21 Apr
What Features do You Want to See?
I’m mulling over 3.1, thinking about what all I want to pack into it, and what, if anything, I want to defer to 3.2 and beyond. I’ve finished up adding bugs for the 3.1 features I can think of off the top of my head. Now, it’s your turn: as users, what features do you want to see In Series grow? It is, after all, all about the users. :)
If you don’t want to create an account with the bug tracking system, you can leave your requests in the comments. It’s a little extra work for me, but I want to encourage as much participation as possible. So, don’t be shy — tell me all about what you want In Series to do!
22 Responses to “What Features do You Want to See?”
Posted: Apr 21st, 2007 at 23:38
One note about the bug-tracking system…. While I think it’s pretty cool and totally understand why you’d like to use it (and like the users to use it), I don’t find the interface when you first go there to be super user friendly. (I know… you didn’t design Bugzilla…)
For example, I would love to be able to go there an see a list of bugs, which I can then filter by status. I know I can get that list by going to search and searching without entering a term, but that’s a couple of extra clicks…. (I’ve since bookmarked that particular search string, but maybe if you had a link to that on the front page of your bug tracker?)
Also, I keep finding myself clicking on “new” expecting to see a list of the newest bugs only to then remember that this is the link for filing a new bug :-(
But, as usual, awesome work! I just posted two bugs and got virtually instant replies! That’s dedication!
Posted: Apr 21st, 2007 at 23:56
@Ananda
Yeah, it’s a wee bit awkward. I’ll admit that I don’t know anywhere near all the nooks and crannies of how Bugzilla works, but I do know that it should be somewhat customizable. I just have to get some time to figure that part of the darn thing out…
Oh, and that’s not dedication so much as insomnia and e-mail notification. But thanks for the credit. ;)
Posted: Apr 23rd, 2007 at 04:50
Hi
It’s a great plugin. Good thing could be that multi authors can write post in series.
thanks
Posted: Apr 24th, 2007 at 03:32
Thanks for a really great plugin. After giving it some thought, I managed to get the SeriesList in place in a widget. However, on installing it, I started thinking about the needs to configure it, and I believe the following possibilities would be great:
* A way to limit the number of series shown by ListSeries to make it fit for use in a widget.
* An option to show the number of posts in each series in the listing.
* The possibility to have an expanded view of the ListSeries, where the TOC displays under each series’ header (great for a bigger separate TOC page).
* While waiting for ListSeries support w/o template tags (can this really be done?), it definitely would help with at least a line or two telling which template tag to use; it took a few minutes to figure out!
Finally, I can just agree in the above comment: “awesome work”!
Posted: Apr 24th, 2007 at 06:09
@cfg
That’s bug #15
@Henrik
That’s bug #14 (with some more new twists). This is quickly becoming the most-duped, so I figure it’s in high demand. As far as inserting it without needing a template tag… I’m going to just try and take the widget route on that one, and just automatically register the right function.
Thanks guys!
Posted: Apr 24th, 2007 at 11:20
Hey there,
I just tried installing In Series on my blog and ran into a problem, which I’m not sure if it’s a bug or not … Basically, what I’d like to do is list the table of contents at the bottom of the post page, but not have it show up on the main page (I have it set up as a list of post excerpts). Instead it shows up all the time. So if it is a bug, it would be nice to be able to set it so that it only shows up on post pages. Thanks.
Posted: Apr 24th, 2007 at 16:25
@David
It’s a feature (no, seriously). However, I do have the other feature slated to make a comeback in 3.1 (bug 13).
Posted: Apr 30th, 2007 at 07:19
This is a very basic question but I’m a bit baffled as to how to include the link to all the series in the navigation section of my blog? Thanks!:)
Posted: Apr 30th, 2007 at 07:40
@Mosey
That’s unsupported right now. However, if you’re brave, you can edit your blog’s template and insert a call to
InSeries::SeriesList()where you want the series list to appear. In Series 3.1 will hopefully allow you to do this without resorting to template hacking.Posted: Apr 30th, 2007 at 22:43
Hey there. Bug report for you: If a post title contains an apostrophe ( ‘ ), In Series produces invalid markup.
I noticed this with 3% laptop battery left, hanging off an unstable wireless connection the other day. I had a look at the code, but can’t work out how to fix it.
PS: Would a bugmenot account for your bugzilla make life easier or more difficult?
Posted: May 1st, 2007 at 06:57
@Ashley
Oops, that’s not good. Thanks for letting me know; I’ll be sure to add that as a test. I try series with apostrophes in the name, but I haven’t tried post titles with that. Now I’m left wondering what the problem could possibly be, since In Series should just be importing the contents of the post wholesale; I don’t immediately see how an apostrophe in the title (or the text) could muck things up.
