What hosting environment do you use for ocPortal

Thank you, Duck, for putting my thoughts into words.    This is something I have trouble with sometimes and is also why I won't volunteer to write a chapter.

The skill level of a n00b coming into ocP will not always be at the beginner level. Doing the book as a "reference manual" style will allow the reader (no matter the skill level) to quickly move to the section of the chapter he feels he needs the most help with.

Once ocP is installed, each reader will have different ideas as to what he/she wants/needs to do with the site. The reader may already have ocP installed and functioning and just needs help with certain parts of customization. This type of book will allow the reader to quickly move through the sections of the book and take that part of the customization as far as the reader wants/needs.

If the chapters are laid out in a logical order of customization, the book could also be used as a step by step type allowing the complete ocP n00b reader to install and then move on to customization in a logical order.

Chris didn't settle on making a CMS that fit a standard. Why should we settle on creating a book that fits a "tried and true" standard? We have the opportunity to create something that is degrees above the "tried and true".

Yes, we need to attract the beginner skill level, but we also need to attract all skill levels and this book has the opportunity to do just that if it is done correctly.

Sholzy-

This has been addressed in this post where I thanked both you and Duck for pushing for this presentation. As I said, we will use this format unless I receive well-considered opinions why this won't work; so far, I have received none.

Does this change in format allow you to reconsider contributing to the book? You're help with catalogs would be especially helpful since you are the only person I know of making use of the new features that became available in version 8.

Bob

@Sholzy I think your writing is often very clear and well presented and I think it would be awesome if you would help write a chapter. You shouldn't be too intimidated because most of the writing is basically gleaning information from existing tutorials and where you can improve upon content or at least rearrange it in a more enticing and understandable format which I think you'll do well at.

BobS said

Sholzy-

This has been addressed in this post where I thanked both you and Duck for pushing for this presentation. As I said, we will use this format unless I receive well-considered opinions why this won't work; so far, I have received none.

Does this change in format allow you to reconsider contributing to the book? You're help with catalogs would be especially helpful since you are the only person I know of making use of the new features that became available in version 8.

Bob

Sorry if it seemed I was still trying to promote my idea of how the book should be. It wasn't intended as that. My OCPD gets in the way once in awhile when I'm not consciously trying to control it.

The reason I'm not interested in writing a chapter is, a writer I am not, as I said in my previous post. Also, as I've stated in another post about volunteering to do the editing I'm sure what my availability will be when that time comes, but if I'm able I will do some editing. I might be able to toss out some notes scribble on the catalogs, but don't hold me to it for the same reason of editing. I have an overly full plate mentally right now keeping my stress level very high, and trying to produce a quality (by my own high standards) chapter would be a very difficult effort for me.

sholzy-

I understand your reasoning for not wanting to write a chapter. Your offer to possibly provide notes on some of the advanced catalog features would be greatly appreciated; you are "da man" in this particular arena.

No worries on "promoting" your ideas. While some might prefer someone to lead with a stronger hand, most who know me know that I am a consensus builder. I see my role in this project as collaborator-in-chief and encourage people to make suggestions (sometimes, as in this case, I am a little slow on the uptake).

On the other hand, as decisions are made, I want to get down to the business of writing this book. We can't continually revisit every decision made - it's just not productive.

Whatever you can do to help with the project will be greatly appreciated.

Bob

Duck said

Styling your site

Beginner Level: Topics:
Change Header.
Change Theme images
Install a new theme
Adding Blocks

Intermediate Level: Topics:
Use Theme Wizard.
Equations VS Shift
CSS Editing with Editor
Saving and Exporting your new theme

Advanced Level: Topics:
Template Modifications
Tempcode Programming
Manual CSS editing

Sorry to be a pain, but I think this is not a good idea at all!

Let's say 'Styling you site' is chapter 2 - what will chapter 3 refer to?

You can't have any screen shots in chapter 3, as there'll be no standard look from chapter 2, as it'll depend on how far the user chose to go through previous chapter.

How can you set out a brief on the first chapter, if each person following the book will get a different result?  

I don't see you can have a step-by-step book where there aren't actually any set steps to follow!  It's now in danger of becoming a reference book - something I thought we were very keen to avoid.

