MODX 2 manager development, yours likes and dislikes

Quote from: sottwell at Nov 20, 2012, 07:24 AM

Hm. Looks interesting. Much less confusing license, at any rate. http://qooxdoo.org/license

And editable tables. http://demo.qooxdoo.org/devel/playground/#Table-ria

tableModel.setColumnEditable(1, true);

Yes looks easy but this brings back DOM inception. I took a quick look through the documentation and its not as documented as ExtJS, so this would confuse users even more plus it doesn't have a large enough community to help if you should find yourself hitting a brick wall.

I'm definitely guilty of not spending much time trying to learn ExtJS. And looking at the code it generates makes me think it's not efficient with the DOM.
However, there's no question the bar is definitely lifted higher by having the standardised UI component interface in the manager - both for presentation, and for development skills required.

Keeping interface components standardised is important for several reasons:

• maintain a consistency in the 'language' of your UI
• quicker for users to learn how to use a new set of controls
• maintains a professional and integrated appearance to the CMS

But if we are looking for a replacement for ExtJS, from what I can see, many of the UI frameworks just dont' provide as sophisticated tools and components as it does.
In terms of both covering the licensing and providing replacement components to the interface in the manager the only real alternatives I can think of are
Dojo/Dijit http://dojotoolkit.org/ / http://dojotoolkit.org/reference-guide/1.8/dijit/index.html
or JQuery UIhttp://jqueryui.com/

JQuery UI would seem like the obvious pathway to provide scope for devs of different levels to get round the issues we currently hear about building CMPs.
I also hear really good things about Dojo, but I don't think it's any less daunting than ExtJS (although its licensing is clearly simpler).

But maybe all we really need, is some better education around using ExtJS - some more tutorials? [ed. note: christianhanvey last edited this post 11 years, 5 months ago.]

Well, I did a fairly simple application and documented it some years ago, and it didn't really make things any easier. http://sottwell.com/datagrid-1.html

However, more tutorials on working with the Revo Manager, starting with something really simple, would be really nice. Maybe a custom Help page with tabs for different instructions or videos for the client?

jQueryUI does not abstract you from HTML. I don't want to know about HTML when I write my app/component. And I want to easy dynamic creation/destroing of components. Yes, ExtJS generates heavy DOM structure, but this enables flexibility and power of components. I hope we get cool canvas-based fast frameworks in future, but now we have to use slow DOM frameworks.

Quote from: gelstudios at Nov 14, 2012, 09:08 AM

The resource tree on the left, Needs to be completely overhauled IMO. Although it does look nice and fancy - I don't want to waste my time waiting for it all to redraw after simply switching tabs or saving a document. Plus not to mention the amount of "i cant see the tree" posts going around.

I agree with this one entirely, it can be frustrating waiting for the tree to reload. I tend to use the quick update feature to make changes which avoids this constant refreshing.

On a separate point, I find that when updating TVs in a document you are taken back to the Document tab each time you save, which it a real pain especially if doing lots of changes, I would prefer to remain on the TV tab this is often the case when working with MIGX.

I've been thinking about resource tree overhaul also, but not the standard one, a responsive one designed to be touch friendly. I'd imagine it would consist of vertical buttons that's when toggled list their children, and use vertical scrolling.

Does anyone have familiarity with YUI? http://yuilibrary.com Ext originally began as an add-on library to an earlier version of YUI. Ron Savage is not a fan really of it (or of Dojo or Ext for that matter): http://savage.net.au/Ron/html/review.of.js.libs.html

That being said, every framework will have its ardent haters and avid proponents.

Wijmo is built on top of jQuery UI, and looks like it has some interesting components: http://wijmo.com

Slow tree loading could be solved by local storage, this is one of the hottest HTML5 new feature.

If you use 2.2.5-pl, try look at System Setting > Backend Manager. There is a new setting manager_html5_cache to speed up backend manager but still experimental. I think this is the right track for the next MODx.

About ExtJS, once I heard Shaun McCormick (aka splittingred) said that ExtJS has been choosen for backend manager because it's OOP feature. I myself agree with that. You can look at another javascript framework, but no one can match ExtJS in terms of OOP. ExtJS is the most complete and extendable OOP framework, and that really help the development and perfectly fits with MODx. [ed. note: lokamaya last edited this post 11 years, 5 months ago.]

qooxdoo is definitely object-oriented.

A bit off-topic, but I was looking at a really interesting looking node.js based CMS the other day. No PHP! Load up your own (or a repository's) node.js library, and off you go. http://nodize.com/screencasts

Wijmo is built on top of jQuery UI, and looks like it has some interesting components

Wijmo really looks interesting and fresh. Thanks for the link. IMHO this is just a widget library, and this is good for lightweight frontend apps, but for Manager Panel I would prefer a power framework.

...ExtJS has been choosen for backend manager because it's OOP feature. I myself agree with that

So am I. So, I would like to see ExtJS 4 in MODx 3 Or maybe qooxdoo (I have just started to learn qooxdoo and do not know enough about it)