ImpressCMS Community - ImpressCMS Blog

1.3 Update - Benchmarking Our Progress

Sun, 15 Aug 2010 02:30:26 -2200

Today we held a developer's review of the work being done in the trunk for the release of ImpressCMS 1.3, and while we talked a lot about the approach Marc and I took for this project, the real benefit shows in the benchmarks we have comparing 1.2.2 and the latest revision of 1.3. The greatest amount of effort has gone into the new architecture for the classes used by ImpressCMS - consolidating duplicate files and functions into single classes and separating each class into its own file. This has been a rather comprehensive work, because no one has done this in any other project before ImpressCMS - none of them have taken the time and made the effort to create a unified code base for their project.

We didn't do this just because it would make us different than the other projects or to break compatibility with previous versions, we did it to gain better performance, more stability and more scalability. We are in a time where most people have access to the Internet through a broadband connection, but also at a time when more people are browsing the Internet using mobile devices - those devices are not using broadband connections, so sites built on ImpressCMS, or any other platform, must be optimized for viewing on devices with less than highspeed connections. We also want to be considered for enterprise-level sites, where high traffic is normal and performance is an issue. So, we need to be critical about what code is included in our core and how well it performs. Let's have a look at how the numbers are stacking up, shall we?

ImpressCMS refactoring: half way through

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 17:58:50 -2200

Hi everyone,

Following Steve's latest blog post, I wanted to keep you updated of our progress. As you know, Steve and I have been hard at work refactoring ImpressCMS. We have some pretty old code in there ! And you would not believe how many different ways there are to name classes, functions and files! The good news is: with 1.3, we will have 1 way of naming classes and files (no, nothing for functions because we won't have any left ! - everything will be in classes!).

So, allow me to tell you a little bit about what we have done so far. It is still a work in progress, and we are refining our process as we go along, but a lot have already been done.

ImpressCMS, PHP5, Code Architecture and 1.3 Beta

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 02:54:06 -2200

The past week has been an interesting one - Marc-André and I have set about refactoring the core architecture of ImpressCMS, which is no small task, given that we have code that dates back to PHP Nuke!

ImpressCMS 1.3 will be a big step in establishing our own framework and clearing out some of the very old and somewhat inconsistant coding practices. We have been touting this release to be smaller, faster and better and that is definitely going to be true. Some of my early tests are showing a significant decrease in the number of queries used, the amount of memory used and a better page load time. As we get closer to releasing the beta version, I'll put out some statistics about the actual improvements.

Getting Out of the Box - Textsanitizer Plugins for ImpressCMS

Wed, 09 Jun 2010 15:54:06 -2200

Off the shelf applications don't always do what you want them to do, so usually, a little customization is in order. For some applications, it is like wading through the bayou as you look through their code to find the right spot to make your change. Other projects have their stuff in order and you're surprised at how easy it is to modify and extend what they've packaged up for you. ImpressCMS is definitely falling into the second category!

After using hashtags and mentions on Twitter and Facebook, I thought 'This would be a cool little addition to ImpressCMS!' So, I started out to create plugins to allow me to use these common tags.

CMS Expo is a great conference!

Wed, 05 May 2010 02:10:58 -2200

I have already been in Chicago for 2 days now for CMS Expo 2010. This is definitely an outstanding conference! Very well organized, a lot of great speakers, a lot of great people, great food, great everything!

For me, it had been a wonderful opportunity to finally meat with someone I’ve been working with for the past 5 years, Steve Kenow, one of the initiators of the ImpressCMS project. We have been working together since in the XOOPS days and started the ImpressCMS adventure together with other great people. We’ve been talking to each other nearly every week for the past few year, but yet again, I had still to meet with him! This was accomplished this week!

I also met with Steve M., another dedicated XOOPS and ImpressCMS user/developer. It’s so nice to meet with people sharing the same interest, in this case, open source CMS. Although CMS users and developers represent a large number of people across the world, you don’t connect with them in real life every day.

ImpressCMS partnering up with Microsoft at CMSExpo

Tue, 04 May 2010 18:39:48 -2200

Great news! Microsoft Make Web Not War is partnering with ImpressCMS at CMS Expo and sponsoring a very slick Arc™ keyboard and mouse for anyone attending CMS Expo!

The rule is very simple: tweet with the hashtag #webnotwar and #cmsx and let everyone know how you like the conference so far! One winner will be chosen randomly from all the people who tweeted this, and the Winner will be announced from @phponwindows on Friday May 7th.

We thank Microsoft for this sponsorship as well as the CMS Expo folks for organising such an outstanding conference !

For sure, we will be there next year! In the meantime, I do hope we'll see some of you guys at Make Web Not War in a few weeks!

How Far Can You Get With a Roadmap?

Tue, 04 May 2010 13:44:47 -2200

The first day of CMS Expo has been fantastic! Not only are we able to be around some of the open source greats and let people know a bit more about ImpressCMS, but I have been able to finally meet some of our own community in person. Marc-Andre and Steve M have joined me here and we have had a great time getting to know each other and talk about the project. One of the topics we've covered and heard a lot about at the expo is roadmaps.

CMS Expo is starting in 2 days!

Sat, 01 May 2010 09:14:54 -2200

As I'm sure you know by now, ImpressCMS will be attending its very first North American conference, CMS Expo 2010 in Chicago from May 3rd to May 5th. This will be an amazing experience! We will have a booth there and intend to meet with as many people as possible. First, to let people know about our great Community Management System, but also to make as many connexions as possible! As I mentioned in one of the very first blog post I wrote on ImpressCMS Blog, people connecting with each other, this is the driving force of an open source project.

Open Source - is it a community, a philosopy, or a license?

Sun, 25 Apr 2010 01:55:14 -2200

At its core, ImpressCMS is an open source project. But, what does that mean? A few recent events have brought this forward today.

The Open Source Initiative (OSI) focuses on the licensing of software as the definitive answer. In an earlier post, Marc-André talks about our open SVN structure. And in another post -

People. People connecting with each other. This is the true asset of an open source project. It is not code, it is not developers, it is the people. The people using the software, the people creating the software, the people helping each other, the people solving problems, the people creating greatness !

Join us at Make Web Not War - Montreal - May 27th

Fri, 16 Apr 2010 13:46:00 -2200

2010 is definitely a great year for ImpressCMS and great conferences! A few weeks ago there was the Montreal Confoo conference, in 2 weeks there will be CMS Expo 2010 in Chicago and last week of May, there will be one of Canada's first cross-platform web conferences showcasing the latest techniques and technologies available to the ever-evolving web community: Make Web Not War. It's a one day only event, May 27 in Montreal.