Well many moons ago ChadStrat pointed out that the look of concrete5.org didn't really hold up to the quality of the CMS. He was totally right of course, and while it did take months of hard work and is really only partially complete, here we are - a new look and feel!
There's a lot of features we have 90% done that we just couldn't figure out how to launch and test without getting the basic look and feel up first, so I don't want anyone thinking that we're done and heading off to Hawaii for a month. Basically we plan on updating concrete5.org at least once a week for the rest of the month until we've got everything just so.
At a glance right now we've actually turned some things that were working on the old site off, just to get things behaving. Here's a list of what we're already worried about:
o.. Showcase just got hidden, only so much time in the day, that comes back next.
o.. Karma got automated so you don't have to worry about us making cute videos to get prizes. We'll have a pool of licenses that we award from automatically each week. If you're a 3rd party developer and want to add yours to the mix you'll be able to do that.
o.. You'll notice some of the add-ons now have a 5-pack price for bulk discounts. We've got the ability to put together some custom deals as well where several different developers can clump their add-ons and themes together into a single purchase for a different price. We'll also be doing a WOOT style deal of the day with that.
o.. How-to section has an awesome new look, we actually have a lot of content to add there too. The basics section will be getting smaller and better written. The table of contents will be coming back to docs in some capacity.
o.. Refunds will be grantable by 3rd party developers instead of just us, and they will actually remove the license in addition to providing a site credit.
o.. Twitter is more deeply integrated into everything with automatic posts on interesting events. New add-ons and themes get stuck in the news feed too. etc.. Oh, check out the blog section, we're still getting the old content over but finally no wordpress blog for the shop. ;)
o.. All sorts of details. The content is being cleaned up everywhere. The forums will likely get a different landing page. The my account area will get a different landing page.. etc..
So that's off the top of my head, but I'm sure I'm spacing all sorts of other things I just said "stick that on the back burner and lets launch" to in the last few weeks.
So thanks so much for putting up with the site being down today, and all your help and feedback.
What do you think of the new design?
What ideas do you have that we should add?
I would like to see a "wish list" added or made available for personal use. There are a number of items both free and with prices that I would like to include on my site at a later date without having to scroll through the list again. It would be similar to what Amazon has. Is that possible?? Just say, "Yes!"
the design looks great. only suggestion id make is the concrete5 text. It fit in more with the old design, i think a bue might look a little better. (or brown) and same thing with the logo / favicon for me. Oh, and a couple issues ive had early on subscribe to post subject gives you the entire content, and search posts by username doesn't seem to work.
a lot of VERY good thing going on with this design. A lot of thought clearly into this. great job.
there are so many great things to point out:
- login moved ! YAY!!!
- all the pop-ups are vastly improved
- the feedback box is very present. nicely done
- feels a lot more intentional
- the ajax loading addons/images/and results is sweetness. love it
if I had ANYthing negative to point out at all, is the heading "yellow banana banners" on the sidebar might be to bright. I think it would be easier on the eyes if it were just a tad darker :-P
great job Core team, I am sure this was not cheep in either $$$ or manpower.
Looks pretty good, my only complaint is how hard things are to read. This is mainly because Helvetica looks like garbage on Windows when used as plain text.
indeed. You can always tell when mac'rs do a website, the default is always in helvetica and they don't seem to realize what that looks like on (all) Windows.
I think the old site was also in helvetica, however since the colors were different, it was much easier to read. White background/light grey text in a fuzzy font, no bueno.
I love the new design. You didn't just reskin it... you refined alot of the site and it shows!
The only thing I'm not loving is the header background. I don't think the colors match the rest of the site and it doesn't look right on tall pages where you don't see the dark footer without scrolling. Maybe do darker colors on the interior page backgrounds.
But that's just nit-picking. It's a killer design and it very well represents the strengths of this community. Good work!
I like the header. and the footer. I can tell you for certain that Franz, Andrew and crew really wanted to maintain personality, and still be pro. So to me..earthy and bright is just right. A certain element of "Quirk" has to be there, or it's just not representative of the core team. m2c.
Looks nice! Something I miss and something I am confused by: In the marketplace I like to sort by Recently Added.
For one, I find it hard to tell how the blocks read for the most recent. Left to right or down the left column, then down the right? I assume it's left to right.
