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  • Michael

    Chowder CMS

    By Michael, in General,

    This is something i've always toyed with over the years, its gone by various names like project chocolate (a poke the vanilla forum lol), zephyr, eoan, etc. its been redone several times over the years as well. it originally started its life as a fuelPHP project, then switch to symfony, then eventually laravel, and now its current iteration, which is some mad mesh of custom scripting and composer packages.
    Chowder itself is an evolution of eoan, which was a sub-framework i was working on for wordpress, cause wordpress is a kind of a nightmare to work with, due to its spaghetti nature. after a few months, i realized all i was doing was using wordpress as a login and a template wrapper for it, so i figured why not expand it more into its own CMS. so that is what i've done, it was a little bit more work than i was anticipating but i'm quite happy with the results.
    so what is the ultimate goal of chowder? i dunno, it might just end up being a vanity project, but i have plans to replace my IPS installs with it in the very near future (maybe the next 6 months). I will be releasing the core and page builder app i am working on for free, not sure which license i will release it under. it will likely be an open source license. as some of you know, i have had negative opinions about GPL and leaned more towards more permissives license like MIT and BSD* style license. however, with working in wordpress and talking with wordpress devs, my opinions of GPL have lessened and i don't see it as the "cancer" i once thought it was. so we will see, i will likely release it under GPL, but like wordpress it will only apply to the PHP code, not the html/css/js, which will help with other developers who choose to use. 
    anyway, it still in its infancy (early alpha stages), here are some screen shots from it.

    the admin panel login.

    the landing page for the ap, there are more widgets for it, but i have them disabled as i work on a few things. right now it jus shows any logs that have crept up. since i'm developing this from the ground up, i've added in built into the "dev mode" a profiler that was inspired by the one in my toolbox app. 
    the panels that can be found in the "profiler"






    it contains info and metrics useful to development. there are more features i plan on adding to it, but those will need to wait till some other things are adding into the framework.

    next it will have a section you can manage/install apps in.

    the "hooks" for apps, work similar to hooks that have been found in previous versions of IPS.
     

    plugins are another weird thing i've added in. original it was meant to be handlers for events, but its grown a bit from there, and will handle events and execution points in the framework. like Group/Member/Settings plugins can be used to expand the forms for those things, smarty types will allow you to introduce things into the processing of a template and finally staff is a combo of events and execution points. when i release it, i will have more comprehensive explanation. 


    member management, in very early development here.






    more stuff related to member/group/staff management.


    here are the logs, they come in different flavors. in the code you can set the severity of them, so they will have different colors when listed and there will be filters to filter them out. there will even be the ability to configure which level notifies you and how they notify you (like thru email or thru the notification system, etc).
    now onto what is being used, here is a screen shot of the vendor folder (note: some of this stuff might not actually be in use, as i might pull in something to test it and decide not to use it, and take it out of my composer.json, but haven't purged it from it yet).



    here is the folder structure i've gone with. its a HMVC framework i'm aiming towards. the "core" app will contain everything to the core, i won't have a separate app and a system fold. nothing wrong with that route, i just prefer things to be more "organized".
    so things i will be using, most of the "core" will be a custom php framework inspired by things like fuelphp and laravel (with some symfony thrown in), but i will use third party libs when and where i can (as long as they meet my needs). I usually attempt to wrap what i'm using from third party components into classes for the core. this is usually more to make the code have a uniformed design language than anything else, its not intended to erase the work from the other libs that i use that might not be mine. it might be a practice i wont continue, and slowly replace what i've done already over several releases, we will see. 
    I'm using the smarty template engine. i chose smarty, cause i've always liked it, i felt its one of the most stable, mature and well documented out there. the main css i'm using it bootstrap 5, i like the look of bootstrap, and i think it gives theme design an easy point to alter, cause of how well supported and document bootstrap is. i also use various symfony components, along with fastroutes for the front end routing. 
    anyway i will release more about chowder as i develop it. if you have any questions or comments or features you might want to see in it, let me know. now is the time to have your voices heard, since its still in alpha
    btw if you want to see the the wordpress subframework chowder evolved from (eoan) in action, you can see it on this site:
    https://terranimperialguard.com/
    the shipyard/captains lounge/skilltrees section are all built with it. 

  • Michael

    Update

    By Michael, in General,

    well its been awhile...
    so to catch everyone up on things, its been a difficult year for me, a lot has happened since i last posted.  I got sick again, it wasn't major, but it was enough that it put me down for a bit. so i'm better now, shortly after getting better, some one close to me passed away. i didn't take that well and have been in a slump. that too, i've gotten better from.
    so where does that leave things? well first off i'm making all my ips 4 apps free of charge, till i can get them upgraded for IPS 5 (which i am not even sure the status of, that is how far i'm out of the loop there). if its already out, it will be a few months till i can afford to renew my license, i took off the time from work for being sick and deal with my depression from my friends death.
    hopefully everything is back to normal, well as normal as things can be. so if you have any questions, i will be back monitoring my discord. well thanks to everyone and hope everyone is well.
    if anyone wants to help out with my renewal, i'll accept donations.
     
    Paypal
    CashApp
    thanks to anyone who helps out, I will hopefully make it worth it.  any way enjoy the apps. 

