Sphinx 1.1 Goes Gold!

By Luke, for DynSCS
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions is pleased to announce that our Dynamic Systems Portal: Sphinx 1.1 has been a long time coming, and while we’re not the biggest player by far, we appreciate every single user that has downloaded and gave Sphinx a spin. To date, Sphinx 1.1 has had pleasant success with 830+ downloads of our core package, and over 1560 downloads combined.

Sphinx 1.1 has seen minor improvements over the RC release. 99% were minor bug fixes, which is a direct reflection of our gracious premium members whom poured their guts out to ensure that our RC was as stable (or more) than most “final or gold” releases. From there, the community both openly and privately reported bugs, and all have been squashed.

This release does not incorporate any “new” features as it was a RC to final type release, with one exception.

While we were working out a minor kink in the downloads area, we added in the ability for users to easily add in their own custom download icons for individual file types. Images can vary with each theme, and are located in the Themes/”theme-name”/images/downloads directory.

A default set of icons has been included with this release, located in the common_files/Themes/sphinx/images/downloads directory.

Users simply add an image file with a name that corresponds to the downloads file extension. For example, for an .mp3 file, you could add mp3.gif to the downloads image directory, and it will show up as the file icon for that type of file.

We now look forward to two things on our immediate horizon. First, we’re already mapping out changes for a Sphinx 1.1.1 release, which is anticipated around the 1st of November.

Second, we’re already hard at work with SMF 2.0, and working to further the Sphinx brand. At this time, it looks like we will put a temporary hold on our highly anticipated stand alone version, and make sure we have SMF 2.0 capability as soon as humanly possible. SMF 2.0 brings a lot of changes to the table, and we do mean a lot. We firmly believe that users will be quite impressed with what the SMF folks have in store for 2.0, and it will definitely further expand the SMF brand.

From there, we will continue on with our stand alone version, and we’ve even duped convinced a third coder to pitch in on occasion to help bring this version to light.

Getting back to Sphinx 1.1, the following issues from the bug tracker have been resolved:

- 0000008: [HTML/CSS] Double radio buttons on Post (luke)
- 0000009: [Templates (Code)] Incorrect Link Format In News Template (luke)
- 0000011: [Modules] Typo in query when responding to guestbook entry… (luke)
- 0000013: [Blocks] Missing “admin” areas (luke)
- 0000015: [HTML/CSS] News only spans one column…
- 0000016: [Modules] Download section does not show image for file
- 0000020: [Modules] Log entry
- 0000022: [Modules] Associate particual icon image to a file in the download section
- 0000027: [Blocks] Log entry - undefined index: 0
- 0000028: [General/Unknown] Log entry - undefined variable secs

For more information, feel free to drop by our bug tracker.

In closing, we’d like to thank each and every Sphinx user for your support and usage of Sphinx. Without you, Sphinx would not be possible.

Enjoy!

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Sphinx 1.1 Goes Gold!

By Luke, for DynSCS
Saturday May 5, 2007
11:30am CDT
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

We would like to announce that Sphinx 1.1(RC) is now available for immediate download from our downloads area.

This brings to light (finally, we know) SMF 1.1 compatibility, and several overall improvements to the code base.

Some of these improvements include, but are not limited to the following:

- Corrections for any reported bugs from previous versions.

- Improved Block Management main interface.

- Collapsible blocks

- Improved default theme

- Improved database queries

- Recent Topics block by recently active or recently added topics

- Vastly improved User Info block

- Further clean up of code and output source

- Lots of additional things as well!

We are committed to this release, and we’re already planning Sphinx 1.1.1 once 1.1 goes final. Our current estimated time frame to 1.1 final is approximately 60 days, depending on bug reports and severity with the RC package. This will allow plenty of testing time, and allow for time to get any issues sorted and corrected.

From there, we will continue to stick to an approximate schedule of releases every 60-90 days, depending on issues and improvements.

In addition to this, we will be continuing work on our 2.0 release as well, which is still tracking for development release in later this year. However, 1.1 will not sit stale during this time, as mentioned we are committed to its releases and update cycle.

In closing, we’d like to thank our premium members for giving this a shakedown and helping us produce even higher quality public releases.

In addition we would like to thank you, our users, for giving this a chance to flourish its young roots as it takes off to become your portal of choice.

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Sphinx Portal 1.1 Released

By Luke, for DynSCS
Monday April 9, 2007
4:00pm CDT
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

Does the name Bad Behavior ring a bell with anyone?