As far as bugzilla goes… I don’t really know. I’m beating spammers off the comments with a stick, and I’m afraid that having a community login would wind up causing the credentials to be posted over (and over, and over), and invite spam in the bug database. So, probably no, but thanks for asking. :)
Posted: May 1st, 2007 at 07:13
@Ashley
Just couldn’t help myself, so I tried it — and now I understand. The post titles are not properly URL-escaped before being dropped into the
titleattribute in my links. Bad developer; no biscuit!I’ll have a fix for this in 3.0.5 and (sigh) re-start testing… :p
On that note, if I put the test cases up, would anyone be interested in performing them? I have test areas + reference databases available on restricted sections of the site, if someone is willing to test but not to set up their own rig.
Posted: May 1st, 2007 at 14:29
Regarding the need to edit templates (Mosey). If you have a widget enabled theme, a simple way to do it is to use ie the widgetize anything widget, which allows you to create widgets based on your own php code, then simply paste InSeries::SeriesList(); into the widget’s code window. Voila, a series index!
Posted: May 2nd, 2007 at 11:21
Hi,
I am beginning to use this and I think I am going to find it one of the core plug-ins for what I am trying to do. I like it :)
I have two related features I would very much like to see in 3.1. I would like an option to have the TOC on the first post in a series only. I would also like the ability to have “previous post”, “next post” AND “first post in series” in the navigation at the bottom of each entry.
This would then enable me to use the first post in a series as an introduction and overview (which includes a TOC) and then have the rest of the posts going back, forward, and rewind to the start.
Many many thanks!
Posted: May 2nd, 2007 at 16:53
@Owen
Glad to hear it!
Having things be different in the first (or last, for that matter) post is a good idea. It probably won’t happen in 3.1, but it’s certainly something I’d consider for 3.2. I’ve been toying with a more generic idea, to allow authors to indicate in the article that they want a series item right here (e.g.,
<!--series-toc-->) — this would allow for full, per-post customization without having to have a million configuration options (first post [multi/single] layout, last post [multi/single] layout, etc.). Would that be good for you?Finally, the first/last links for series are already slated (bug 16).
Thanks for the feedback. :)
Posted: May 3rd, 2007 at 01:14
Hi,
Thanks for the speedy reply - and the good news about the first/last links!
Yes, indeed the approach would be PERFECT for what I have in mind.
I completely agree with you. Allowing full, per-post customization would be a much better approach than my suggestion which would almost inevitably lead to configuration overload!
Please head in that direction. I think it stands a good chance of including almost all the different features that different people want in one conceptually simple package.
Roll on 3.2 :)
Posted: May 20th, 2007 at 15:43
[…] and code up the tests. I can’t wait to spend more time goofing off (er… I mean, writing new features!) instead of testing. Hooray for constructive laziness! […]
Posted: Jun 4th, 2007 at 07:36
Hello Quandary,
template tag InSeries::SeriesList() shows only series names. It would bee nice that it can show list of posts in that serie.
It is very nice plugin and I impatiently waiting for 3.1 version.
Posted: Jun 4th, 2007 at 07:49
I found one bug: plugin do not work with internetional UTF8 characters in serie name. I got this error:
WordPress database error: [Illegal mix of collations (latin1_swedish_ci,IMPLICIT) and (utf8_general_ci,COERCIBLE) for operation ‘=’]
SELECT series_id FROM wp_in_series_3_0_series WHERE series_name=’Pluginų grupė: Feedai’ AND owner_id=’1′
Posted: Jun 4th, 2007 at 08:11
I corrected this problem:
In table wp_in_series_3_0_series, field series_name, Collation column I changed latin1_swedish_ci whith utf8_general_ci.
It woould be nice in the next release that plugin can automatticaly detect whitch collation to use.
Posted: Jun 8th, 2007 at 07:07
@Tomas Jablonskis
Hey there; sorry for the delay in response. Slacking off is hard work, you know! :)
But seriously… you can get a list of all the posts in a series by using the
InSeries::adv_FirstInSeriesandInSeries::adv_NextInSeriescalls. I tried to make sure that all the building blocks were available, so that folks can build up whatever custom things they like — mostly because I can’t write up, maintain and test a zillion different layouts. That said, if a lot of folks want to see a table-of-contents listing of each series, I could certainly code it up.Hope that helps,
Posted: Jun 8th, 2007 at 07:12
@Tomas Jablonskis
Oh, and with regard to the database collation — I never touch that. I assume that the tables get created with whatever is the default for the database. I have no idea what the “right” collation should be, in any given scenario. But I can ask around and try to find out. I’ll probably wind up following whatever WordPress does — if it creates all its tables with UTF8, I’ll do likewise; if it uses the database’s default collation (which In Series does now), then I’ll keep doing that.
Sorry for the inconvenience!