WOX (World of XOOPS) Newsletter # 41 (February 2011)

Please help us spread the word about XOOPS!! .

If you are a happy XOOPS user, let the world know - please blog about XOOPS, share your experiences with others, rate and review us on SourceForge and other Websites. We need to let the world know about XOOPS!!!

And if you're not happy with something in XOOPS, please let us know so we can fix it and improve! Better yet - help us fix it and improve it!

Remember - XOOPS is powered by YOU!!!!

01. Donations

If you like the XOOPS system, and would like to give something in return, you can make a donation to the XOOPS Foundation! Simply use the XOOPS Donation System and use your PayPal account or your Credit Card to donate .

Your donation will be used to promote and advance the use and development of the XOOPS system. The XOOPS Foundation is a registered not-for-profit organization in the USA, dedicated to promote XOOPS! All donators will get the Friend of XOOPS rank here on this website. Thanks to all the Friends of XOOPS for their donations and continued support!

If you wonder what is happening with XOOPS money, please read the 2009 XOOPS Financial Report. The 2010 XOOPS Financial Report is coming soon.

This month we've got a donation only from Ian Underwood:

Ian A. Underwood: $25
Albert Einstein Mota de Souza: $5
Henei Marketing: $50
Sun Ruoyu: $31.50 (on behalf of: Anonymous, Anonymous, Defkon1, flymirco, loukaum, Mamba, oswaldo)

Thank you so much for supporting XOOPS!!!!

02. New XOOPS developments

Current Releases

XOOPS 2.5.0 Final
Xoops Engine Alpha 1 Released
Modules working with XOOPS 2.4.x (Babylon by Xoops)

03. Team Reports

In 2010 we are re-introducing monthly Team Reports from our XOOPS Teams.

Core Development Team

Xoops Engine Alpha 1 Released
XOOPS 2.5.0 Bug Hunting

Documentation Team

- XOOPS 2.5.0 Installation Guide Released
- Xoops Engine Installation Guide released

Modules Development Team

Voltan is working on extGallery
Standardizing XOOPS Module GUI (help in testing needed)

Theme Design Team

First community-developed theme for XoopsEngine

Community Coordination/Support Team

Standard maintenance of the Website, and keeping it current.

International Support Team

See Support Site Guidelines. Unfortunately some support sites do not anymore offer the quality of support we are looking for so these sites will have to be removed as official support sites and no longer linked to from the International Support page. This will however, open the opportunity for other webmasters in these regions to start and maintain a local XOOPS Support site, which is a lot of fun and you'll help a lot by spreading our great CMS to your area and language. To apply for official status, use this form (login required).

XOOPS on Facebook: join the main XOOPS group on Facebook

Communication/Marketing Team

WOX newsletter, keeping press informed about Xoops Engine, additional PR:

- http://cmsreport.com
- http://www.smarty.net
- http://zend-framework.pl
- XOOPS, There It Is! A CMS for the Masses

04. XOOPSers of the Month

Our "XOOPSer of the Month" Award is given to XOOPS members who show extraordinary dedication to XOOPS, and go the extra mile for XOOPS. Sometimes they do something spectacular, but most of the time they just do something everyday, but by doing it day-in and day-out, they make a BIG DIFFERENCE in life of XOOPS community. And we thank them for that!!!

This month, we would like to recognize Ruoyu SUN (insraq) from China, for his initiative to donate half of the proceedings from his themes sale to XOOPS, and first theme for XoopsEngine.

You can read his previous interview here

05. XOOPS Innovation Award

Our XOOPS Innovation Award is given to people who create something very unique and very innovative for XOOPS! We are clear that XOOPS can only succeed, when we push the limits of our creativity, imagination, and innovation to "infinity and beyond" . And therefore we would like to recognize people who create this "WOW!" effect, when we see what they've done. The XOOPS Innovation Award is not a monthly award, i.e. theoretically, there might be a month where we won't give one, but we certainly hope that this will never happen

This month the Innovation Award goes to Luiz Carlos Batista (Andrax) from Brazil and Michael Albertsen (culex) from Denmark for their work on the XIM Chat module as a team. We would like to see more people working as teams on developing themes and modules.

Interview with Luiz Carlos Batista:

Where are you from, and where do you live now?

I'm from Brazil, I was born in Cachoeira, a small town in Bahia state... but have lived almost all my life in Salvador!!!

How long have you been programming?

I started learning to program out of curiosity more or less 11 years ago, to do my own mIRC script... From this, my curiosity led me to pursue more knowledge, including web development (HTML, CSS, PHP, etc...), what 6 years ago has become my work!

What is your expertise?

Seek solutions and learn how to use and expand them

What got you to XOOPS?

In 2004 I needed to create an intranet for the company where I work, and after much research and testing of various CMS, I found XOOPS, which was undoubtedly the best option... but the community was the big difference that made me want to participate and help others

What do you like the most about XOOPS?

The community, modularity, and ease of customization.

Why did you decide to work on the XIM ?

I was studying XOOPS module development, so I thought about doing something cool and different, something that the community wanted and would enjoy (Well, seems it worked )

You just released the version 1.02. What are the future plans for XIM ?

For now, the basic ideas revolve around adding individual friends list, group chat and allow use of plugins on the module.

What was the best part of working as a team with somebody from another part of the world (like Culex from Denmark), what was the hardest?

