were too 'busy' for my tastes.

So, if I were you I would do what I have chosen to do myself. Choose a background of your choice, something typically steampunk. Load it using Windows normal desktop functionality.


http://rocketdock.com/addon/walls/40825

If you have a taskbar (win XP & Vista) then move the Windows main taskbar to another location on your desktop. It can sit left/right/top/bottom. Find out how to do that on t'web. In XP/Vista you simply slide it out of the way. I put mine at the top and hide it.

Install Rocketdock/Objectdock launcher and place it where you want, add the programs you use most to the dock. I am a power user so I have a lot of icons on my launcher - I really do use ALL of them, all of the time.


http://rocketdock.com/download

Download some steampunk icons. Change each one to the chosen steampunk icons, skin the dock using the configuration options supplied.


http://rocketdock.com/addon/icons/38398

If you want some pretty desktop widgets to do stuff and to enance the look and feel to a steampunk desktop to a steampunk dreamtop then they are free to download from my site, load the widget engine first, then the widgets.


http://lightquick.co.uk/steampunk-widgets.html?Itemid=264

A nice screensaver (best ones are commercial) is worth applying.


http://www.3planesoft.com/clock-screensavers/mechanical-clock-3d-screensaver/

Note you will need plenty of memory to do all this in Win 7. That o/s is a prodigious user of memory. A complex image on the desktop uses more. Rocketdock is a highly graphical program which can use high res. PNGs as icons, using more memory. Each program you add consumes memory if not cpu. My XP laptop is 3gb which is just enough for me but you will need a lot more in Windows 7, probably at least 4gb.
You need plenty of memory of you are a power user of wondows (sic) and want to use the system for more than just a pretty interface.

Later I will summarise what I do to reskin Ubuntu in a steampunk fashion.

People are talking, a lovely lady has just created a little write-up of the steampunk widgets on the weekly column in her Steampunk blog: "Steampunk on a Sunday" http://gaslightandgilt.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/steampunk-on-sunday-toys-for-your.html. She seems to be very fond of our offerings and we reciprocate by complementing her on her fine blog.

Not sure quite why I did this but I just knocked up an OXO cube package from just after the turn of the century, I just did. It is based on the cardboard packets that the OXO cubes were shipped in prior to them being wrapped in foil. They really are quite sweet.

You can download it here and assemble your own OXO cube packet. The only difference from the real version being the little logo I've added. You can have a version without, just ask!

Feel free to download the image. Print it on your printer, cut round the edges, fold and gum together with some copydex. Drop your zinc foil-covered cube in the middle. Hey presto!. You might want to stick some thin card to the back of the paper to give it more the feel of a real box.

When you download this one you'll need to resize it as I have created it larger than life, to approximately 100% larger than the real thing. When you scale it down some of the text will lose resolution. If you want a perfect one, sized correctly, with miniature fonts that will look perfect real size then drop me a line here .

This article should be named how to create a steam boiler from a baked bean tin and if anyone shows interest I will add more detail on how to do this.

I'm just showing off my very limited engineering skills in creating a small desktop steam boiler which can power a small steam engine. It is made from a campbells condensed soup can (2.5" in diameter), some 8mm and 15mm plumbing bits and pieces plus some spare brass sheet I had lying about. All this has been soldered with a blow lamp or a soldering iron. I did buy a 40PSI blow-off valve from ebay just to be on the safe side but it is generally built all from bits I had lying about. Powered by a night light candle. Total cost £22 so far.

What am I going to do with it? I am open to suggestions, so far I have no engine to power, so all it can do is let off steam...

This is it placed together in the approximate configuration, assembly yet to complete but it shows it approx. how it will look, no piping yet.




My first foray into real metal and steam. 

The tin can boiler, I've soldered up the seams for more strength:


You can see more by clicking on the read more below... 

