Custom Manager Pages in 2.1 don't scroll content correctly

Quote from: Bruno17 at Jun 10, 2011, 12:44 AM

Quote from: Moondawgy at Jun 09, 2011, 02:13 AM

Being a MODx user since the start and creating over 100 sites in it - I can categorically say I will never use Revo until someone much cleverer than me creates a non ExtJS admin.

Clean HTML 5 with easy to edit CSS with a bit of Jquery and AJAX as the backend please.

I love MODx and the community, never, ever get me wrong about that. But trying to create a ’desktop’ like admin is overkill.

There I said it - I would even donate quite a lot IF you could find someone who could take the time to do this.

I’m very happy with the Extjs-driven manager in Revo. The core-team did and does outstanding work with it.

I think it would take years to develope a new manager from scratch for Revo.
But perhaps it would be somehow possible to port the evolution-manager to Revo and add Revo-specific features in a bit less time than years.

I do not remember where I read this but I think OpenGeek said there was a manager from evolution available that was first used on the version 2 (0.9.7)? code and could be developed by the community if anyone so desired but it would need a lot of work as a lot has changed since the code was last used.

As far as I can recall nobody even bothered to ask where to find the code. As noble as the idea to get away from extJS may be I do not think there are enough people prepared to dedicate the time required to implement a none extJS manager at present in the community. I think Shawn has stated it was a time constraint that lead them to extJS as the fastest not optimum manager interface for Revolution.

Getting involved in this discussion is way above my pay-grade in MODX.
I would not know where to get started in either but correct me if I am wrong.
In it’s simplest form the manager is just a way of accessing the various tables in the database is that statement basically true or not?

I’d say that statement is true.

I am actually working on an alternative.. sort of. It’s called HandyMan and is a mobile optimized content manager, and hope to finish a first alpha release in about a month. It wont replace the entire manager, and only start of as a way to update your content from a mobile device (I don’t even want to think about opening the manager on a 300px wide screen), but built in such a way that it is easy to extend.

The source is on git, and contributors have access to a hosted demo I’m keeping up to date. If you’re interested in that initiative, check the site for it: modxmobile.com.

Thank you Mark that code is way-way above my pay-grade. I see you are also using a JS framework, was you decision also based on time?

Am I right in saying that anyone attempting to create any manager interface would first have to implement the current permission system before allowing access to edit even just say ’the content’ section of a resource.

It was cause I didn’t feel like reinventing the wheel, when I can just hook up into jQuery Mobile to get app-like transitions, touch optimized buttons etc.

One of the main conditions in picking the right framework was progressive enhancement as well as speed (filesizes), which is something jQM is great at: I build the pages in simple HTML5, and by passing data attributes I tell jQM what to do with it. If JS isn’t enabled for whatever reason you can still use it all, minus the extra usability added by jQM.

I could’ve also went with Sencha Touch, made by the same people who made ExtJS and could’ve just used that to hook into the existing system more easily, but that one was something like 5x as big (filesize) as jQM and I think he didn’t do PE as good either.

So yes; based on time concerning the general app-feeling, but no for time in general as it does require me to build my own MODX-side of the framework which wouldn’t be necessary with Sencha Touch.


As for the current security system.. you *can*. Depending on how you develop, you can bypass quite some checks however with HandyMan I decided to utilize as much of the core I can reasonably and am hooking up saving resources etc into the main modx files. They in turn check quite some permissions and if it fails it outputs an error message.

Thank you again for your detailed reply.

How did you find out how to use the existing code. (loging into manager and permissions)

By reading existing code and comments? or some other means.

I guess I already knew the most I needed, about the security perms and the processor system etc. From there it’s looking in the code, most is pretty self explanatory or commented. Though I guess if you’re new to modx the core code is daunting....

Mark while trying to understand your code for Handyman I loaded same onto my dev server to see the results I don’t know if you are aware of it but code within <p> tags truncates with .. in Content by comparison introtext (no <p> tags) displays to fit screen size.

I was amazed how easy it was to follow your code I think I almost understand most of your code without a php reference at my side. Seemed a little easier than trying to follow the manager index.php in the core package from what I remembered but after looking at your code and revisiting the manager index.php and modx.class.php they did not seem so daunting as I first thought.

Does anyone know where to find the old evo manager code that @OpenGeek spoke about before they changed to extJS?

Maybe I will take a look at that and see how that was done!

hum ok so because of this new system layout, babel add-on make disappear the checkbox of richtexteditor in create/update ressource form as explain on topic http://modxcms.com/forums/index.php/topic,64909.0.html

Quote from: allanb at Jun 11, 2011, 12:00 PM

Mark while trying to understand your code for Handyman I loaded same onto my dev server to see the results I don’t know if you are aware of it but code within <p> tags truncates with .. in Content by comparison introtext (no <p> tags) displays to fit screen size.

I’ll have to check that out, could you create an issue for it on the Github repo for me so I wont forget? I’m thinking it’s something jQM is hijacking and I’ll have to put it back in his cage there.

I was amazed how easy it was to follow your code I think I almost understand most of your code without a php reference at my side. Seemed a little easier than trying to follow the manager index.php in the core package from what I remembered but after looking at your code and revisiting the manager index.php and modx.class.php they did not seem so daunting as I first thought.

I think for sure my code is easier to follow. That’s cause it isn’t quite as extended as the MODX core, and functionality is still rather limited. The tough thing about the main MODX files is keeping track of where certain calls go - I find the API docs quite convenient for that at api.modxcms.com, though that also needs some getting used to (and hasn’t been updated for 2.1 I think).

I don’t know about the evo mgr "port", though you can always fetch & install Evolution to see how that worked

Thanks again Mark. I have created an issue for you at github.