Also, I like to see the dates in the list, so I quickly know whether or not I have looked back to the date I most recently viewed.
Give that logo some more room to breathe! Check out the screenshots for the idea. I've always had an affinity towards sign-in button's in the upper right.
There's something wonky about the ChunkFiveRoman font on FF3.6.13/Mac, though. It flashes between the chunk font and helvetica twice before it settles in. It's a little too chunky in my opinion, too.
I agree with tbcrowe that Chunk5Roman is rather chunky. I dig it in places where it's used sparingly (like the forums, icing on the cake); however, it feels like a bit much on the about page (and maybe the marketplace sidebar ~). I suppose what I'm trying to say is that the typographic hierarchy is unclear there.
Dudes, the new C5 look is REALLY great. I always wondered why C5 looked how it did knowing what a great CMS it was, but figured you guys were busy making C5 great instead of updating the site! :)
So, I've been a little absent from the C5 community in recent days...mostly due to just the busy-ness of life, but to a certain degree the new design has re-invigorated my excitement about Concrete5!
I'm sure you guys have worked your butts off to get this done and I for one and thoroughly impressed and excited - not just because it's a cool redesign - but because I think it presents C5 in a more exciting way and will help generate more momentum for the project!
Trying to start a new topic for the discussion board and don't see a submit button. Just in case anyone reads this, I'm a newbie on a test site and I started a new page and I clicked on add to main to add text. I clicked on add block. I clicked on add content. Got a big blank box and I can't figure out how to type anything in.
On thing I just noticed. I just posted a new discussion, submitted it and then tried to go in and edit it and just got 'Null' in the overlay box. Screenshot attached.
(Using Firefox 3.6.13 on Windows 7)
Yeah, I just listed a new theme (ROSEcrete) the day before Concrete updated their site. It still isn't visible to the public, but it shows up for me when I'm logged in.
So, I'm guessing they're still having issues with the recent marketplace submissions.
Great looking site, however, I do think that in general at times concrete5 CMS is painfully slow. This is certainly detrimental to the further development of this software in the open-source CMS stakes compared to WordPress, Drupal, Joomlah! etc.
If you can work on speeding it up - even your own site - I am sure you will win the hearts of many more prospective users.
Version 5.4 of concrete5 is a bit slower than 5.3 was, mostly because it's doing a lot more and relies a bit more on some hefty zend framework libraries, but 5.4.1.1 rectifies some of those problems and can compare pretty well with wordpress and others, as that link describes.
Great re-design guys! This site is awesome. I'd posted on the forums right before the site went down for upgrading. Very thoughtful on your part to put the Bridge video up as a metaphor. Loved the idea, and it went hand in hand w/ your voice throughout the site, both old and new.
You can imagine the big grin on my face when I visited to check on the forums and saw the new site. I was blown away. While I really wanted to get an answer to my question, I spent a good 1 1/2 just checking out everything on the new site. Noticed the new content, or revision or old content. Much more thoughtful and overall an excellent job. Only issue I've found so far is when I check my account where it says I've posted x number of posts, etc. If I click that link to go see my forum posts, I get a 404 Not Found error. Only way I've found to easily get to my posts is to go to Forums and so a search for my name. That works fine.
Overall though, excellent job. I love c5!
Congratulations on the new design guys, it looks fantastic and I'm sure it'll drive a lot more adoption of c5.
There's a problem with Firefox though - I'm not seeing your nice custom typography except once I'm signed in. Bizarrely, IE8 shows it as it should. It's worth fixing to give the best possible first impression to new visitors!
I love all of the changes! Congrats, it looks great.
Will you guys be documenting or publishing a white paper/case study on the upgrade?
Would be nice to see some of the issues you encountered etc. Especially to help show clients the ability to upgrade their site.
-Phil
I will likely be publishing something on html5 and css3, including web fonts, modernizr, 960 grid system, etc... since this is the first time I've worked on a site that really utilizes those technologies. Not totally on the topic of concrete5, but hopefully worth a read ;)
Alright, new change was a nice move. The only thing that bothers me now with the new layout is that all the colors are a little bit too soft and the content became hard to read.
The redesign is great, well done. One request I do have is to bring the titles back to the "recent messages" of the main forum page. See screenshot for example:http://screencast.com/t/MMdjqy5mPkvl...
its there we just havent added a link yet. If you use a browser that shows rss feeds available in the toolbar it will be there on the blog landing page or any of its categories.
