New blog: ProcessWire modules directory

[adrian]

@ryan - looks like the presence of a support button is not dependent on there actually being a thread for a module, eg: https://processwire.com/modules/login-register/

[adrian]

@ryan - any reason why Soma's PageEditSoftLock has been removed from the modules directory? I still install that on all my sites so it would be great to have it back please. Thanks!

[teppo]

Hey @ryan — what's the proper process for getting access to a module in the directory?

It looks like https://processwire.com/modules/process-changelog/ isn't connected to my profile, and it's also no longer auto-updating for some reason (looks like the latest update was in 2019) ?

Edit: actually when I look at the public list of modules with my profile, I can see 19 modules, but after I log in only 15 of those show up under my own modules. Is this something to be expected? I'm assuming that the public list is not be using the same logic for connecting authors and modules, and this may even be by design, but it still seems a bit quirky.

Edited March 15, 2021 by teppo

[ryan]

@teppo When a module doesn't connect to your profile, it means that the module was submitted with a different email address than the one on your account. When that happens, I just fix them manually so that they connect to your account. I have fixed ProcessChangelog and all 3 or 4 others I could find so that they connect to your account now. Thanks for letting me know. PM or email me if there are any others, as I don't always know when someone tags me so it's easy for me to miss. 

@adrian I don't know about PageEditSoftLock specifically, but there is an automatic purge of older modules that match these conditions: they don't indicate support for PW 3.x, haven't been updated in 2+ years, and the author is not active. They are still technically in the DB, so if there is someone else that wants to maintain an inactive module, or if there's a known reliable module despite not being active, or if it just appears to be a mistake, let me know and I can re-publish. 

[szabesz]

On 1/21/2021 at 7:35 AM, adrian said:

any reason why Soma's PageEditSoftLock has been removed from the modules directory? I still install that on all my sites so it would be great to have it back please. Thanks!

@adrian Would you please become the maintainer of this module? In this GitHub comment of yours you wrote:

"I use a modified version of Soma's module in hard lock mode. The modification I made makes superusers exempt form the hardlock. Obviously I still don't edit when someone else is editing, but at least I can view the page edit screen. I think ideally, the hard lock would let everyone view the edit screen, but they wouldn't be able to save it."

I would love to see you take this module a bit further by adding the features you described above. You might want to ask @Soma first of course, but since he is not an active PW dev these days, he will surely agree... After that you can ask Ryan to re-publish it for you, perhaps. Good plan, isn't it ? 

Edited March 16, 2021 by szabesz
typo fix

[teppo]

42 minutes ago, ryan said:

@teppo When a module doesn't connect to your profile, it means that the module was submitted with a different email address than the one on your account. When that happens, I just fix them manually so that they connect to your account. I have fixed ProcessChangelog and all 3 or 4 others I could find so that they connect to your account now. Thanks for letting me know. PM or email me if there are any others, as I don't always know when someone tags me so it's easy for me to miss.

Thanks! This wasn't particularly urgent, so thought I'd post it here in case others might stumble upon the same question. Anyway, will PM you if I find any more issues, though I'm pretty sure you covered them all ??

[adrian]

Hi @szabesz and @ryan - it's interesting to me that no-one else has mentioned that this is missing from the directory. I think it's an essential module for any install. As far as I know, it's the only way to prevent users from accidentally overwriting each other's edits. That said, I think this is the sort of functionality that really should be in the core.

I have made some other additional changes to the module - it now also fires on "onbeforeunload" so that pages are released as soon as someone stops editing them. I got tired of telling clients that they had to wait for the page to be released after someone else closed it. I am happy to share this version, but I still think it should be core functionality.

 

[szabesz]

1 hour ago, adrian said:

I think it's an essential module for any install.

So far I have been relying on Ryan's "System Notifications" module, which is at least notifies users when concurrent editing takes place but that's not too much help, just the basics. Also, the "System Notifications" module can be problematic, see:
https://processwire.com/talk/topic/9526-strange-errors-following-upgrade/?do=findComment&comment=95893

and it has not been given any love from Ryan in long years, its short description is still "Adds support for notifications in ProcessWire (currently in development)" for at least 5 years in a row.

1 hour ago, adrian said:

I still think it should be core functionality.

Me too. It is a very popular request with currently 17 likes : https://github.com/processwire/processwire-requests/issues/23

Maybe it is time to rethink it all:

• concurrent editing (borrowing ideas and features from Adrian's frok of PageEditSoftLock)
• page drafts (Ryan hinted that he is going to port the foundation of ProDrafts to the core)
• "System Notifications" module "finalized", or better yet, reborn with features integrated with the previous to points above

1 hour ago, adrian said:

I still think it should be core functionality.

Could you please at least share it on GitHub (I would like to move away from "System Notifications" module), and let's see what @ryan thinks about this request?

Edited March 16, 2021 by szabesz
typo fix

[adrian]

12 minutes ago, szabesz said:

Could you please at least share it on GitHub

Here you go: https://github.com/adrianbj/PageEditSoftLock

Good luck actually uninstalling that System Notifications module - it's a persistent little bugger and IMO it should be removed from the core immediately - it gives a bad impression for anyone who tries it.

[cb2004]

There is the User Activity module which is part of Pro Dev Tools. That's in my default installation profile.

[szabesz]

2 hours ago, adrian said:

Here you go: https://github.com/adrianbj/PageEditSoftLock

Thank you so much!

2 hours ago, adrian said:

Good luck actually uninstalling that System Notifications module

I will not bother with trying to uninstall it as I do not find it particularly problematic, but from now on I switch to using PageEditSoftLock on new installs, hoping that one day Ryan will roll out a solution baked right into the core.