Flex Store Module for OpenEdit Framework

We plan to begin highlighting OpenEdit development done by members of our community. If you have something you've developed with OpenEdit, let us know and after we test it, we'll announce it here. We will be making modules available for download directly on our website soon!

AckDev Inc. developed this add-on for Flex Store:

The OpenEdit Flex Store module is an open source add-on to OpenEdit and is used in production by several Ecommerce sites e.x. http://trinketssales.com/flexstore/index.html, http://atv.trinketssales.com/flexstore/index.html.  In addition to providing a fast presentation layer, round trips to the server are reduced by performing all filtering locally on the clients desktop.

OpenEdit was chosen as the persistence & business logic layer for the Flex Store module as OpenEdit provides an intuitive administration interface and the product detail pages are search engine friendly.  In addition OpenEdit lent itself naturally to supporting REST style HTTP transactions used by the front end to gather additional details on products.

Flex Store module can be downloaded here: http://sourceforge.net/projects/riastore/

Contact AckDev at storesales@trinketssales.com

Julie Riley Wed, Jun 18 2008 4:15 PM 0 comments

A bright future for the OEF

Why OEF?

For a long time, OpenEdit and my own company, IJ Solutions, have been focused on providing great web applications to end users.  Although we've been enjoying the use of the what has recently become the OpenEdit framework for a long time, we've been using it primarily as an in house tool that has allowed us to bring agile development practices to bear on specific problems in what has proven to be a very flexible way.  As we've helped develop enterprise grade applications like the OpenEdit Media Archive on top of the platform, we've been fortunate to  be able to improve the core framework and content management systems at the same time.

What has happened, and what has made all of the difference for us, is that OpenEdit has started to pop up in the wild all by itself.   Every time we turn around, we're discovering new sites that are running on the OEF platform.  Other developers grab it, download it, quickly and easily install it  and are starting to develop plugins and applications of their own.

I've had the opportunity to work with numerous web application frameworks over the years, and I've even rolled my own custom solutions a couple of times.  I've found that the differences in philosphies between them lead to different benefits and drawbacks.  They all come with their particular set of rules and ideas.  Some are component based, some are strict MVC based, some are very constricting while others are loose.  After having worked to develop applications on the OpenEdit framework for the last 2 years, I can say confidently that it has some benefits that have made it my framework of choice.  I've got a lot of reasons, which you can read about on my blog. 

While we knew we had a great platform to develop from, we're all very excited about the idea of engaging our community of supporters for ideas and guidance.  Please comment freely, let us know what you like and don't like, and what you really need to get started with the framework.  We'll do our best to listen and provide.

Ian Miller

Founding director, OpenEdit framework

Ian Miller Mon, Jun 9 2008 7:11 PM 0 comments

User Group Meeting Notes - Collaboration and OEF

We just completed our first OpenEdit User Group Meeting. In short, notes from the meeting can be boiled down to this:

• Improve Collaboration: OpenEdit users are integrating Openedit into all aspects of their online information management work flows and are looking to use the many tools within OpenEdit 6.0 to increase accessibility to all their digital assets for improved communication and collaboration on projects involving multiple users spread across vast geographical areas. OpenEdit users have asked that we continue to improve the tools being used for collaborating on large multinational projects that require organization of hundreds of thousands of digital assets with multiuser communication and permission level work flows.



• Increased access to work directly with the OpenEdit Framework (OEF) and OEF's many development tools: The most significant discovery from the OpenEdit user group is the level of interest amongst developers and power users to harness the power of the OpenEdit Framework (OEF). During the OpenEdit User Group meeting Chris Burkey articulated the founding principles of OpenEdit which are now listed on our homepage as the key advantages we experience while developing applications with OEF. These advantages come from an absolute commitment to the founding principles that live and breath within OEF. We shouldn't have been so surprised that getting this powerful set of tools into the hands of developers surfaced as the number one request amongst OpenEdit enthusiasts. Matt Avery describes the OEF development environment as the Nirvana and we now realize that we need to support this community as they learn the power of working with OEF.

  We have been shy about OEF because we first wanted to prove it's value in large scale enterprise grade production environments. OEF has proven it's value in the real world, one application at a time.