The site is definitely nice looking if not as functional as I would like it to be (I much prefer the phpbb style of forum software).
If I may make one suggestion though...get rid of the "Karma" term and call it something else like Candy or Stars, or some such.
I don't believe in Karma and quite frankly it makes this site sound a bit like a haven for religions of India.
As such it is not as welcoming as it could be for those of us that do not adhere to the religious idea of Karma.
It would be like calling the reward obtained, "Glory Crowns" (after the biblical concept of a crown of Glory), or "Number of Virgins" (after the idea of virgins in the afterlife as found in some Middle Eastern religious belief).
It's just not good to have such terms used which might turn off many while being a nice term to a few.
Better I think to use a more neutral term that does not take away or otherwise diminish the use of this forum as a place to discuss all things having to do with Concrete5.
Incidentally is there a way to excuse me from getting any Karma points at all? Nothing personal but I just don't want a whole lot of "Karma" associated with me. The more I participate here the more Karma I end up with.
"Karma" in the states at least, is a pretty common term for trying to
assign values to the golden rule. "What goes around comes around"
makes sense to me outside of any religious setting and I'm not really
excited about calling these points "Wuffies."
If its any consolation, we're based in Portland Oregon and generally
we're a pretty agnostic bunch.
Don't ever get rid of Karma.. or Karma may bite you back. Whether it is a religious term or not; it is undoubtedly a universally recognised and understood concept. Do unto others etc.. has nothing to do with preaching.. it just seems like basic good sense.
It may seem like a utopian approach to life, hoping that people will be nice to you if you are nice to them but surely thats a sweet way to brighten up life. Whether i believe in karma or not.. I know I need some of that good stuff.
How about a "Karma Exchange" program. You don't want your Karma and some Higher Being knows I need it... pass it on. Give me your good Karma in exchange for the pleasure of knowing you have no good Karma hanging over your head(!)
Trying to follow step 1 "Refreshing an Add-on" but in the My Account --> Transactions --> Licenses (http://www.concrete5.org/profile/orders/) I can not see any links to download the archive of purchased addons, there is only the link to the addon page in the marketplace and that does not have a way to download an archive either. The addon purchased is linked to the project and appears in the project dashboard, but will not download.
Please let me know where can I now download addon archives, or update the licenses page so the archives are available there
The new version shows up in the dashboard, the problem is that the update won't download. Hence why I am asking for how to manually download the addon from my license page.
To be specific, I am attempting to upgrade the ecom tools addon from 1.03 to 1.05 in the dashboard of our site. Although I think the specific addon is not relevant here as I have updated several other addons in the past, and thus I think our site is working correctly.
The issue occurs when I click the Update Addons button in the dashboard, I get an error message of:
Fatal error: Call to a member function getRemoteURL() on a non-object in /srv/www/htdocs/updates/concrete5.4.1.1/concrete/single_pages/dashboard/install.php on line 222
I have tried this on both our dev and production installations with the same result. To troubleshoot this I took a packet trace and when I did that, I see that the site makes a request for the package and then the C5 marketplace server returns a "500 Internal Server Error"
Based on this I am thinking there is an issue with the C5 marketplace server for the 1.05 version of eCom tools. Could someone on the C5 team take a look and see if there is an issue?
I can live with that there is an issue around the download, but the fact that I can't download an archive is the fundamental issue here.
Thanks for your help on this!
Stuart
>>> Concrete5 Community <discussions@concretecms.com> 4/22/2011 11:45 AM
Have you ever thought about adding the Concrete5 Karma as an application that you could add to the Marketplace. Maybe a stripped down version...Just a Thought
That looks like it should do it for add-ons with a price, but I am wondering about my lonely free add-on (Last Updated), gauging how it has been doing to decide on other ideas.
With the new site profile, it would be helpful to update (maybe auto-detect?) updated URLs. I had started a couple sites where I phased in Concrete and to update the project page to correct project URL after implementation of Concrete is not at all helpful.
Just change the order of the shown URL of a project in "My concrete5 Sites", so that the last updated one is shown (insted of showing the first registered url).