We have an article on Xersposa.com called Steampunk Widgets for the Digital Age, you can find it here: http://xerposa.com/steampunk-widgets-for-the-digital-age

Enamored with the idea that a society based on steam power and clockwork would be an awesome one indeed, Xerposa is a blog that seeks the newest ins and outs of the steampunk community with merciless determination. Your source for in-the-know Age of Invention goodness, Xerposa is thoroughly researched and updated regularly with a strong twist of imagination.

The Sanderson Orrery - This gorgeous brass and steel orrery is the real thing. It is a beautiful object and better than this, it actually works. I build widgets, virtual clocks, thermometers and widgets in software but this chap does it properly, turning metal, casting wheels, grinding and tempering. The end result is this wonderful working steampunk orrery. It is of course in miniature and a gem but I keep thinking to myself - "if only it was real, 1:1 size it would be perfect!". Lets hope the constructor builds one in full scale, might take him 20 or so years.

The Yahoo Widget Gallery is closing, forever. http://widgets.yahoo.com/

If you have any widgets that you think could do with a reskin in the steampunk style then now is your chance to select them, or forever hold your peace... Once the gallery goes offline I will have no access to the widgets.

So, if you feel inclined, have a look at the Yahoo gallery and find any widgets you use or could use that you really think might be better dressed in steampunk style, choose those that others might like to use too, download them and send them to me one way or another and I'll think about skinning them if they might prove popular to others. I have already received one request for an earthquake monitoring widget.

This is your last chance to view the gallery before it goes off line forever.

This does NOT mean that the Yahoo widgets will stop working now or in some time in the near future, it just means that Yahoo cannot afford the new servers to support the gallery and they are diverting development staff to their TV widget engine (they seem to think that we want widgets on TVs rather than TV on our computers... silly chappies).

The Yahoo widgets will work for the foreseeable future, Vista, win 7/8/9+, ReactOS, Mac OS/X.

So, last chance... get downloading, it turns off on the 10th April 2012.

PS. This BBC article shows the reasoning behind the Yahoo gallery closure, it is nothing to do with technology but everything to do with money.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17614854

Keep an eye on this space, there will be some developments that will be reported here giving you an idea of life after Yahoo widgets.

Retro-computing can be fun and it is in the spirit of retro-computing that I bring news to you all of a superb bit of programming from Kroah (Pascal). This French chappie has reverse engineered a number of Atari 8 bit games form the late 80s and has converted them to a high level language (C++) which can then be compiled and run on the PC. So far Kroah has reverse-engineered some twenty-or-so old 8-bit games which run in Windows as if they are native applications. Some of the menu style idiosynchasies inherited from the old style GEM operating system have to be accepted but the games are generally very usable and work well on Windows.

Kroah has not broken any copyright rules when converting the games because he has converted them from machine code, subroutine by subroutine to the c++ language resulting in entirely new code that performs in exactly the same manner as the original. This method requires a high level of skill and understanding beyond that of most of us mere mortals. I wouldn't even start a job like this, Pascal may be slightly mad but his madness is to our benefit.

Quoting Pascal - "In 2005, i started disassembling the Atari version of Colonial Conquest to understand a strange behaviour during the battle round. To fully shed light on this, i had to write the battle system back to a high level language. Months after months i added new features, making it almost playable and getting closer to the original game. But an important feature was missing: being able to play Colonial Conquest with friends on LAN or over the Internet. So i began refactoring my code to include the network play: CoCoNet was born."

Why would you want to run a game from the late 80s? Well some of them are actually quite good. Colonial Conquest for example, this game was a staple of all strategy gamers. It is a turn-based world domination game set in the time of the great colonial expansions of the 1880s. The main players are all the great world powers of the time. The game is turn-based and up to 6 players can play in a LAN or over the internet. The AI is tough to beat and a game can often be interesting and challenging. Kroah has implemented Colonial Conquest with internet support and enhancements over the original game such as bugfixes to the original logic, the implementation of simultaneous turns, preliminary support for custom ArtificiaI Intelligence and the addition of game and player statistics.

