WOX (World of XOOPS) Newsletter # 49 (August 2012)

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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 .

As mentioned above, your donation will be used to cover the cost of our dedicated server, and 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!

Donations we've got since last newsletter in June 2012:

$4 Anonymous Aug-14
$3 Anonymous Aug-10
$5 Pakaj Aug-10
$15 poehoes Aug-10
$5 DCrussader Aug-9
$25 CrazyJoe Aug-6
$5 deka87 Aug-6
$5 Yurdal Aug-4
$10 flipse Aug-2
$25 Nick_James Aug-2

Thank you very much for your support!

02. New XOOPS developments

Current Releases

XOOPS 2.5.5 Final released
Modules working with XOOPS 2.4.x (Babylon by XOOPS)

03. Team Reports

In 2010 we've re-introduced monthly Team Reports from our XOOPS Teams.

Core Development Team

Work continues on XOOPS 2.6.0, with the team publishing the Roadmap:

XOOPS 2.6.0 Alpha 1 has been released for testing

Roadmap for XOOPS 2.6

You can follow the development on XOOPS SVN, or you can subscribe to our SVN mailing list to receive updates.

Documentation Team

- no report

Module Team

- Several new modules have been updated to XOOPS 2.5.5 Admin GUI. We are slowly getting closer to release of Basic Module Pack
- first modules have been updated for XOOPS 2.6.0

Theme Design Team

- New themes below

Community Coordination/Support Team

Standard maintenance of the Website, and keeping it current.

International Support Team

New XOOPS Support Site: for Slovak language

For list of existing Support Sites, please visit our International Support page. To create a local XOOS Support Site, see Support Site Guidelines. If you would like to start and maintain a local XOOPS Support site, which is a lot of fun and is helping XOOPS by spreading our great CMS to your area and language, you can apply for official status, by using this form (login required).

XOOPS on Facebook: join the main XOOPS group on Facebook

Communication/Marketing Team

WOX newsletter, keeping press informed about XOOPS, additional PR

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 Stefan Ilivanov (DCrussader) from Bulgaria, for his coordinating the the translation process.

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

I am from Bulgaria, where I lived in several towns - my job required me to move a lot: Sofia, Pazardjik, Varna, Dobrich. Since October - I live in Canada, Ontario, Oshawa.

What is your expertise?

Team leading, I started i18n project like a game GTLT - https://sourceforge.net/projects/gtlt/ 2003, with the idea, to get mostly used apps translated into rare languages such as Bangla, Bulgarian, rarely used versions of Chinese such as Cantonese and Mandarin, but later evolved into bigger project.

What got you to XOOPS?

Ease of use, XOOPS was the only CMS - where the user can install anything with one click, talking about 2.0.18 distribution, everything required to have a site and start playing with it was there.

What do you like most about XOOPS?

The activity in development in the last year. XOOPS even ugly still remains the easiest CMS ever.

In what area of XOOPS do you contribute and why?

Maintaining language files up to date and organizing translation teams on Transifex.

You've been contributing a lot lately to translations of XOOPS and XOOPS Modules. What are the biggest challenges and opportunities that you see for XOOPS in this area ?

People are the biggest challenge, some apply for task they can't understand or can't handle, but just to be present there. I guess, they want their names to be displayed in some credits or something like that. Lack of communication between developers and translators is another big challenge. But hopefully this will be solved in near future, I trust in XOOPS community.

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

Can't add only one, it misses a lot. Auto-update on the core and system modules from the administration. Modules/Themes installer from within administration. New language files and translation standard. New theme engine, current is unchanged from XOOPS 1.3.

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

When I'm not busy, playing with new CMSystems out there.

You favorite dish and drink?

Pork in any forms and beer, a lot of beer

What about movies and music?

Movies: Braveheart. Music: Hard Rock '60-'70

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

Don't pay for GNU GPL!

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

Canada - number one place for living like human being.

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

Onokazu and Mamba. Why ?
Onokazu because he made something amazing from damn buggy and ugly Nuke, and Mamba - because I didn't see in past years in any Open Source community, man/girl which put so much energy, time and nerves in such a project.

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, we would like to recognize Lucio Rota (luciorota1) from Italy for his work on xHttpError, xAddresses, and AjaxFileManager.

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

Italy, North Italy, a small village called Montello

How long have you been programming?

I started programming when I was 15, with my good old commodore 64, in Basic and then in assembler (a hard byte by byte programming...)

What is your expertise?

I studied Pascal and C at school and I started my HTML, PHP, JavaScript experience at work. I work for a small non-profit OGN (Caritas Diocesana Bergamasca); few year ago we needed to upgrade our internet site and so I ended up doing it...

What got you to XOOPS?

I was searching for a good CMS, an a friend, Alessandro Maestroni, told me about XOOPS...

What do you like the most about XOOPS?

I think there are a lot of good Open Source CMS... I like XOOPS because it's very easy to learn, and because the distance between ideas and reality is very short...

Why did you decide to work on the xhttperror, xAddresses, and AjaxFileManager modules ?

xHttpError: I was looking for a server errors manager for my sites. AM Hterror is a good module but it's quite old, so that's why I started on xHttpError...
xAddresses: I had to improve Addresses module...
AjaxFileManager: an experiment.

What are the future plans for these modules?

xHttpError: This module is quite ready, RC in some days, then Release. It is useful if you need a better control on your sites.

xAddresses: Not ready, a lot of improvement/bug fixes to do, I need testers. Useful if you need maps on your site.

AjaxFileManager: Also this is ready, I need testers. A useful way to manage files on your site, not powerful as a ftp connection but..

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

An easy way to connect to other databases, not only MySQL .

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

I 'm an husband and a father. I have a wonderful wife and 2 daughters (8 and 1,5 years). Mainly I spent my time with them... sometime I play music with friends or I go out for trekking (there are wonderful mountains near my home, The Alpi Orobiche). When I can I travel, I like travel...

You favorite dish and drink?

Dish: fish, spaghetti, pizza, Asado Argentino with chimichurri ..... slurppp!!!!
Drink: beer, wine grignolino, sangria and natural water

What about movies and music?

Movies: action movies
Music: I like music (I play guitar, bass and drum with some friends). I like Buster Poindexter, Silvio Rodriguez, John Cougar Mellencamp, Irish, Scotch and English folk music, classical music, country ... the only one I don't like is disco music (sorry)

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

Enjoy your present time, time never stops and never comes back. !

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

Anywhere, outdoor, but away from my office

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

Adam & Eve, how many problems we've got for just an apple ...

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