I'd have a few suggestions with the functionality of this site:
1. When browsing the Marketplace (e.g. add-on search results) I've noticed it pretty hard to reach the footer of the page. Sometimes I use the footer to browse to a different location on the site, so it's quite irritating to me.
2. When submitting an add-on, there is no pagination for the discussion with the add-on review group. So, if I have a mile long discussion there, I need to scroll through that EVERY TIME I want to make a change / update the add-on. (Quick fix: just hide that discussion in edit mode with accordion or something so that I can open it if I want to)
3. When clicking an add-on support discussion link from the mail, I would prefer if it forwarded me to a login page that would forward again back to the discussion. Currently it forwards to the add-on main page when not logged in.
4. When editing a message the "Reply" button could state "Edit" instead (just to be clear that I'm not posting a second reply). Also, just noticed after editing this message that there is not anchor back to this part of the page, so after I'm finished editing, I need to scroll to the bottom of the page.
I have one site that currently has concrete5 installed and I love it. I registered with concrete5.org's marketplace to buy themes.
Today I installed concrete5 on a new site of mine... and I am trying to buy a theme thru the marketplace but I am unable to ADD my new site to my marketplace account....
Can you explain? I would like it if I could choose from my sites when I am installing a new theme... I see there is a drop down menu for this but I am not able to find where I can add my new site to my marketplace account.
Althea99,
Have you opened a "Project" page for each site? When you connect to the community from your site's dashboard, you can create a project and it will then show up on the default drop-down of site when you purchase licenses.
Once your site has a project page, you can also add contributors, assign to and of course remove licenses from your sites.
I have been very satisfied with Concrete5, but my last purchase of a forum has not worked out. It required the update and after updating my dashboard in not functioning properly, thus not able to load the Forum I just purchased. If there is someone that can suggest how to resolve the issue of my dashboard access I would greatly appreciated it
I'd be happy to help figure out what could be happening with your site. I couldn't find any licenses purchased by your account, nor any project pages in your account profile-- do you have your site connected with a different concrete5.org username?
If you'd like to send me a Private Message with some more details about what exactly is happening and which site is having the problem, we'll gladly take a look and offer some guidance. Just click my profile picture and then hit "Send Message".
If so, we've got some ideas in the works for what to feature there. It's something we meant to flesh out after the site launch but haven't yet gotten around to it.
As noted there's a way to access most of that stuff from the public profile or the sidebar on the profile landing page, but some fancier presentation of it in there, front and center, could definitely be useful. We've also talked about pulling in news, blog and marketplace content into that area.
Yes exactly! I apologize if I was unclear in my original suggestion. I just noticed upon viewing that page that there is an abundance of space just begging to have a "pretty" face put on it that is functional.
I can't wait to see what you guys do with those ideas.
I like the idea of pulling in some real time community updates there, as well as maybe a section with that "woot"-esque deal of the day quick look. :-) A snapshot of the member's profile. . . I think that could be a nice interface.
Definitely. We're always welcome to suggestions. We've got some similar content-focused stuff happening in the Dashboard of our upcoming 5.5 release and we've talked about integrating some of that material into the profile page as well.
I agree, Woot's pretty cool! For now, our alerts feed on Twitter is probably the best way to keep up with Marketplace deals:http://twitter.com/concrete5alert...
Okay so I just had a small site-wide epiphany that would only be slightly time consuming to implement.
In Add-Ons and Showcases, etc., whenever you click on a "visit this website" link - that link loads in the current tab/window instead of opening in a new window/tab. I mean one can always ctrl/cmd/right click and get things to load in a new tab/window, but why not just have those links default to target=_blank so that we aren't moving away from the concrete5 website if we forget to ctrl/cmd/right click. :-)
I would like to see a "wish list" added or made available for personal use. There are a number of items both free and with prices that I would like to include on my site at a later date without having to scroll through the list again. It would be similar to what Amazon has. Is that possible?? Just say, "Yes!"
I would like to see a "wish list" added or made available for personal use. There are a number of items both free and with prices that I would like to include on my site at a later date without having to scroll through the list again. It would be similar to what Amazon has. Is that possible?? Just say, "Yes!"
I would like to see a "wish list" added or made available for personal use. There are a number of items both free and with prices that I would like to include on my site at a later date without having to scroll through the list again. It would be similar to what Amazon has. Is that possible?? Just say, "Yes!"
Actually Amazon has also noticed this functionality to increase sales.