Gameplay is as good now as it was in the 80s, when your graphics are limited then you need to come up with good gameplay. This is what makes some retro games playable to this day. When I want to relieve myself of some stress I find that running colonial conquest is a really efficient  relaxation method. The game is an advance on the old game-staple 'Risk' and in the complexity stakes sits somewhere between Risk and Diplomacy. If you play a quiet game subverting neutral countries and avoiding conflicts with your neighbours, you can prevent war breaking out and play a quiet game of building up your defences until you are stabbed in the back by a jealous super-power. You can set out from the start building up a beligerent and bellicose war policy and attack your neighbours as you see fit, though this may mean you leave the game early. The game is fun and if you have never played it before, like turn-based strategy games then you will enjoy colonial conquest. If you haven't tried retro games then this is a good place to start. If like me, you remember staying up late to play CC on your Atari 512ST with your teenage mates then try Kroah's downloads page and grab yourself some nostalgia. The colonial Conquest download is here , the forum is here , the other Atari ST downloads are here .

I've just resurrected an old project of mine and given it  a facelift and new functionality. It is an old VB6 project called the WOTW Companion. Started in VB6 a long time ago when VB6 was still 'OK' to use. It has quite an original front end, quite steampunk and was created that way before the term steampunk was even coined.

The front end is a simple rectangular form using nothing but standard VB6 functionality, it isn't a.NET program as it is simply a Windows program and has no use for all that unnecessary .NET stuff. As a result it runs quickly and only requires the VB6 runtime engine to run. The program front end is highly original comprising a series of old adverts for Victorian products and then controls which when pressed give out the noises, bells, clanks, clunks and whistles that you'd expect from a steampunk application.

The WOTW Companion provided an upgrade to fix problems with Jeff Wayne's war of the worlds PC RTS game. If the game did not work on XP then the companion fixed it and provided a lot more. It got the game to work on XP in a variety of ways, in full 1024 x 768 screen resolution, windowed or full screen. It also provided new scenarios, autosave functionality, the newer patches for the game, a new and much more comprehensive manual, a better launcher than the original, access to a PS1 emulator so you can play the PS1 shoot-em up version as well as hints, tips and cheats for the game. It provided tools to modify the registry so you could alter key characteristics of the game. Anyone who has played the original Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds PC Game will know it's limitations. This utility was created to resolve those problems. When it first came out the look and feel was very much the standard windows look and feel that windows provides, very dull. VB6 can be skinned at design time and you can create a very nice GUI with compartively little effort as long as you have some skills in Photoshop. There is no excuse for the dull old grey programs of yore, even with VB6 you can turn out something pretty.

So I have fixed all the problems that have been introduced by windows upgrades over the last few years, given the application a whole new steampunk reskin, added new functionality regarding desktop widgets, sounds and made it a fun place to be. I had to decide whether to rewriet it or just give it a once-over with the spray gun. In the end I chose the once-over but of course it turned out to be much more than that.

Here it is running on my desktop, showing you it running the registry tweaker with all the widgets and other stuff that the companion provides.

Is it The End of Yahoo! Desktop Widgets? On the Yahoo widget site and on the forum is states that the Yahoo widget gallery and support for the widget engine will be closing down on the day before the 1st april. I don't think it is an April Fool's trick but what does it mean?  It means the gallery where you have been able to upload and download your widgets will be gone, so you will lose the ability to popularise your widgets (mine have been downloading at 1,000 per day) so for me this is a complete pain...

The good news is that the widget engine won't stop working, it will work on Windows XP/Vista/7/8 and probably Windows 9 + and for the forseeable future, we shall see... So, there is no immediate danger of your widgets stopping working. As for support from Yahoo? it has been non-existent for years, no changes, no improvements, no sign of the linux version, support was all but non-existent. All it means for now is a loss of the gallery but more importantly the loss in the future of the widget platform as a Rapid Application Development tool. This is a real pity as Yahoo widget engine was probably the best and the easiest of the widget platforms to develop for.