The OpenEdit development team has created and implemented large scale Enterprise Content Management solutions that include eCommerce, Digital Asset Management, work flow and collaboration tools, Events Calendar, Multiuser permission structures, etc, etc.. The versatility of the OpenEdit Framework has been proven in live production environments across the globe in multiple languages. The limiting factor has become time.. we can only do so much. So the time has come to find out..

What can you create with OEF?

Joel Halse Thu, May 22 2008 12:59 PM 0 comments

Self Contained Simplicity

"OpenEdit 6.0 is our first attempt at putting together a list of our best features and best practices that focus on simplicity and re-usability." - Chris Burkey

Over the past seven years OpenEdit has grown it's list of capabilities by implementing one feature at a time for one client at a time. This collection of features has progressed into a Content Management System that places the focus on the presentation of information. This is in contrast to most Content Management Systems that focus on the data storage model and treat the presentation and accessibility to the information as secondary. We feel the data storage model is less relevant than the ability to access, interact, and modify the display of each piece of valuable content within your site.

During this morning's introduction and brief history of OpenEdit, Chris painted a detailed picture of a company and a software that continues to place the web site at the center every OpenEdit web application. No matter whether you are working on an image, an HTML file, or a configuration file, OpenEdit currently enables each user to find, access, and manage this information based on permission levels from within the browser. In most cases, the tools, or links to the tools which are required to edit the content is found inline. Now that these tools are in place and accessible, the next step is to promote collaboration.

"In many ways OpenEdit is entering it's second stage of growth in an effort to provide internet users with a collection of tools that is designed for the end user." Throughout the morning, Chris continued to outline a plan for enabling both site administrators and end users to collaborate on multiple projects where OpenEdit enables a one to many relationship for effective communication and work flow surrounding the information being discussed and developed.

"A good example is our issue tracker where there are many people collaborating to resolve a single issue that has status, attached files, messages, date of entry, hours tracking, etc." Chris continues "The intent is to ensure each feature of OpenEdit is self contained with as few interdependencies as possible. The idea is to allow each feature of OpenEdit to be able to interact with, or even within, other parts of your application."

A good example came from Frank Corrigan of State Farm who observed that the source of many discussions and projects are content from within their media library. "Quite we would like to initiate a discussion surrounding an asset or group of assets within our library." Another important component of this collaborative work flow is user separation which can be managed with user permissions via the account manager.

OpenEdit 6.0 represents a great list of tools. The next step is enabling more collaboration so many users can work together on all the content of your OpenEdit application. As the tools continue to improve the time to market for these powerful capabilities continue to shrink.

Joel Halse Tue, May 20 2008 1:54 PM 1 comment

New File Manager Screen Shot

Improvements have been made to the file manager for greater visibility and access to your OpenEdit files.

Here is a screen shot:

Joel Halse Fri, May 16 2008 11:44 AM 0 comments

Batch Product Upload

Within the latest release of OpenEdit 6.0 is new upload capabilites for categories, products, items, and product/category relationships. You can now upload thousands of digital assets directly into OpenEdit.

A big part of mass product uploading is the handling of metadata.

Here is a bit of history about the evolution of OpenEdit's Digital Asset Management capabilities.The OpenEdit Archive was originally built as a web interface for Cumulus. Julie Riley, working as president of Carey Digital at the time, needed an improved web interface for Cumulus and the OpenEdit Media Interface for Cumulus was born. Since this project began, OpenEdit's Digital Asset Management capabilities have expanded and today OpenEdit 6.0 is starting to mature into a complete Digital Asset Management Solution. Originally Cumulus was a necessary component of OpenEdit's DAM capabilities because Cumulus provided a desktop application for the addition and management of large numbers of digital assets. With OpenEdit's new capabilities for mass uploads of assets and metadata, OpenEdit is now being installed as a stand alone Digital Asset Management solution with all the benefits that come with Enterprise Content Management.

Development continues at a furious pace and I'll get some highlight screen shots of some new features shortly.

In addition to development of the software, here are some other initiatives in progress:

• we're starting to put together short video presentations of the features included in OpenEdit 6.0
• a comprehensive features list on the home page of the demo for all OpenEdit 6.0 capabilities - we are publishing our work daily but the list is not yet complete
• an improved demo based on valuable community feedback

Joel Halse Fri, May 16 2008 10:33 AM 1 comment

Anticipation builds for Launch of OpenEdit 6.0

May has just begun but there is already lots to talk about within the world of OpenEdit. Here are some highlights.