I don't see any advantage to this method over moving the intermediate to later chapters, so people all follow the same path.

Plus I thought this book was not going to cover advanced level stuff, in order to stop the book becoming bloated an unachievable.  (It's easy to propose this approach, but very different to actually write it!)

I'm quite happy to be overruled, but I do think very strongly indeed  that the 'all in 1 chapter' approach is a not a good idea.  

O

Let's just say we have 10 topics with Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced levels.  If each level is in one chapter, that's 30 levels that have to be written before the book can be published.

If all the Beginner chapters are written first, it's only 10 before the book can be published.

The Intermediate and Advanced can then be written and added at a later date, either on the end, or as separate books.

A chapter by chapter approach allows a book to be produced much faster - and that's a big priority.

I think I sort of get where you're coming from when you say you worry about the ScreenShots not matching if someone Skips the different levels of topic but I believe that is less a concern than one might think at first. Just because the intermediate or advanced topics might cover more material doesn't mean the produced results have to change much.

I mean think about using the Theme Editor or CSS Editor (Classified currently as intermediate topics) The changes made using this methods can be exactly the same finish as using the Manual CSS changes (an Advanced Topic). Where things might be a little Different is with the Tempcode Programming maybe but even that can be dealt with easy enough. Besides with each topic if we move the user through different stages of skill that is good and probably far easier to learn than to start with a topic (like styling your site) in Chapter 2 but give only a part of the puzzle and then 20 Chapters Later revisit this theme with more stuff. Then Later when the user needs to refresh his memory on something he has to try and remember which section of the book he read it in. This would reflect one of my peeves about the Documentation on this site. I find a lot of the tuts etc are sort of scattered in terms of similar information topics and sometimes I can't remember where I read something and waste copious amounts of time trying to find it again and get very frustrated.

I also will bring back up the argument that our best category of users to convert is the intermediate level or better of new ocPortal users and the book really needs to include a lot of intermediate to advanced topics. I know Chris stated many people come and look and leave and his assumption means they are noobs because the ones who stay have enough knowledge to pluck away till they learn and become comfortable but I don't believe that is true. The reason being is all the ones here have even stated they almost gave up because of the learning curve involved. I can't tell you how close I was even though I was very excited but even today I am sometimes tempted to return to the simplicity of a Nuke site when I get frustrated.

I also know that since I have been here I have promoted ocPortal in the Nuke Community and have seen several (intermediate level CMS admins) come here get a little excited but then disappear already. I fully believe the COMPLETE n00b no matter how well written the book won't even be interested in reading it because when they come here and see the words CMS and try the demo or whatever will go "WHOA This is way to complex for me! Where is that Wordpress thing I heard about?" So they are not going to even give a second glance to a book and I will bet with anyone on that! The target we have the best chance with has a basic understanding of what a CMS is and has likely played with one or 2 before and/or at the very least has had a static website before and wants to improve.

However I know that some of you will still disagree on the target user, that doesn't really matter as long as the book allows for the different skill levels. Then it will be of the widest spread use.

But I do know if we end up starting with the first 10 - 20 chapters all aimed at just the very basic Skill level before we add advanced topics (at least ones pertaining to  the same subject matter as earlier topics) we are going to have the same failure in documentation that this site currently has. I mean there is so much good information in the sites documentation that we shouldn't even need a book right? But we do because that info is scattered and hard to follow logically and only the most excited will stay long enough to get acquainted with it. Our job is to convert that so when I want to know something about how to style my site or add a catalogue I know I can turn to one section of the book and have everything pertaining to that subject right there in one section for me be it an advanced or basic level task.  