What a pity Yahoo took over the Konfabulator engine as they seem to have killed it stone dead. Yahoo's note on the subject stated that Konfabulator is not dead and it lives on in the Yahoo! Connected TV widget engine for Yahoo TVs. They invite developers to take part in the development of widgets for this new tool.

"The Desktop Widgets website will be shutting down on April 10, 2012. Developer uploads of new Widgets will end on April 3, 2012. Due to this, consumer downloads of new and updated desktop widgets will end on April 3, 2012. Desktop widgets will continue to work for the foreseeable future with a new Consumer Terms of Use: http://info.yahoo.com/legal/us/yahoo/konfa...terms-1821.html

Now the good news. Konfabulator is certainly not dead. Konfabulator is what powers more than 8 million TVs running Yahoo! Connected TV Apps. Yahoo! TV Apps are extremely easy to develop. The TVs run Linux and use a specially modified version of the Yahoo! Widget Engine, a fifth generation application platform derived from the legendary Konfabulator desktop widget platform. We have further extended and simplified widget development by building a JavaScript framework which abstracts most of the complexity from Konfabulator.

How to get started:
1. Get the Yahoo! Connected TV Widget Developer Kit (WDK)
2. Build something awesome!
3. Submit to Yahoo!
4. Your will go live and become available to millions of TVs around the world"

I personally wouldn't touch the Yahoo! Connected TV widget development kit as it makes no logical sense to do so. Yahoo have just shut the multi-platform yahoo widget engine down and that is quite obviously the most massive hint that the yahoo TV engine is also on the way out. No-one in their right mind would shut down such a wealth of development experience if they believed their new platform would succeed. I should think any TV widget developer will be packing their bags and looking for a new platform to work in.

In my opinion Yahoo have totally failed to capitalise on the Konfabulator engine. If they had created a linux version right from the start instead of the closed Yahoo widget version for TVs, if they had then had implemented the same engine on Yahoo widget TVs, kept the marketplace open to all and sundry instead of locking it down, if they had prodiuced the developer kit for windows instead of linux then there would by now have been a wealth of widgets and a thriving community of TV widgeteers to support it. As it is it will be dead within a year or two.

The writing is on the wall and Yahoo just wrote it!

The only good thing for Yahoo to do would be to release the Konfabulator engine code as open source and let the world finish the job properly, the way it should have been done from the outset.

-oOo-

News:

Word is that the Yahoo widget gallery has been closed due to server upgrades and changes. The servers that supported the gallery are due for replacement and there needed to be a business case for the new servers. There wasn't a good one. I suppose that if Yahoo sees there is no cash return from the widget service then there is no reason for Yahoo to continue it.

More News: 

Yahoo has confirmed that they are in fact focussing on the TV Yahoo widget engine and they believe the release of resources from supporting the desktop yahoo widget engine will have a positive effect on their development.

-o0o-

The widget engine itself will continue to be available here:

http://desktopwidgets.zenfs.com/4.5.2x10a50/widgetsus.exe

and the Mac version here: 

http://desktopwidgets.zenfs.com/4.5.2x10a50/yahoo_widgets_4.5.2.dmg

For the moment the Windows SDK is still available here:

http://desktopwidgets.zenfs.com/4.5.2x10a50/ywidgets_sdk_setup.exe 

The reason for downloading and installing the SDK rather than the normal Windows download is that this version of the engine comes with none of the bundled widgets, just the runtime engine by itself.

Should you as a user worry about it? - No not really, Yahoo widgets will continue to work, the engine will be downloadable for the forseeable future, the widgets will work on current and future versions of the Windows operating system and Mac Os/X.

Keep an eye on this space, there will be some developments that will be reported here giving you an idea of life after Yahoo widgets.

Who is this Mr. B? Sounds like a bit of a bally nincompoop to me. Seriously though I think Mr. B has a point, some of those songs he is singing sound significantly better than the originals.