I’ll bet it does with the bloggers out there. If not, where’s your head?
This is an anti-spam option, for the record.

Here’s the problem with spam bots.

Captcha’s work, usually, but those dirty spam bots are still eating up your bandwidth. So if a [b]spam bot[/b] hits your site 1000 times before giving up, how much bandwidth did it just eat up and waste.

Bad Behavior is one of the leading anti-spam solutions in the blogging world, and has enjoyed great success. We’re pleased to be able to offer the same cleansing feeling for your Sphinx portal and forums.

Not familiar with what Bad Behavior is or does?
Check out the Bad Behavior Website for more info.

This Add-on for Sphinx is now available in the downloads area located in our community

To put it blunt, I hate spammers. Hate is a strong word, and one that is taken too lightly most of the time. I kid you not, I’m not taking it lightly. Not whatsoever. They are the absolute scum of the earth. In our always evolving efforts to help protect your sites, we decided to make the port of Bad Behavior. Which I will admit, I am a big fan of.

Granted nothing is perfect, but the more layers of resistance you can add, the better off you are.

So give it a whirl, and see what you think. Then enjoy surfing your site, while Bad Behavior quietly works its magic in the background.

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Sphinx Adds Bad Behavior To Lineup

By Luke, for DynSCS
Friday April 6, 2007
1:35pm CDT
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

At some point tomorrow afternoon, Saturday (local time), we anticipate releasing our beta version of Sphinx 1.1 for testing purposes.

It’s been a long time coming, and we’ve busted our tails to make this as stable as possible early on to speed up the testing process. Needless to say, your development team has been testing the heck out of it.

I would like to give a big thanks to the DragonPrime - LoGD Resource Community for their testing of Sphinx 1.1 as a pre-beta/alpha release, and making sure it was stable enough for our beta testing release. Their users found the little stuff, and have helped tweak it up to where it should speed up the public release candidate by quite a bit. Between them and Mark Zerr’s testing of 1.0, it’s combining efforts which are leading to an even more stable code base. Thanks again, folks.

Please note that this is a beta version under our new release schedule, and is available for open testing to any registered member of our forums who have donated to the project and upgraded to our Premium Membership option.

What, you haven’t upgraded yet? Why not upgrade now and enjoy our additional support options and get the opportunity to help test and shape the future of Sphinx?

Feeling left out? Well, there’s no reason to. As we’ve mentioned previously, release testing used to be held in a closed environment under an “alpha” title, and the first public release would have been labeled as “beta. We’ve simply switched up the names, and opened testing versions to those who would like to participate, instead of being by invite only. What would have been a public beta, is now simply called a release candidate. So you’re still getting the same release access as you always have.

Also, support is still what you’ve come to expect and trust as well. The forums are open, as always. Upgrading does allow a few extra options, which many users will find nice, but if you are unable to help support the project through donating we understand and aren’t leaving you out in the cold.

With Sphinx 1.1, not much has changed in terms of features. The main reason behind this is to speed up the release process and get it into your hands as quick as possible. We have discussed a few minor tweaks and additions, some of which have made it into 1.1, and some of which may end up in 1.1.1.

What are they? We’re not telling, but it should make managing multiple themes and blocks easier in the long run.

Thanks for using Sphinx!

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Sphinx 1.1 Beta Release

By Luke, for DynSCS
Thursday March 29, 2007
10:01am CDT
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

Well, so far so good with Sphinx 1.0 I believe. A few minor things here and there, but nothing that seems to be a problem with the package yet. Just remember, it’s a good idea to make sure all your files upload properly.

Looking forward, we’re still running tests on Sphinx 1.1. We’ve found a few minor things over the past day or two, but nothing that is major. Mostly things are in the area of new variables to play with, new css classes in the default templates, and some fields that were moved or changed in the database.

Once our 1.1 release is available for public consumption, we encourage everyone to move on it. At that time we will only support security fixes with our 1.0 release, as it is meant to be a transitional release between the old Enigma project and our new Sphinx project. For 1.1 we will still provide an upgrade path from Enigma 1 and 2, beyond that we’re still discussing. Most likely we’ll have one for that as well, but it’s many months off.

