Thank you all for the information and advice on this.

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I pretty much thought the same thing, but just wanted to make sure. There are sometimes trademark issues regarding names, especially if someone is trying to profit from someone else's name (which I'm not).

The site would be my contribution to the XOOPS community, and would be open to others who want to contribute and participate. Thus, it is all positive and it will be of good use. It will probably be narrowly focused on a few specific topics and act as a knowledgebase on those topics. There will be no commercial activity on it, and I will probably use a .info domain to make that known. I'm still in the brainstorming phase of it, and it is not something that is going to happen for a while.

Is it ok to include the "XOOPS" name in a domain address created for a noncommercial informational type site? Is there any kind of policy regarding this?

I'm not sure if there are any kind of trademark or copyright issues that would make it not ok to do that, or if some kind of permission needs to be granted by the XOOPS organization for this.

Any information on this would be appreciated.

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Hi Seth,

I'm more than happy to do what I can to help in this area.

Dave

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Hi Darcy,

I suppose we could give this a try. I've changed the heading as you suggested, and I will post my future thoughts and ideas regarding the positioning of XOOPS in this section. I'm sure that I will have a lot more to say in this area.

Although, I have some concerns as to how some members may react to me squeezing my own blog column into the forums. I'm thinking that it may be more appropriate if a blogging module is installed on XOOPS.org, so that anyone who wants to write on a particular topic area can have their own blog.

I read something a while back about a simple blogging system being developed, where each community member could have their own blog space. I'm not sure how that would work out though, especially if some of the arguing and negativity in the forums moves over to the blogs. I believe that any kind of blogging system should exist only to provide valuable information and positive ideas for the community.

Dave

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There are reputable organizations that have decided to use Ning and networks similar to Ning for their CMS, even though they would have done much better with XOOPS.

I agree that companies wanting full control will not be satisfied by something like Ning, but there are many companies that do not realize the differences between different products, and will go the path of least resistance when all else "seems" equal.

I've seen many companies select a platform that was inappropriate to their needs because the marketing of the better platform was too weak to gain their attention.

You are right that Ning is not a direct competitor to XOOPS when the technical details are compared. They are very different animals. However, I believe that Ning is part of a larger trend towards the mentality of setting up a CMS in 60 seconds. And networks similar to Ning are trying to lure companies into going their way. In my opinion, XOOPS and anyone else in the CMS industry needs to consider this trend when marketing their own product.

There are a lot of CMS type products arriving and about to arrive, which means that every CMS organization needs to clearly articulate the unique strengths of their product in comparison to other products.

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I would definitely be willing to help here at XOOPS.org in the same role that I mentioned earlier.

I think there is a fear factor when it comes to organizations and companies adopting open source solutions. Microsoft products have been such a staple of technology for so long, that companies are afraid to venture outside of the Microsoft box. This perpetuates itself when it is time to buy upgrades or new products, especially since Microsoft and other commercial companies are trying to compete with everything open source that comes to the market.

I don't think that open source is dying. However, it is only being used by the organizations that clearly understand the benefits of open source. I know several people in various IT departments that don't even know what open source really means. Thus, there is definitely a general lack of understanding about open source in the business community as a whole.

I think an understanding of open source technology needs to be more effectively promoted to the business and nonprofit communities. I think that if and when large segments of the business industry realize that something like Open Office is at least just as effective as Microsoft Office, there will be a large migration to open source solutions and a much better understanding of the benefits of doing so.

I do a lot of reading on the latest technology trends within the Internet industry. What I've been noticing is that there are many CMS type social networks in existence, and more on the horizon. I'm concerned about this, because I feel that XOOPS needs to more clearly distinquish itself in the minds of the general public, especially since the competition is increasing in other areas.

An example of this potential competition is Ning.com. Ning is a free network that allows anyone to create their own social network or CMS type site. A user can register a free account, create their own CMS type portal, and configure many options. There is nothing to install and no need for a separate host server. It comes with several core features, such as forums, blogs, a basic article system, groups, photo galleries, a membership/profile display system, etc. Ning also comes with domain mapping (for a small fee), which will make a user's network appear as if it is self-standing and not part of the Ning network. I've come across several respectable organizations that are using NING for their CMS.

The reason I'm mentioning this is because Ning is one example of a trend towards more networks like this. I believe that XOOPS needs to clearly establish the advantages of using XOOPS over something such as Ning, in order to make it an attractive option to companies and organizations starting or migrating a CMS.

As for the capabilities, customizability, and applications of something like Ning, it is obviously very limited when compared to XOOPS. However, I'm not sure if the nondeveloper community perceives the significant differences between XOOPS and something like Ning. The XOOPS community and developers need to focus on making these differences obvious to the general public.

In my opinion, one of the major strengths of XOOPS is that it is a well structured CMS framework that allows the installation and easy administration of a wide variety of sophisticated CMS modules. Thus, I think that one of the major keys to distinguishing XOOPS from the other stuff out there, is to put a focus on developing modules with sophisticated functionality for a wide variety of business, media, and nonprofit applications. Yes, XOOPS already has modules like this, but I think that it needs to be expanded even further after the Core XOOPS upgrades are released, and include cutting-edge features such as AJAX functionality.

Another important element is to promote the degree of customization and extensibility available with XOOPS. I would like to see the creation and release of developer tools (for the web or desktop), which help developers streamline the customization and development of modules. Providing documentation and PDF style books that educate aspiring XOOPS developers would also go a long way towards this effort.

There are many aspects (that I've not mentioned here) of the current XOOPS and future versions of XOOPS that clearly make it a very powerful and superior CMS system. My main point is that these exceptional features need to be promoted and continuously evolved to clearly position XOOPS as something that is way above and beyond the other tools and systems out there, including the Drupals, Joomlas, etc. XOOPS is without question potentially the most powerful CMS system on the planet. I've experimented with just about everything out there, and I have no doubts about the superiority of XOOPS. We just need to clearly distinguish and focus on what makes XOOPS so special.

By the way, I'm willing to contribute to this effort. I'm not a PHP programmer right now (I will be working on that), but I am willing to start some kind of discussion group and/or a blog/site regarding the promotional aspects of XOOPS. If anyone is interested in getting involved with that or involving me in their own efforts, send me a message.

It may be worth looking at the original organizational structure that led to the first successful versions of XOOPS. When I first joined the community a few years ago, there was a steady flow of core upgrades, new modules, improved documentation, etc.

Obviously, the original organizational structure worked very well at that time, since it resulted in a lot of productivity and completed goals. I realize that XOOPS is a lot larger in scope now, which means that the organizational structure has to grow with it. However, it still may be worth looking at what worked in years past, so that maybe we can apply some of that to the current issues.

I'm a little confused about the version numbers.

After the merge of 2.0/2.2, is there going to be a public release of the merged version? If so, what will be the official version number (2.3 or 2.4)? Or is this just a merging of code for development purposes only (with no public release)?

What is the difference between 3.0 and 4.0? On the general roadmap, it states that 4.0 is the official release of the 3.0 version. Why are there two different version numbers? Is 3.0 an internal version number and 4.0 the public version number?

I apologize if this was discussed previously. I think it was, but I don't recall the details.