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Re: Marketing TXP
zero wrote:
bq. keith wrote:
Or you embrace Txp’s sophistication and “sell” it on its real strength, which (IMHO) is that unlike pretty much any other blog/CMS out there, you can do anything with Txp: pretty much any combination of look, feel and functionality is achievable in Txp with a bit of work and the right tags and plugins, and personally I love it for that.
iblastoff wrote:
ehh i dunno. that argument might have held some weight several years ago, but with the influx of modern updated cms’s these days, it seems highly unlikely that theres something in TXP that i could not do using EE, modx, or even wordpress now.
zero wrote:
I doubt the last sentence but, for the sake of argument, let’s say maybe. Whatever you say though about other systems, Keith’s points about TxP’s strengths are true and are a big plus that can be embraced and “sold”.
As for the negatives, the relevant people know about those and they are being addressed one way or another. I hadn’t heard of ‘tutorials like on how to convert a regular xhtml/css site to its cms counterpart’ being mentioned before but it’s a good idea, although pro web designers probably can figure it out quite easily which is perhaps why it hasn’t been done.
sure if you can give me an example of what can be done in TXP that i couldn’t do in the CMS’s i mentioned i’d be glad to retract my statement. i’m just saying “txp can do anything” really doesn’t count for much these days.
being a ‘pro web designer’ has nothing to do with learning the ins and outs of a complex cms. you could be writing html/css for centuries and still not understand how txp:if_different works. each cms is obviously different in their setup and i’m quite sure most people spent at least several months if not more trying to understand textpattern.
not trying to diminish txp’s worth or anything as its still my main cms i use. i think one of txp’s strengths its its templating style. you just write your own html and then throw in xhtml-styled textpattern tags while having fun figuring out some correct if/else logic for whatever functionality you need. its pretty satisfying to write some simple html/css + simple programming and get some amazing results. of course this also applies to modx, EE, etc etc so i don’t know if it truly counts as a strength on txp’s part.
so far i think the best website thats indirectly doing TXP’s marketing is welovetxp.com. people want to know AND see what exactly TXP can do.
Last edited by iblastoff (2008-06-08 14:41:37)
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Re: Marketing TXP
ruud wrote:
Manfre never had SVN access. There’s nothing to give back.
Right, so no energies were split.
In actuality, the way TxP is marketed, it lends itself to being packaged up by others. I can take the core, throw a nice template on it, do up the admin with a theme, throw in some plugins and voila, TxBlog.
A good analogy is Debian, their website is spartan, the biggest support forum isn’t even theirs and frequented by a few of us. Now take Ubuntu, flashy site and their support forum is teaming with people all the time. Yet, Ubuntu is just a repackaging of Debian Sid with better marketing.
We Love TXP . TXP Themes . TXP Tags . TXP Planet . TXP Make
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Re: Marketing TXP
I do not think it is a good idea to split textpattern to CMS and blog. It’s all just about setup and used plugins. The whole effort should concentrate on the new admin’s design (I’m working on), a new design of front-end after the Textpattern’s installation and simple and clear instructions who to do this or that. I admire work of developers and all who help Textpattern. I also would like to contribute because Textpattern has given me a lot. I use TXP on tens of web sites and see its marketing weaknesses, that me as TXP experienced users do not worry, but for newbies there is a few large obstacle.
In fact I plan to create a package with textpattern, which will have fresh look appearance in admin and in front-end, including all necessary plugins. At this time I’m working with my wife on the concept of this project and considering which way we will take.
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Re: Marketing TXP
iblastoff wrote:
sure if you can give me an example of what can be done in TXP that i couldn’t do in the CMS’s i mentioned i’d be glad to retract my statement. i’m just saying “txp can do anything” really doesn’t count for much these days.
Technically that’s probably true and perhaps I could have made my point differently.
Like most of us I imagine, I’ve also dabbled with Phpnuke, Geeklog, E107, Etomite, Wordpress, B2, Joomla, Website Baker, Typo3 and more.
If you Google “Powered by xxxxxxxxx” you’ll find many example sites for any of those CMS and blogs – and the vast majority of those you find look, feel and function like a Phpnuke site, or a Wordpress site, or a Joomla site or a Geeklog site.
But you see very few Txp sites where you instantly go “that looks like Textpattern to me…”
Does it mean much? Dunno really: but the point is, that lack of someone else’s “branding” appeals to me.