In one article I read recently it was said that people tend to do things more likely if they said they would (well, you could also guess that with common sense). And this is exactly why there are such features in the web stores.
So shortly: +100 to this suggestion, everyone wins!
I'm new to C5 so don't have a comparison to make but think this a much needed tool for those new to web building or moving on to designing. I previously taught myself MS Front Page around 15 years ago and worked with that for several site changes over the years but of course it's now dead in the water and it didn't have as many features as this nor someone on call to give pointers (and how I needed them for a LONG time!)
Likewise it's going to take me some time to work out C5 but I'm very grateful for all the member support and links on site and hoping that when I get over my current glitch (losing log-in access to my site hrrmph)I will have a fabulous website and learn to grow with it!
Thank you :-)
I would love a way to mark an add-on or theme as something I'd like to use one day. Possibly assign it to a project, or just keep it in a wish list. I stumble across cool features all the time, but not always when I have a project for them, or the time to install them. The developers would get an idea of how much interest is out there for their work, and possibly a connection to ask us what might be holding us back.
I would love a way to mark an add-on or theme as something I'd like to use one day. Possibly assign it to a project, or just keep it in a wish list. I stumble across cool features all the time, but not always when I have a project for them, or the time to install them. The developers would get an idea of how much interest is out there for their work, and possibly a connection to ask us what might be holding us back.
I have been developing on Joomla for the past 7 years. I ran into this site by accident. I am extremely interested in testing this software. I made my account and went to test but received errors.
That was yesterday. Today I can't find where my test site is located?
I'm very eager to test this out and see how this works.
It looks like fun!
Just a quick note, I keep getting lost in the nav tryign to find my active support forum posts would it be possible to put a list of you posts on your accounts page like with the support section for addons.
c5 should integrate a solid video platform. i've used many platforms including jwplayers, brightcove, dacast, etc. c5 already has the cms that would dominate the video platform market.
this would include:
ad server: with personal adds or integrate with 3rd party companies like tremor, openx, adapt.tv, google, etc. include pre, post, mid roll and companion ads.
include this with current banner add server.
live streaming is another story, but edgecast is a solid cdn platform that integrates nicely.
Ok, this is something that gets me every time... Please make the "Keep me logged in for 2 weeks" text be a <label> for the checkbox. A small usability issue, but very quick to fix.
Badges don't seem to be working quite right. For example, I registered on this site in November of 2009, but I don't have any of the anniversary badges (1 year, 2 year, etc).
Am I missing something and having an account on the site is not what gets me one of these badges?
Its all categorized, and it should be very easy to get around. If your looking for a user setting for example you will be sure to find it under "users & groups". It's also not that far off from 5.4 or older versions. All the settings for users in 5.4 and older for example were still under the "user & groups" tab just like it is now.
Not having seen the original site I can't make comparisons but I certainly like the look and feel of this one.
I do have one query though - how do I get permission to post in the community forum? I joined the site in April 2012 and have begun to explore building a site on a free hosting server as a way to learn how to use Concrete5.
i admit to putting all of my eggs in the wp basket, but after seeing so many fail, i.e. mambo and those likes. we are from the postnuke era, where CMS was as fresh a word as "cloud hosting". we came back over after there was a group of us on the phone who hads danced the circuit of CMS, social media effots, and it was talked about, so i came back to make another run. and i must say, you guys have made some tremendous changes, and all for the better.
one thing i was looking for that i dont see as a native plugin or on the market is an AV chat, or streaming solutions at all for that matter. couldnt even find anything for shoutcast.
I think a nice feature to add on the c5 site is the ability to checkmark developer documentation, how-tos, etc. I'm thinking just being able to mark it as Read, Que, and Helpful would be a nice feature.
I thought of this b/c I was reading the documentation and couldn't remember where I'd left off.
Plus, it'd be helpful when I find a how-to that's useful for me, as I may need to revisit it sometime and would like to not have to track it down again.
I LOVE Concrete5. I'll get to how the "My Account" page should look IMHO in a second. But first I should say, C5 easily blows doors on Word Press, Drupal, Joomla, and all other CMS systems. I've been a techie guy for a long time, but it doesn't mean I'm good at it and Concrete5 is easily the simplest for me to comprehend and use. It's definitely buggy sometimes and very slow with all the html requests for javascripts, external Images, and external CSS stylesheets and the next release should have built in CSS sprites for images and something like LABjs or Minify and Speedy PHP built-into the base of concrete5.
