ProcessWire for Designers

[apeisa]

Guys, try to keep other languages than English, PHP and Klingon on translation forums. It is little bit frustrating for us who read all unread topics.

[Nico Knoll]

@jan: Klar, sag einfach Bescheid, wenn du Fragen hast oder so

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Translation: Thanks, just contact me if you have any questions

[totoff]

hi,

same here: my profession is designer and copwriter, not coder. i still have difficulties to think like "real" coders but i'm progressing. however, here is what i found after having discovered pw for me (i came from contao via textpattern to pw and i have some good knowledge of wp too):

• coding is fun
• coding with pw is even more fun because it rewards you with success
• pw gives me the superpower i always wanted when i tried to adapt contao's pre-made markup to my needs
• you would like to do the same with wp you can do with pw? good luck - go and learn advanced php. beginner skills will not be enough

apart from this, i'm not sure if making wp themes is a good business. if i look at themegarden for example it seems quite competitive. why not specialize in custom tailored websites to clients that appreciate it? from my experience, this market is competitive too, but working.

enjoy pw!

[jploch]

Guys, try to keep other languages than English, PHP and Klingon on translation forums. It is little bit frustrating for us who read all unread topics.

fixed

[Macrura]

hey i'll add to the rant

@totoff  - you mean themeforest i think ?

i think the prefabs are necessary for some devs and users, and for certain projects; I'm a sworn PW user, but i have a site running joomla because there is a really good invoicing system called nBill; and some CMS have advanced prebuilt addons (a.k.a. plugins/modules/components etc..) like community, calendars etc.; so you have to do research and consider budgets before you choose the cms for the project. When you can use PW you'll be relieved, it has the best admin UI hands down of any CMS.

i just got done converting a wordpress template, one that I liked a lot, to use in a processwire site – it was really educational;
i was able to see how the wp theme was coded and it wasn't a pretty site. Tons of code bloat (but all necessary to make the theme usable to a wide audience);

and then i was able to go and attain all of the functionality of the wordpress version and more using 1/20th of the code; and i'm able to do really cool things now with the content management, media (audio, video) that would be completely impossible in WP, or would be a ridiculous hack job...
 

[iNoize]

So you never had to write a snippet by yourself?

Because in ProcessWire, things are almost the same - but I think lots of people are scared about using php tags / variables.

For example:

//modx
[[*body]]

//processwire
<?= $page->body ?>

//modx
[[getResources? &parents=`1000` &sortby=`created` &showHidden=`1`]]

//processwire
$pages->find('parent=1000, sort=created, include_hidden=1');

Cheers

Are there more examples like this ? For the Basic Modx calls and PW? Thats the only reason why i havent realize a real project with pw. I have no time to search and corect the code later if i do something wrong. Time is money . But some kind of cheatsheet for MoDx users bring a lot of new exModx user i think.

[Wanze]

Hi creativ3minds,

Have you seen this thread?

http://processwire.com/talk/topic/3691-tutorial-a-quick-guide-to-processwire-for-those-transitioning-from-modx/

[Ovidiu Roman]

Hello!

First of all, I have just registered at Processwire / Forum so it's possible that I am posting in the wrong place. Sorry if that's the case. Now, straight to the subject:

For the latest weeks I've been Testing CMS solutions for small to medium websites. The initial list had about 50 platforms. I have personally tried - download/install/customize - about 20 of them. Now, my list has only about 4 CMS platforms and Processwire is one of them... I don't really understand how or why but I found myself coming back again and again at Processwire... My Mind doesn't understand very well PW but my Heart is somehow in love with PW.

Important: I am NOT a coder and I'll never be. For the moment, I deeply regret Processwire IS NOT a "Ready To Go" CMS. I have to build a few small sites and I don't have the Time and Knowledge to Code! For the the first 2 websites (small and simple) I have already used other CMS platforms but I was hopping to make Processwire WORK! And I still hope but time is short...

When I say I'd like "Processwire to Work" I mean it LACKS too many BASIC Features, so I can't use PW for my projects yet. Here they are:

-No "Contact Us" or News / Newsletter feature or module - at least a Contact Form with Name and Email it's a Must!

-Awful Text Editor! No Alignment and worse, NO Font Color changing - thats almost unusable! I've lost my patience trying to make CKEditor work...

-No Image Gallery? The image(s) open in full resolution. No Next-Previous, Back or Close. The BlogProfile has it, and a very good one! Why Processwire not?...

-Multilanguage Suport but NO Language Switch for Frontend... no comment.

-No Friendly management of Logo's, Banner or Frontend skin... and NO Social Sharing... (I mean Facebook, Tweeter, Google+ etc)

Conclusion: Not Easy / Friendly, not Ready To Go. It seems it's designed for geeks and a good option for medium/big websites.

Now, don't get me wrong! There is something I LOVE at PW... I don't know exactly what... it's nice, clean and fast and... I don't know, I Like it!

What I want to say is that with people like you (on this forum, including Ryan Cramer) Processwire COULD become twice as Usable in 2-3 months...