The best part is that with different visions, experiences and ideas, we can improve the module much more than if we did it separately... after all, there are two (or more, kris helped us a lot) people bring interesting solutions and solving problems that appear...

And the hardest part for me, certainly was the language barrier and synchronizing the work agendas!

If you could add one feature to XOOPS, what would it be?

A core feature or module that allows installation of modules and themes from zip files on your disk, files URLs... or rather from a centralized repository of XOOPS modules. (This idea is already being put into practice by a member of the XOOPS community in Brazil, I believe we will have news soon )

What is your major achievement in programming that you're most proud of?

I believe this is still to come ... I have learned a lot and improved my skills in recent years.

What are your hobbies, when you're not coding?

I like learn, read and playing sports... but I don't have much free time!

You favorite dish and drink?

I love pasta, lasagna and pizza... to drink a fruit juice or soda.

What about movies and music?

I enjoy music and movies and consider myself very eclectic in that sense, but I prefer rock music and sci-fi movies

If you would have a chance for a 30 seconds commercial with a message to the world, what would you say?

Carpe diem!

If you could choose a place and time to live, what would it be and why?

I believe the best time to be is now, and the best place is near the people you love.

Who is the person that you would like to meet and why?

Jesus Christ, the most outstanding personality of all time. I would like to hear His teachings directly from Him.

Interview with Michael Albertsen

Where are you from, and where do you live now?

I am born in the northern most city of Skagen, where I still live.

How long have you been programming?

I started programming when I got my first computer (C-64). But I didn't really got anywhere until I got my first PC and started making a website for myself. And then it kind of kicked off from there. It was kind of sporadic use of programming until I started using XOOPS. Now I feel I am learning new things every day.

What is your expertise?

Expertise and expertise... well I'm getting to know PHP and MySQL pretty OK by now, and with the jQuery trend I have focused no learning javascript better too. So I guess these are my areas of expertise. A little all round with plenty to learn still.

What got you to XOOPS?

An abysmal website for the local radio station that needed to be exchanged in a hurry. Laziness led me to a search for a CMS systems, and I ended up trying out a few, until I reached XOOPS. Now I would not dream to use anything else.

What do you like the most about XOOPS?

It's easy to get it to look exactly how you want. It's as secure and possible and mostly I like it because it's not a mess like so many other systems mixing HTML, PHP, JavaScript and CSS in same pages. And it's progressing with every release. Every time something new and improved. You don't find better developers anywhere else

Why did you decide to work on XIM ?

Because of limecity he asked for Quote:

xoops chat integration (like facebook) ?

. I agreed this would be a great feature and the race was one to make it. Andrax had the same idea, and we decided to join forces.

You just released the version 1.02. What are the future plans for XIM ?

There are plenty of plans. Some features are already prepared (friendlist [add,remove,block]). I'm hoping we would also have group-messaging, all-in-one chat window chatting, picture/zip file uploading and sharing etc etc.

What was the best part of working as a team with somebody from another part of the world, what was the hardest?

The best part was the ability to move things. Sometimes when you get stuck with a problem there is someone else to help or solve the problem.
Another great thing is that all the small blunders and bugs you miss, he/they will find. Not to mention when things move fast suddenly the project is much bigger and cooler than you had in mind in the beginning.
I would definitely recommend teamwork to all Xoopser.

If you could add one feature to XOOPS, what would it be?

Send message via SMS. Video chatting...this would be very cool. Video chat is maybe something to add to the plugin system mentioned in the prior question

What is your major achievement in programming that you're most proud of?

Xim is it. This is by far the most advanced project so far I have been part of. But of course I'm also proud of my comment-hack module I made with Rune, indexscan and onair module. The last two is in big need of a upgrade though.

What are your hobbies, when you're not coding?

I have for the last 15 years been working in Tiger FM, the local radiostation. I do some commercial, station ids and some music mixing also. I used to work as a DJ in the weekends but haven't got the time anymore.

You favorite dish and drink?

My favorite dish is definitely "Free food". It always taste twice nice when someone else pays Favorite drink kind of depends. At home working at the pc I'd have to say coffee. Nothing else really feels right sitting at the pc, strangely enough the same goes when sitting in front of a microphone. Otherwise I would drink beer. The best Danish beer is still Red carsberg (you gotta love that commercial hehe).. A few years ago I discovered Bulgarins make very nice beer, so when we're there I drink Zagorka (brilliant beer!!)

What about movies and music?

I like Thrillers, mystery or horror movies. No romance for me please. As for music I like almost everything. Too many years having to make radio programs from all ends, I guess. Rock and metal music is still favorites though.

If you would have a chance for a 30 seconds commercial with a message to the world, what would you say?

Make sure you make the most of every chance you get, and try to never put yourself in a position where you would think "Why didn't I...". Life is short and we ought to make the most of every second. Even the time you have spent reading this will never come again. (LOL I'm depressing myself. I Need Zagorka!!)

If you could choose a place and time to live, what would it be and why?

Most people would like to live somewhere back in the past, I think I would like to go forward 500 years. I'd love to see what we discover/invent in all that time.

Who is the person that you would like to meet and why?

hmm I don't know. There are plenty of interesting people out there, but to single one out is difficult. Maybe the driver of whatever crashed in Roswell, just to get his/her side of the story