leesykes
DNN Creative Staff
Nuke Master III
Posts:3325
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| 28 Sep 2005 3:48 PM |
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Following several enquiries, I have decided to make the Efficion Consulting Articles Module Review and 41 minute Video Tutorials completely free of charge.
This is to allow you to view a full review so that you can see what good value for money a subscription will give you.
Our reviews are not just reviews, they are full video tutorials, not only providing you with information on how to use the module, but also offering further suggestions for how the module can be used.
This particular review consists of 9 Flash Videos which work through practical examples of using the module with a music website.
I would be interested in any comments.
The videos:
1) A brief description of how other websites have implemented the module
The modules main features
How to install the module (3 min 5sec) – 3MB
2) How to Insert the Categories module to a page
Configure it so that only administrators can view the module
Adding Categories and inserting the Articles module to a page. (2min 51sec) – 1.98MB
3) How to add an article using the HTML / Text page function
Viewing the article (4min 36sec) – 4.32MB
4) View a demonstration of the different article types.
Configuration options for the display of the articles list, filtering articles etc.
Adding a page with an articles module and
Configuring the site-wide options with the category filters (8min 57sec) – 7.81MB
5) Further configuration examples.
Working with featured articles
Creating a custom more articles link (4min 38sec) – 4.19MB
6) The Approve articles function and searching the articles (1min 39sec) – 1.45MB
7) A workaround for using banner ads (4min 56sec) – 3.95MB
Covering the 3.2 Beta module:
8) View how to install the module and
Fix the problem of the articles no longer displaying (3 min 20sec) – 2.92MB
9) View the additional features: Multiple Categories and assigning them to an article
A demonstration of the areas that still need to be implemented
Roles that can view content (8 min 21sec) – 7.01MB
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Lee Sykes
Site Administrator
Subscribe to the website : DotNetNuke Video Tutorials : The Skinning Toolkit : DotNetNuke Podcasts
Twitter: www.twitter.com/leesykes
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viet
Nuke Newbie
Posts:1
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| 21 Jan 2006 3:28 AM |
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Please show me how to download this Free Vieo.
Where's link to download ? |
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leesykes
DNN Creative Staff
Nuke Master III
Posts:3325
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vidapura
Posts:0
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| 04 Dec 2006 3:25 PM |
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Hi there Lee,
About the efficion articles module. It has a search facility.. but I couldn't get the main DNN search to find anything in the articles entered via the Efficion Module... is this by design? Or is it just that they ahven't gotten arounnd to integrating it with the main search?
Its just that I can see users complaining that they can't search everything from one place.
I apologise if I appear a bit uninformed.. cos.. I am.. heh... I've just started with DNN, got it installed and am now engaged in the dizzying search for the modules that can do what I want to do.
I was kind of shocked that there wasn't an articles management module built into dotnetnuke.. I have done a couple of postnuke sites and that whole idea was so.. central to the whole thing...
Thanks
Vida |
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leesykes
DNN Creative Staff
Nuke Master III
Posts:3325
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| 05 Dec 2006 5:17 AM |
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Hi Vida,
I haven't used the module since the review and a lot has changed since then. I suspect that the search is not integrated with the main DNN Search.
DNN search is not great, especially if you are creating a big site, the search results do not always read that well.
You may also find problems if the site grows really big that DNN can't index it all and runs the CPU at 100% causing your hosting provider to shut you down. If I recall correctly this happened in 3.2.2 - I don't know if it has been fixed in the later versions. - It would be worth searching on google for 100% cpu and search to double check this.
So it maybe worth using one of the articles modules search function and getting rid of the search token in your skin for DNN.
I would suggest experimenting with the various options to try and find some sort of happy medium. Let us know what you find,
Thanks, |
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Lee Sykes
Site Administrator
Subscribe to the website : DotNetNuke Video Tutorials : The Skinning Toolkit : DotNetNuke Podcasts
Twitter: www.twitter.com/leesykes
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vidapura
Posts:0
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| 07 Dec 2006 9:10 AM |
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Thanks for the heads up Lee,
Last thing I would want is to have the hosting people shut me down.
Still, not terribly happy with this situation.. I just know my users will kick up about the search not picking stuff out of the pages(tabs?), the articles, AND the forums....