  • Michael
    I have a mac mini from late 2020,i purchased it brand new from B&H in June of 2021. it has 16gb of ram and 256 ssd.
    Everything works on it, and it runs the latest Mac OS.
    I'm looking to sale it or trade it.
    Asking price is $600 o.b.o.
    things i would consider trading for it:
    iPhone 12+ or a flagship android  +cash(if the value of the phone is less than asking price on the mac) (doesn't matter the exact model or storage, i'll use prices found at https://www.backmarket.com/ for trades. should be in good to excellent condition, meaning it turns on and stays on, with no major scratches or defects, its battery should also be at least 80%. i will consider phones in lesser conditions, but at a reduce price).
    I'm open to anything else. I am also looking for a desk that can go from sitting to standing with a push of a button, and 30"+ 2k or 4k monitors in good conditions, but shipping on those might be prohibitively expensive.
    I am willing to do business outside of the US, US is preferable, but overseas/cross borders i will do if you are willing to pay for shipping. 


  • Michael

    Should Babble Return?

    By Michael, in General,

    Recently I was asked to look into creating a "live event" system. Sorta like "status update" but for general news/tweets/articles/etc, that could later be converted into a pages page at the end of the live event. This got me thinking about how live event systems work. To be effective, they have to be able to deliver the information in real time, there are only a handful of ways to do this efficiently. Ajax is simply out of the question in most cases, cause it can be a huge resource hit if more than 20 or so people are actively viewing the live event, so this got me thinking about babble once again. One of the things that set babble apart from other chat systems, was the fact it used websockets to deliver the messages to the connected users instead of relying on ajax to retrieve a list of new messages. this allowed for much faster real time communication, as the message being sent and received were almost instantaneous, with the biggest limiting factor being the connection speed of the user.
    However, this required special software to achieve. I opted to use node.js to serve as the websocket host. this would've required a separate server for site to run the babble node.js app on or use my service. Both of these required additional resources from both the client and myself, to implement fully. Now as most of you know, I am not some fairly large corporation or even a large or medium or small business, I'm one person, with the resources of 1 person.  So running the service for me was a costly endeavor for me. Even if it is more of a pita, the self hosted option is honestly better for everyone involved. Yes self hosting a nodejs server could be more expensive for some, but for most it might actually be cheaper. The servers I had, I had 2 of them at one point, then rolled back to 1 cause of cost for version 3 (but it was a more powerful server than the previous 2 I had). I tried to evenly distribute the cost of the service to the packages for babble (which at the time of the service, I was not making any money on the app itself and the service cost i was mostly in the hole on always). This was cause the size of the server had to be large to handle the load it would have, so more load, more cost, and then more cost to you. So with a self hosted server, you could scale to your needs, i would honestly say most sites would need a very cheap vps from like digital ocean or aws (around $6 to $12 a month).
    So if I were to bring back Babble, it would also include a live event system in it. I have several ideas to improve it to, one of the ideas i had was a "watch together" type system, that would allow multiple people to watch the same video (say from youtube and the creator of the watch together would have control over the video, like pausing/ff/rewind/etc) and have a chat going among those watching it. 
    If i was to bring back Babble, it would be apart of the subscription model, but it would not have a service attached to it this time. It would strictly be a self hosted thing, I of course would offer a setup service for those who needed it. 
    Let me think, here are some questions to ponder:
    Should i bring back babble and why. what features would like to see added what changes would you like to see what concerns you'd have with running your own node.js server should alternatives be explored instead of node.js+websockets whatever other question/comment you might have  

  • Michael

    Stratagem 3.3.0 release

    By Michael, in General,

    Stratagem 3.3.0 has been released under the new subscription model. 
    I've always wanted to do a central app that was required for all my apps, as I use a lot of "shared" libraries in my apps that i've created, that i will fix a bug in one of those and forget to bring it to the other apps or forget where i fixed the bug or when. So this shared app allows me to have only one app that actives the license key and checks on its status when it needs too and also keeps libs i've created to be shared among my apps into one location. 
    This will likely help a great deal with version 5 of IPS, as i have plans on moving over to a framework that plugins into IPS, but use very little IPS code to avoid issues in the future that always plagues me. this should also allow me to more easily move my apps over to other platforms like xenforo and wordpress moving on in the future. 

  • Michael

    Stratagem Update 2

    By Michael, in General,

    I was hoping to have had at least a beta released before the 4th, but i'm having issues with the license system in nexus. 
    I'll work on it over this weekend and hopefully i will have it up monday

  • Michael

    Happy 4th of July

    By Michael, in General,

    I just want to wish all my fellow patriots a happy and safe 4th of July!
    and here is a brief history of the U.S.
    How it all started, July 4th 1776:

    When Abraham Lincoln delivered the emancipation proclamation, crushing the rebellion and winning the civil war for the union!

    Teddy winning the west and protecting us from the evil sassysquatch:

    FDR defeating nazi germany and imperialist japan:

    JFK being the first man on the moon and riding a steel stalion:

    Nixon going to china:

    Reagan defeating communism:

    and why no one fucks with america!

    disclaimer: some liberties might have been taken in telling you this brief history of america. stay safe patriots!
    source for images: https://www.etsy.com/shop/sharpwriter?ref=shop-header-name&listing_id=1246161092&from_page=listing i highly recommend checking this guy out, he has an uncanny ability to capture what it means to be an american  

  • Michael

    Stratagem Update

    By Michael, in General,

    I'm currently finishing up the update for Stratagem. I will be testing it for the next week or so, to make sure i've got everything fixed. Stratagem will be the first app released under the subscription model. 
    after this release, i will begin development of stratagem 4.0, which will like be the last branch for the IPS 4.x series. Stratagem 5.0 will be the first branch for IPS 5.0.
    if you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave them down below. 

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