• Christopher Burkey is currently in Spain conducting on site training for Pindar. OpenEdit clients have access to personal training in both English and Spanish by the lead developer and CEO. While this isn't something you are likely to find elsewhere, it does speak volumes about the level of dedication that goes into supporting every OpenEdit feature and every OpenEdit client.
• OpenEdit is about to host their first User Group Meeting in Cincinnati on 20th May. It's shaping up to be quite a week with clients and OpenEdit enthusiasts alike flying in from all over. We hope to see you there.
• OpenEdit is now available in Spanish. We have expanded over the past six months and now operate in three countries. We have 8 new members of the OpenEdit team and are excited about working with you in both English and Spanish.
• The OpenEdit development team is putting together the finishing touches on OpenEdit 6.0 which will be the most complete open source java based content management system available on the web. This claim is based on comparisons done at cmsmatrix.org.

Joel Halse Thu, May 8 2008 12:30 PM 1 comment

Chris Burkey in Spain - OpenEdit provides On Site Training

Chris Burkey is in Spain this week providing on site client training.

Here is a picture of Kevin in front of the Pindar office building in Spain.

They also saw the Real Madrid vs. FC Barcelona game tonight.

Joel Halse Wed, May 7 2008 10:47 PM 0 comments

CMS? ECM? What do these terms really mean?

What differentiates a CMS from an ECM? I'm curious if these terms (along with a few others) are well understood, specifically within the content management industry.

I suspect there are many people in our industry that use these terms within their daily professional lives but aren't clear on their meaning. One indication is the notes found at the top of each page within wikipedia on this topic. Almost every page has a quality standards warning saying the article makes vague or superficial statements and focuses excessively on Web CMS.

As an aside, I'm using wikipedia as my source because it is written by the online community and is a reflection of our collective understanding of these terms. It shouldn't come as a surprise that the complex systems we are trying to define have given birth to terminology that is still unclear. Terms such ECM are less than a decade old and are being used by marketing departments across the net, often out of context, to sell software.

So what does it take to be a CMS or an ECM? Let's start by looking at the definition of CMS.

Wikipedia defines a content management system (CMS) as

 a program used to create a framework for the content of a Web site.

In this case it seems the warning at the top of the page is right. Not only is this definition fairly vague, it also implies that every CMS deals with only web based content. If this were true the wikipedia wouldn't define a Web content management system as

 a CMS with additional features to ease the tasks required to publish Web content to Web sites.

If we assume for a minute that we are talking about a web content management system and focus on the tie that binds, then the next question is about the word content. What is meant by the word content in the context of a CMS?

In media production and publishing, content is information and experiences that may provide value for an end-user/audience. Content may be delivered via any medium such as the internet, television, and audio CDs, as well as live events such as conferences and stage performances.

My initial reaction to this definition is to limit the discussion to content that is only delivered via the web to a browser. This limitation seems a poor choice however if we consider that more and more web content is being consumed via other devices such as cell phones and hand held devices like the Black Berry. Given this trend, shouldn't a Web CMS be able to manage content that may be delivered via any medium?

The definition of content brings to light another discussion that I find extremely interesting as well. Content can be an experience. So if wikipedia is right, a web CMS manages not only information, but also experiences. I'm not sure what qualifies as an experience but try for a minute to view a CMS as a tool for managing an experience. How does one define an experience?

I'll leave you with one more thought. Even if we had a clear definition of content, what is meant by the word management?

Comments?

Joel Halse Tue, May 6 2008 3:44 PM 2 comments

OpenEdit in Spanish

OpenEdit.org is now available in Spanish. Click 'Español' beside the search box and enjoy.

This is our first draft of the site in Spanish and we are sure to have some errors and mistakes that will need to be ironed out. Just send me a note if you find something and I'll get it fixed right away.

No dude en contactarnos si tiene alguna pregunta en ESPAÑOL. Contacte a ana@openedit.org
Ella los contactará con las respuestas a todas sus preguntas.

Joel Halse Wed, Apr 30 2008 5:58 PM 0 comments