Do you know of any forum module that integrates with the DNN search? I couldn't find one at all...
Sadly, I.m starting to feel that dotnetnuke is sorely lacking in a lot of areas when compared to the unix based CMS's like postnuke and mambo/joomla...
The first thing that struck me is that you seem to ahv to buy everything. With postnuke I was able to find the excellent pnbb for the forum, free. The articles is a built in.... and galleries etc.. all free...
In the area of skins too, if you look at http://demo.rockettheme.com/ to see the quality of the skins that joomla users have access to. I've searched high and low and can't find anyone offering DNN themes of that quality. ( and of course the basic solarflare II theme, which is a bit gorgeoous, isfree too)
Ahh I don't want to be a part pooper but to move to DNN I've had to pay for far more expensive hosting etc and I don't really see hge advantages apart from the hope that, since I do .net development in my day job, I might be able to write modules of my own eventually...
Thanks
Vida
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leesykes
DNN Creative Staff
Nuke Master III
Posts:3325
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| 07 Dec 2006 9:32 AM |
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There is a module which is about to be released which promises to solve all of the search problems in DNN by Venexus
You can find further informationn here;
http://www.venexus.com/Services/DotNetNuke/DotNetNukeSearch/tabid/1280/Default.aspx
http://www.flatburger.com/venexus/
http://dnnblog.venexus.com/PermaLink,guid,1bc994fa-5443-4ea3-977f-7702786a5318.aspx
http://dnnblog.venexus.com/PermaLink,guid,5a77daa5-0965-441e-a251-4a76b548f037.aspx
It is due to be officially released shortly, there is a comment in the last blog post to reply to the blog if you wish to test the PA - yes it's going to be available for free!
I converted to DNN because it enabled me to programme my own modules easily in asp.net and the skinning section is relatively straightforward. There are some bits that are lacking and generally if they are then I have found you are best off just creating it yourself and learning how to do it. If you stick with it I'm sure you will see the rewards in the end, especially if you develop your own custom modules.
Thanks,
Lee |
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Lee Sykes
Site Administrator
Subscribe to the website : DotNetNuke Video Tutorials : The Skinning Toolkit : DotNetNuke Podcasts
Twitter: www.twitter.com/leesykes
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vidapura
Posts:0
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| 07 Dec 2006 11:00 AM |
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Thanks you lee,
you are a real treasure trove of information. That search engine looks like the business allright.
Can I just ask one more questions, its a bit off topic but...
Speed of a dnn website? I find that when I leave a site for a few mins and go back to it the disk starts churning away and there is a noticeable delay before the page is finally displayed.. this would be on my desktop machine now, as I'm still just trialling things... I ahve seen stuff around on the web about DNN keep alives.. and I'm wondering about the reason and need for them... is this more of a dotnet thing than a DNN thing specifically? Does IIS periodically unload the app? Is there a setting on IIS to stop it doing this? Or do I need to get one of these KeepAlive things?
Thanks
Vida |
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leesykes
DNN Creative Staff
Nuke Master III
Posts:3325
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| 07 Dec 2006 11:10 AM |
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no problem. Speed of a website. - If a site is not accessed for a period of time it is unloaded from the servers memory,. It then takes 17secs(or so!) to re-load the site into its memory when a user visits the page.
We can live with this on localhost installations, but on a live website we have to ensure it loads fast. If you have a busy website, you do not need to worry about it as each visitor ensures the site is kept in the servers memory, but if you are just launching a site you need to ping the site so that the server thinks there is a visitor.
How often you ping the site usually depends on your hosting providers settings, but i have found that it usually is required once every 5 - 10 mins for a quiet site.
Don't purchase a keep alive product, you can use this service for free.
http://host-tracker.com/
Just register and you can add as many websites that need 'monitoring' as you need. - It's really useful as you also get reports on the uptime of your website.
Bear in mind it will send some of your website stats out as you are regularly pinging!
cheers, |
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Lee Sykes
Site Administrator
Subscribe to the website : DotNetNuke Video Tutorials : The Skinning Toolkit : DotNetNuke Podcasts
Twitter: www.twitter.com/leesykes
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