Lastly 5hink about this too:

If we are teaching an absolute beginner about a subject (like styling your site) what better time to improve his skill level to intermediate or advance than when he has just learned the basics? I mean if I started out learning how to change my header then moved on to setting up forums followed by catalogues followed by the comcode editor followed by the permission system followed by the galleries followed by the blogs and then you start talking about using the them wizard or something like that my brainwave is not on that track anymore and it becomes more difficult to retain information. I can give you an example that I struggle with all the time. I both CODE php and DESIGN Graphics or Templates. When I start on one project like coding a new module in php or something and work on that for a week my brain is the programming mode and then I have to switch to do a DESIGN for someone it is very hard to get my creative gears going in the graphics area and it becomes really slow to get started and then by the time I am finished with that when I want to return to coding it is again a really slow transition and sometimes I end up leaving projects unfinished cause I just can't get back into gear. Scattering Topics of similar subject matter throughout the book will create that same issue for readers. It will confuse and demotivate them instead of teaching them everything they need to know about a subject while their mind is on the track. It's like you want to drive a person half way down a road then making them turn to a different road for a while then eventually teleport them back to the original road so they can finish driving it. That would demotivate many I am sure.

ZONES

Same site, single installation, but each change in the book is shown by directing the reader to a specific zone by its ID in the URL, which will be provided as a link for the reader to SEE what has been changed.

 

You make a good point, Duck, but having written documentation in the past I can tell you it's a lot more work than most people expect.

I think there's a very real danger of this book being so over-ambitious that it will simply fail to materialise.

I agree that in an ideal world the book would cover all the way up to advanced.  However, I just don't know if that's viable give the very limited resources available.  I mean, how many people are there actually volunteering to write chapters?  Have these people done it before?  Do they have a realistic idea of the amount of work involved?

If we write a book trying to cover everything and run out of steam during the intermediate stuff, we'll have nothing.  And I think that's a very real danger.

If we write a book for beginners and run out of steam during the following intermediate stuff, we'll at least have a book for beginners.  Not perfect, I agree, but definitely better than nothing.  

And nobody can get to advanced without being a beginner first.  Everybody has to start somewhere.

^^^^ What he said!  

I have to agree with Duck. The only thing I can see that could be different is the advanced topics moved to a second book, only for the sake of having a second book to produce more revenue.

Other than that I'm staying out of this.  

I do see your point too and it is a very good one. Getting the book out is important and given limited resources with a huge amount of work ahead of them does mean maybe we need to prioritize. But if we must drop content I think it should be the beginner content.

I would have purchased a book when I found ocPortal if one was available. If I found it's content aimed solely at a beginner I would have wanted a refund. I need to now the nitty gritty. I don't need to know how to install it. I don't basic explanations of HTML and CSS and I don't need to know what a blog or Catalogue or even CEDI is (though I did need it translated to WIKI lol)  I wan't to know the little tricks like how to use the Admin Search (I never realized how useful it was till I had been using ocPortal for at least a month or 2) I want to know how I can save time using OCCLE I want to know whats the best way to use the theme editor and probably the most common I want to know how I can make ocPortal look like any website out there. But don't talk to me about replace an image in the header I can figure that out quick on my own. You talk to me about all that stuff and I would say this book is garbage. It teaches me nothing common sense couldn't have done on its own.

There are a couple of things I want to go over here.

First, I have said from the beginning that advanced features can be covered in later chapters or, better yet, a separate book. I still think this is the way to go.

That leaves us with the issue of beginner v intermediate. I responded to sholzy in a private message that I think a better way to approach this is what is essential and what is frequently/typically used. These areas must be covered in the book regardless if they are "intermediate".

I've been playing all morning with outlining chapters and run into the issue of which is the better approach for what is basically a "how-to" book. By their nature, how-to books are narratives and our book needs to reflect this.

While I want to make sure the reader has the material available that they need to build something more than a basic site, I also have pencilled in as a requirement that we have trouble-shooting guides by chapter. This allows people to zero in on their problems when the information is fresh in their mind and is much better then leafing through an appendix at the end of the book.

What I am saying is that the book needs to be written in a narrative style and we need to move beyond the notion of beginner and advanced to a concept of essential and most useful.

Bob

Everyone has a vision, if it comes to write a book or something. We have to find a way between both bests I think.

Duck said

I do see your point too and it is a very good one. Getting the book out is important and given limited resources with a huge amount of work ahead of them does mean maybe we need to prioritize. But if we must drop content I think it should be the beginner content.