Some concerns have come through my email in the past few days, and I’d like to put those to rest. Mainly the concerns have been over what 1.1 will bring, and if it will be supported past the initial release. Yes, it will be. While we don’t anticipate any real earth shattering feature inclusions, mainly because we don’t want to write something twice because of the 2.0 road map, we will still be supporting bug, maintenance, and security fixes. So as an example, if SMF releases 1.1.3 and makes a change that effects the Sphinx portal, we will have a fix and update for it accordingly. If their path through the 1.0 branch is any indication, there shouldn’t be any problems running their update packages through the package manager. As always, please allow us the chance to try any new update packages first so that we can ensure your production environments will not be affected.

All in all, 1.1 is on track for release as we have anticipated. We’re still waiting testing, so that we can make releases as stable as possible. We’re also awaiting bug reports from our 1.0 release, as some of those may also be relevant to 1.1 as well. Granted some code and various functions have been changed, but just in case.

Right now 1.1 is in a beta release stage, which will be the final stage of testing before a public available release.

Some minor concern has been brought to my attention in terms of our new offerings of Premium Member status, which includes additional support options and early access to code releases. Mainly the rumbles have been in terms of support being limited to the community and code not being available as soon as it could be.

While that may be one way to look at it, here are our intentions with this.

For early code releases:

While the terms of alpha and beta are being used for our early code releases, these are in name only. These would be packages/releases that would have remained internal, or offered to a very select few people anyway. No different than previous alpha releases, as we’ve also had a select invite only group for those as well.

With that in mind, we are actually opening up the testing availability to essentially anyone that wants to participate. This approach is being taken so that even more people can access the test releases than before. Previously these would have been by invite only, and limited to 10 or less people. By opening it up, this allows for people who really would like to test cutting edge versions but may have not been selected for early testing. A win win situation for all.

For additional support options:

The support you’ve come to expect still remains. Being not only supported by other knowledgeable members of the community, but by the developers as well. That will not change. Ever.

In addition to the standard support we will be offering additional support options for Premium Members, but that absolutely does not mean that regular community members are now “second class”, or will be ignored through the forums. This additional option will simply be above and beyond the already first class support that you’ve come to expect from Chris and I. Perhaps a better comparison or explanation would be that the additional support would be on a more personal level in terms of interaction with us, while sometimes a simple forum post can come across as non-personal thanks to the electronic communication platform known as the internet.

Support for regular members will not sway, rest assured.

So now, what exactly is up with the Premium Membership anyway? Here is how we approached this issue.

We looked at the project donations, and what community members who were in a position to be able to help a great, free project with some of the bills were getting out of it. Well, besides that satisfactory feeling of supporting a worthy cause. Maybe a little link love, but not much in addition to that. So, after looking at several other projects and their handling of charitable contributions from members, we decided that throwing a few bones back to those who were able to donate would be the right thing to do. Not because we felt we have to, but because we feel that we should in some way show our appreciation.

So, we decided to open up what would normally be internal code packages, and offer a little more privatized support as well. Where they can get a little one on one interaction time with the developers, in addition to the usual interaction within the forums. Let’s face it, sometimes when needing help we’re all a little nervous of posting our problems in the eye of the public. Usually these would be sent with a PM, but now they have an additional route as well.

We’re still working with this new concept, and we are taking into consideration several levels of interaction. Perhaps a level which only includes early code releases, or the option to simply upgrade support.

As always, donations are much appreciated and we’re thankful for the support we’ve received thus far. Your donations help us keep the server bills in check, allow for integrations with other “paid” applications, and keeps us from needing to mow lawns on the weekend when we could be writing more code.

So, in closing, we would like to thank everyone for their support and input thus far, and we look forward to building on the successes we’ve built to date.

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Development Notes, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Looking Towards Sphinx 1.1

By Luke, for DynSCS
Monday March 26, 2007
7:55pm CDT
Published on Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions.

On behalf of Chris and myself, your Dynamic Systems and Content Solutions developers, I would like to welcome you all to a new direction for an existing product.

Welcome to Sphinx, currently public with version 1.0, which is a fork/continuation of the Lunabyte Systems Portal, Enigma.

If you would like specifics, feel free to brush up on the history of the project, or browse around for some of the features if you are not yet familiar with what Sphinx can do.

For now, we invite you into our home and community where you can sign up and get busy with moving your website forward.

Thanks for the patience, understanding, and support. Enjoy Sphinx!

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Tagged as: News, Sphinx, Software, Luke, Portal, CMS

Trackback URL for: Finally, Sphinx 1.0 Is Here