[Pmwiki-users] PmWiki development

Steven Leite steven_leite
Mon Jun 7 08:18:44 CDT 2004


There was a lot of talk a while ago about introducing (some form) of
user authentication.  Just wondering if you'd given any thought to that
in this new design.  Where does that rank on the Development list? (eg.
High, Med. Low?)

-S

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Patrick R. Michaud" <pmichaud at pobox.com>
To: <pmwiki-users at pmichaud.com>
Sent: Sunday, June 06, 2004 3:36 PM
Subject: [Pmwiki-users] PmWiki development


> Recently I've been working on a number of features that I and others
> have wanted to add to PmWiki, and over the past few weeks I've
basically
> come to the conclusion that perhaps it's time for a redesign/rewrite
> of the core code.  To that end, I've been developing a new version
> of PmWiki, which is online at http://www.pmwiki.org/devel/pmwiki.php.
> It's not quite ready for alpha/beta releases yet, but I want to give
users
> the opportunity to experiment with and test it from a user
perspective.
>
> I must warn everyone:  The code I've been working on is a major
redesign
> from the existing PmWiki 0.6 code.  Most of the markup and code
internals
> have been improved substantially to enable features that have been
> long desired and discussed but (until now) somewhat difficult to
> implement in previous versions of PmWiki.  Some highlights:
>   - Eliminates the multiple meanings of double-brackets--double
brackets
>     are now used exclusively for links
>   - Vastly easier to use link markup syntax--all links follow a single
>     basic(?) syntax
>   - Authors can set arbitrary page titles and search engine keyword
lists on
>     groups and pages
>   - Alt-text for images (finally!)
>   - Page links can be followed with actions (e.g.
[[WikiSandbox?action=edit]])
>   - Markup can be generally customized to emulate other wiki engines,
>     including earlier versions of PmWiki
>   - Much greater flexibility in markup transformation--cookbook
authors
>     can insert new features at almost any stage of the transformation
>     process; headers and page output is delayed until after markup has
>     been processed
>   - Cookbook scripts are much easier to develop and maintain -- markup
>     transformations are managed in a single array instead of separate
>     $BrowseDirectives, $DoubleBrackets, $LinkPatterns,
$InlineReplacements,
>     etc., arrays.
>   - Improved page edit+post cycle; local customizations can perform
>     actions just before and just after saving new text (e.g.,
>     comments and blogging, merging of simultaneous edits, author
>     signatures)
>   - Page storage database is modular and can be customized to use
other
>     storage formats or systems (e.g., MySQL)
>   - Source code is maintained on sourceforge, available via anonymous
CVS,
>     and will be easier to document and explain
>
> I will say that in the short period of time I've been working with the
> new design, I've thus far found it to be *much* easier to add new
features
> than it has been in earlier versions.
>
> Of course, the downside of all of this is that the redeveloped version
> is not going to be a simple upgrade for existing PmWiki sites.  I'm
> expecting to develop a robust suite of tools to convert existing
PmWiki
> (and other!) sites to the new version, but this will be one instance
> where upgrading will definitely be "non-trivial".  On the other hand,
> I'll be willing to provide lots of assistance with conversions, and I
> expect it to be the last major conversion to occur for at least a
year,
> and probably longer.
>
> Of course, PmWiki 0.6 still works just fine, and there's nothing
> wrong with continuing to use it indefinitely.  For the forseeable
> future I'll continue to provide bugfixes and minor enhancement
> releases for 0.6.
>
> This brings up the question of "what to call the new version?"  Thus
> far I've come up with only a few ideas:
> 1.  Release the existing 0.6 version (with a couple more enhancements)
>     as "PmWiki 1.0", with the new version to be called "PmWiki 2.0".
>     This is reasonable, as I think 0.6 has reached a level of
>     maturity where it could justifiably be labeled as a 1.0 release.
> 2.  Leave the existing 0.6 version as is, and designate the new
>     version as "PmWiki 1.0" when it is officially released, perhaps
>     being called "PmWiki 0.9" while it's continuing to be developed.
> 3.  Rename the new version to something other than "PmWiki".
>
> Of the above, I think I prefer #2, but I'm interested in hearing what
> makes sense to others.
>
> Please feel free to play with the site at
> http://www.pmichaud.com/devel/pmwiki.php and let me know what you
> think.  I expect to be making alpha and/or beta releases sometime
> this week, and for those who want to be on the truly bleeding edge
> you can use anonymous-CVS to checkout copies of the development
> code from sourceforge.net.
>
> Comments, suggestions, questions always welcome.
>
> Pm
>
> -- 
> Pmwiki-users mailing list
> Pmwiki-users at pmichaud.com
> http://pmichaud.com/mailman/listinfo/pmwiki-users_pmichaud.com
>
>




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