OK, that's it... I dont know if my post deserves an answer, I guess I have to stick to what I used already (ImpressPages, Concrete 5, Silverstripe) and, the most important, have patience and LEARN Processwire.

Thank You and Apologize!

PS: I will complete my profile later, I just arrived!

[pwired]

Go to the forum under community support and start reading topics under all 9 titles. Really all your answers are there. Will take 10 or 20 minutes. Have a look here too:

http://processwire.com/talk/topic/4173-grouped-forum-posts-links-articles-tutorials-code-snippets/

[pwired]

But some kind of cheatsheet for MoDx users bring a lot of new exModx user i think.

Yes, that's a really intriguing idea, how to do modx the pw way. Would be very attractive for designers and beginners. Would also show how easy and powerful the api of pw really is.

[Martijn Geerts]

I would say: ProcessWire has more basic features then any other CMS out there that I know.

( but it's not a one two three, click, click: I have a new website )

In other CMSses you have to learn a lot of things to (maybe it doesn't look like code, but it is).

But when you switch to an other CMS your Knowledge is gone. I don't want to invest in a unsure future.

Who can say that the big 3 will be the big three within 3 years.

If you don't want to code at all. I think it's better to not a CMS at all. There are plenty of website builders for Mac or PC.

[diogo]

@RIVO, I'm as surprised as you that you still keep coming back to ProcessWire. It really sound that this is not the tool you are looking for. That said, I will try to explain why PW is not as "usable" as others by listing some points.

1. Flexibility (first and last point on the list)

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PW as a very well defined kind of user: coders (and willing to learn non coders) that look for extreme flexibility. The fact there there aren't many built in features makes it possible that (with some work, but not a lot) things will be exactly as you want them to be. It can seem a bit scary at first, but if you actually try to use the API you will understand how intuitive it is and how easy it is to come up with several ways of quickly building the features that you mentioned.

Anyway, I can't say I agree with PW lacking those many basic features. Let's go through them one by one:

-No "Contact Us" or News / Newsletter feature or module - at least a Contact Form with Name and Email it's a Must!

There is a module for basic contact forms http://modules.processwire.com/modules/form-template-processor/. If this is too basic there's always Ryan's excellent form builder http://modules.processwire.com/modules/form-builder/

-Awful Text Editor! No Alignment and worse, NO Font Color changing - thats almost unusable! I've lost my patience trying to make CKEditor work...

Really?? TinyMCE is exactly the same as in Wordpress and many other CMSs and there are plenty of instructions around the forum to extend it with buttons and plugins. If you prefer CKEditor (as I do) and are not able to install it, just ask in the forums, and I'm sure we will figure out what's happening.

 

 

-No Image Gallery? The image(s) open in full resolution. No Next-Previous, Back or Close. The BlogProfile has it, and a very good one! Why Processwire not?...

What do you mean? A frontend gallery? There are plenty javascript plugins for galleries. The advantage is that PW let's you easily use any of them.

Here's is a tutorial on how to implement one of those (flexslider) http://wiki.processwire.com/index.php/Simple_Gallery_System.

 

 

-Multilanguage Suport but NO Language Switch for Frontend... no comment.

Please read http://processwire.com/api/multi-language-support/multi-language-urls/

 

 

-No Friendly management of Logo's, Banner or Frontend skin... and NO Social Sharing... (I mean Facebook, Tweeter, Google+ etc)

Again, flexibility, flexibility, flexibility... PW will never touch your frontend code (plugins might do it, but not the CMS itself), you'll have to build the page yourself (use dreamweaver or an html template if needed), and in my opinion PW is by far the easiest and most flexible tool for doing it.

Welcome to the forum

[Ovidiu Roman]

Wow! So many useful replies already!

@ pwired - thanks for posting those links! Very useful to start with!

@ Martijn Geerts - kinda true, PW has more basic features than many of orher cms (but not instantly applicable). Thanks for Font Awesome suggestion

@ diogo - Thanks for your patience and suggestions. Very good tips, it will help for sure! Form Processor is good for start, Ryan's template is Awesome

Your replies are very "refreshing", they reinforce my initial feeling that PW has so much potential! It looks like PW offers Great Rewarding with Little Learning. So I should do the learning. For the moment I'll stick to PW for my personal projects and learning.

diogo: I'm as surprised as you that you still keep coming back to ProcessWire. It really sound that this is not the tool you are looking for.

Well, I guess it just sounds that way. As I said, my mind doesn't really get it yet but my heart (unconscious mind) loves PW. I trust my unconscious mind!

And I am very happy this forum has so many skilled and helpful guys. Thanks all for replies. I will start with A-B-C.

Thanks! I'am glad I found PW and this Forum! Have a nice day!

[Martijn Geerts]

@RIVO

I love to hear this: For the moment I'll stick to PW for my personal projects and learning.

You won't regret learning a little PHP. Even if you leave PW, the knowledge is there, ready to use everywhere.

[diogo]

I'm glad you will be sticking with us

Here is the A-B-C:

http://processwire.com/api/

http://processwire.com/talk/topic/693-small-project-walkthrough-planets/