I would have purchased a book when I found ocPortal if one was available. If I found it's content aimed solely at a beginner I would have wanted a refund. I need to now the nitty gritty. I don't need to know how to install it. I don't basic explanations of HTML and CSS and I don't need to know what a blog or Catalogue or even CEDI is (though I did need it translated to WIKI lol)  I wan't to know the little tricks like how to use the Admin Search (I never realized how useful it was till I had been using ocPortal for at least a month or 2) I want to know how I can save time using OCCLE I want to know whats the best way to use the theme editor and probably the most common I want to know how I can make ocPortal look like any website out there. But don't talk to me about replace an image in the header I can figure that out quick on my own. You talk to me about all that stuff and I would say this book is garbage. It teaches me nothing common sense couldn't have done on its own.

Duck-

The problem here is that I suspect that you and I do not reflect the majority of users who download and try ocPortal. You, in particular, have a great number of skills which are very often lacking others who come here asking the most rudimentary of questions.

This book needs to be for beginners and get them up to speed on the most common features that are employed on a typical site.

Bob

Many possible new users of ocPortal have trye also most other cms systems on the market. So from that vision out I can understand Duck.

On the other hand is ocPortal to complex for a normal starting users. What I have write earlier, they start on it to install, and don't no how to get further and search for a simple solution like Wordpress.
If we can give them a hand with a book that handless most simple questions to a solution, many go will further to use it. ofcource everyone has to begin before to get advanged user.

Harry

To elaborate think about the idea of purchasing a book. Why would you do that? Because you are excited about the product and want to learn more. Absolute beginners are not going to be very excited about ocPortal because it is a complex beast in comparison to much else out there. T

he only people that will be motivate to spend money on a book are those that recognize what ocPortal has to offer and and WANT to learn more how to use it. Absolute beginners aren't even likely to find ocPortal in the first place because they are searching google for "How to build a website about cars?" or "How to setup a blog site". If a user finds ocPortal it is because he is serious and was looking for a CMS which he already understands what that means and much of what it involves.

 Power users are ocPortals best market and Power users will not want to invest money in a book that teaches them basics they either know or could have figured out easily on their own. Power users want you to show them the power! They willl pay for that! Beginners are going to take one look and say WOW this is above my understanding I am not sure I want to spend money on a book to see if I can learn it.

Think back to your beginnings everyone when you were really new to the concept of a CMS. Where did you turn? Would you have run at first site from ocPortal? I know I would and probably did. I ran from many CMS that I found too complex. I certainly wasn't going to buy any books about them unless I was excited about them. Even still today if I want to learn something new I look for books from intermediate to advanced on a subject because I know beginner books have you bored by the end of the second chapter and by the end of the book I feel damn most of that could have been explained in 3 paragraphs and saved me some time. The best books I have seen delve deeper into a subject and give you real world examples and bring you up to power user level fast. Those are the ones worth money.

Anyway just keep what I said in mind. I am fine with the beginner course of action if that's what gets the boll rolling. I just want to see ocPortal progress as a community and I think targeting more intermediate and up users will grow it faster and stronger than trying to attract a ton of n00bs who will likely run away or worse yet stay and be more of a burden for support. (I mean that in a gentle way.)

The "… for Dummies" books are amongst the best-selling out there. They get a beginner up to speed with a single product or concept. This is exactly what we need to do.

As stated, people with skills will always find a way to sort things out if they are truly interested. Sure, a book that focuses on advanced topics would be a real plus but I in no way think that that demographic is (or should be) the largest set of users.

Further, we have discussed the possibility that we make the basic book free and then charge for an advanced book written later. This may be the way to go. The amount of money made by selling a book is probably insignificant relative to the cost of acquiring a new user.

Bob

Duck said

I would have purchased a book when I found ocPortal if one was available. If I found it's content aimed solely at a beginner I would have wanted a refund. […] To elaborate think about the idea of purchasing a book. […] The only people that will be motivate to spend money on a book are those that recognize what ocPortal has to offer and and WANT to learn more how to use it.

Sorry, my understanding was that this book was going to be either a free or very cheap ebook, that could be updated as and when new topics were written.  I was not aware that it had now moved on to being a full priced hard-copy book.  (Sorry - I don't have time to read everything on here.)

Please ignore all my previous comments.  To justify  the full $19.99 (?) purchase price you will indeed need to produce a lot more content, although I would allow a great deal of time for this.

Apologies.