ZOO 2.0 Frequently Asked Questions
In the comments of our latest blog posts and on Twitter, we recently noticed some questions about ZOO 2.0 that were being asked more than others. There seems to be a lot of confusion if some demanded features will make it into ZOO 2.0 or not. Our latest posts are about the new architecture of ZOO 2.0 and all new features we developed. But of course we want to answers all your questions and clarify the features of ZOO 2.0.
What about Frontend Submission?
Update: ZOO 2.1 BETA is available with frontend submission and editing. Read more here.
The most demanded feature is frontend submission. But there are some misunderstandings about what frontend submission really is. Some are asking for frontend submission, some for frontend editing, some for frontend capabilities and so on. For us there is a big difference between user submissions and frontend access to the ZOO administration panel. The demand of administration through the frontend is caused by the need of a better permission management for Joomla. For example website administrators just don’t want to allow their customers to access the Joomla backend. Joomla 1.6 will solve this problem. It will have a completely reworked ACL system which looks very promising. Of course ZOO will make use of it as soon as Joomla 1.6 is released. Because of this, we have no plans for frontend administration for ZOO. Frontend submission on the other hand allows non-registered users to submit items. For example blog articles could be submitted or new files could be added to a download archive. Frontend submission is a more complex feature than frontend administration. You have to validate all submissions because user submissions cannot be trusted like submissions from administrators. We have a lot of ideas for the frontend submission and it is on top of our todo list. But for ZOO 2.0 we had to focus on the new architecture and all the basic stuff. We are very happy how everything worked out with the ZOO 2.0 development and after the release we will look forward to implement features like frontend submission. Currently we are not sure if it will make it in ZOO 2.1 or 2.2 but it has high priority. We are aiming for short release cycles for the next versions and it will not take long before we start the development.
What about multilingual content?
Currently Joomla offers no support for multilingual content. There are great extensions available to solve this problem like Nooku Content and Joomfish. In most cases this solutions works but for a complex content management extension like ZOO with CCK features it is a very difficult task - Not simply to make everything translatable but also to have a great usability, which is very important to us. To make a long story short, it is currently no solution available which works 100%. But of course we will keep an eye on the progress of multilingual extensions and maybe work something out in the future.
What about the framework?
ZOO 2.0 does not make use of any other PHP frameworks than the Joomla framework. There is a simple answer to that. ZOO is and will be used by a large user base. And to keep conflicts small we don’t want any dependencies to more than one framework. Think about Mootools and JQuery. We would never use both at the same time. There should only be one. Don’t be concerned. We are pretty sure our code quality will meet your expectations ;-)
What’s next?
We hope that we could answer a lot of open questions about ZOO 2.0 and that you are looking forward to the release. The next blog post will again be about the new features.
Comments (37)
heinski
Kray-Z
sascha
Marco Rodrigues
sascha
AndrX
sascha
FeSys
If not available, I will choose Drupal. I'ts better than any joomla CCK or Framework. But it's difficult.
K2 now is very popular of front-end editing. Flexi-content is better than K2 but will not gain popularity of Front-end editing. I guess you are so talented and so experienced not to relay on Joomla 1.6 ACL.. Front-end editing for what You built at administrator (catalogs... etc) area is must.
heinski
mihha
I was hoping to finally see it implemented and still nothing. Bah!
heinski
Linus
ЯдеÑнÑй
maxi
alex
sascha
roy.kastning.96
sascha
ehsan.torkamanzehi
Jesse
A lack of frontend editing is definitely enough reason to choose other CCKs that have it together like jReviews. If you really want a directory or any type of actively updated system, you need frontend editing. It's not like Yootheme doesn't realize this, it's just that they can't justify wasting a ton of money on something that will be obsolete by summer time.
P.J.
I would personally be willing to pay a lot more money to be able to allow regular registered users to submit from the front end because it would make our apps so much more powerful and valuable. I completely understand that this will be a big task to develop because of permissions and everything else that goes along with it (which types of users can submit to which apps, which users can edit submitted content) but it will be well worth the wait!
As I see it, front end submission is a must, as well as front end editing. Front end administration is definitely not necessary, if you require a different user to administer an app then that user should be trusted to go into the backend.
sascha
Chris
nice nice nice :) Are there plans for a radius distance search and a Overview Map (Google Maps) for the Business Directories (which are registered in the system)?
This would be awesome!
jossi.fresco
Can you be more specific about limitations for Joomfish-based sites?
Samuel
yngve.rodli
stephane.laroche
sascha
johnnyQuest
sascha
Jelger
sascha
heinski
James Hughes
All we have in the current zoo is search on key word across everything, what is really badly needed is search limited to certain applications (and their instances) and the ability to search specific categories.
On your site you have things like a recipe guide demo, which is great. But no one would ever use a big recipe site if they could not narrow their searches down to a specific category.
Other than that its showing amazing progress and I much prefer it to K2
Char
sascha
tqddn_hmzh
and 1 more thing why zoo not the core system of Joomla because this system totally the best cck ever with apps and user friendlier.