I think the My Account page should look like a grid of tiles with icons and one or two word at the bottom of each tile stating what that would link to in your account. For example if there were 3 rows with 3 tiles in each row the titles of some of these tiles could be something like:
1) "Messages"
2) "Forums" (then after clicking on forums you're taken to a page that has 2 links: (#1) Forum Conversation (for topics you're engaged in) and (#2) forums you're following that have "how-to" info or are simply topics of interest where the user is following the discussion.
3) "Downloads" - for a list of free or paid for themes or add-ons that you have downloaded and/or used on your site
4) "Sites" - this would link to a list of all of the website projects you're working on
5) "Karma" - that shows the history that the user has with Concrete5 including badges, lists of replies and questions posted in forums, etc.
6) "Profile" - Where this lists your stated public Concrete5 profile and all of the sites you have worked on and at the bottom of the page a list of add-ons and themse you have used on each site.
7) "Search" where you have a tile with a field you can search all of Concrete 5 from
8) "Contact" where you can email the C5 team
9) And I'm out of ideas for #9 =)
The current state of the My Account page is just not intuitive and the titles of the links don't easily and clearly tell me what I need to click on to get to where I want to go.
I LOVE Concrete5. I'll get to how the "My Account" page should look IMHO in a second. But first I should say, C5 easily blows doors on Word Press, Drupal, Joomla, and all other CMS systems. I've been a techie guy for a long time, but it doesn't mean I'm good at it and Concrete5 is easily the simplest for me to comprehend and use. It's definitely buggy sometimes and very slow with all the html requests for javascripts, external Images, and external CSS stylesheets and the next release should have built in CSS sprites for images and something like LABjs or Minify and Speedy PHP built-into the base of concrete5.
I think the My Account page should look like a grid of tiles with icons and one or two word at the bottom of each tile stating what that would link to in your account. For example if there were 3 rows with 3 tiles in each row the titles of some of these tiles could be something like:
1) "Messages"
2) "Forums" (then after clicking on forums you're taken to a page that has 2 links: (#1) Forum Conversation (for topics you're engaged in) and (#2) forums you're following that have "how-to" info or are simply topics of interest where the user is following the discussion.
3) "Downloads" - for a list of free or paid for themes or add-ons that you have downloaded and/or used on your site
4) "Sites" - this would link to a list of all of the website projects you're working on
5) "Karma" - that shows the history that the user has with Concrete5 including badges, lists of replies and questions posted in forums, etc.
6) "Profile" - Where this lists your stated public Concrete5 profile and all of the sites you have worked on and at the bottom of the page a list of add-ons and themse you have used on each site.
7) "Search" where you have a tile with a field you can search all of Concrete 5 from
8) "Contact" where you can email the C5 team
9) And I'm out of ideas for #9 =)
The current state of the My Account page is just not intuitive and the titles of the links don't easily and clearly tell me what I need to click on to get to where I want to go.
In Internet Explorer 9 on Windows 7 the drop-downs are partially hidden behind various page blocks. Seems like the z-index of the page blocks are above the menu's z-index. For that matter the obfuscation of drop-down menus in IE9 occurs in other C5 themes in the marketplace as well. (Leave it to IE, all other browsers behave.)
I think it would be really great if we could remove or hide Add-ons and Theme Licenses that were purchased but did not do the job we had hoped they would. I will often try apps on my own site first (especially free ones) before installing on a client site. Now I have tons of unused apps in my directory to sort through when looking for licenses.
Every time somebody buys one of my add-ons, I send them a thank you message.
It would be really great if you could provide some kind of api or hook for developers who have add-ons and themes in the marketplace.
This would allow us to develop some kind of CRM by automating tasks such as mailing.
It could be simple, for instance allow the developer to provide a url to a script and events such as "add-on bought" would be sent to that url.
It gets me thinking. We already receive an email each time one of our addons is purchased.
So maybe an addon could be built to interrogate a mail server for such emails, parse the info you want, then add it to a mailing list. Maybe integrate a job to do this with one of the existing mailing list addons.
Not that I have time to do it, but if anyone else did, I may be interested, all depending on how it works out.