Yes, you can do lots of stuff with those other scripts, but most don’t: but Txp seems to encourage its users to push the boundaries of what’s achievable. That has to be “spinnable” into something worthwhile…
Last edited by keith (2008-06-08 18:25:55)
Keith
Blyth, Northumberland, England
Capture The Moment
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Re: Marketing TXP
Like WordPress, TextPattern looked like another well-crafted blog publishing system. […] The whole software package is considerably smaller than Wordpress […] but TextPattern just can’t seem to compete with Wordpress when it comes to community and extendability.
Word! (emphasis mine) – and then WordPress users moan that WP devs never show up in their forum…
Though two years free from the Wordpress loop and the oftentimes furniture throwing inducing complexity of its template tags may have strengthened my personal avowal to steer clear of even uttering the damn thing’s name ever again, Textpattern by comparison is the wizened professor who helps you learn everything you need to know, while doing 90% of your homework.
Yet another word! I feel better now…
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Re: Marketing TXP
TXP scores 1 point on extendability versus 3 for Wordpress? And both scale the same way?
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Re: Marketing TXP
you’re nitpicking ;-)
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Re: Marketing TXP
Sheesh, RoR has a learning curve of 2? (with 3 being easiest). Perhaps if one is a cyborg…
From my experience it should be more like -50. But we digress.
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#24 2008-06-09 12:31:29
- uli
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- From: Cologne
- Registered: 2006-08-15
- Posts: 4,319
Re: Marketing TXP
Much of the points TXP didn’t get in the comparison table on liftstudios.ca were not given because TXP would employ plugins for these. If ied_hide_in_admin | sed_section_fields were known to liftstudios, it’d gathered some more points for permissions; session management will become possible with smd_vars; mcw/hcg_templates makes themability peanuts compared to onboard-methods, …
So I think it’s necessary to stress TXP’s slimness and the positive consequences implied (“taylor-made” solutions), plus open the communicated spectrum to the plugins available: TXP is capable of so much more than commonly assumed, I fear restricting it’s communication to just the core code will be disadvantageous to its distribution.
In bad weather I never leave home without wet_plugout, smd_where_used and adi_form_links
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Re: Marketing TXP
uli wrote:
Much of the points TXP didn’t get in the comparison table on liftstudios.ca were not given because TXP would employ plugins for these.
Agreed. A lot of TXP’s power is from the combined fact that it scores highly for being lightweight out of the box, yet insanely powerful if you throw a few plugins into the mix.
session management will become possible with smd_vars
Hehe, perhaps that’s going a tad too far :-) True session management with all its inherent security / nonce / hashes and such is still reliant on dropping into PHP to get at the relevant info.
smd_vars simply offers the ability to remember user input across pages so it appears to have memory and can be used to add rudimentary session/wizard control to your pages if you wish. Combined with a bit of PHP magic it could probably be used to track browser sessions but in its raw plugin form you’d be hard pressed to offer session support. Mind you, I’ve not really thought it through enough yet and if you’re going into PHP to do stuff, you won’t need smd_vars to track sessions for you ‘cos the browser does it.
Last edited by Bloke (2008-06-09 13:05:53)
The smd plugin menagerie — for when you need one more gribble of power from Textpattern. Bleeding-edge code available on GitHub.
Hire Txp Builders – finely-crafted code, design and Txp
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Re: Marketing TXP
wet wrote:
Word! (emphasis mine) – and then WordPress users moan that WP devs never show up in their forum…
Yet another word! I feel better now…
It is interesting to see the language used
Wordpress
It’s by far the easiest CMS to teach how to administer and possibly the easiest to theme and customize too.
Which means: I am using it for some time now and I’m good enough to teach it. I do not know many other CMSs but keep on reading anyway
Textpattern
It has a clean administrative interface and seems easy to use.
Which means: I have never used it but if I did, I would probably find it easy
Expression Engine
The only problem with this solution is it’s not completely open source and don’t have a vibrant community behind it as a result.
Which means: i looked at it but as it is not free I am not interested about it
Joomla
… I haven’t been able to convince … myself to use if for a project.
the first straight statement
Drupal
It is somewhat scalable but requires the correct server hardware and configuration.
… I can continue but I think that my point’s made.
Yiannis
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Re: Marketing TXP
wet wrote:
Word! (emphasis mine) – and then WordPress users moan that WP devs never show up in their forum…
Found this comment interesting:
It has a clean administrative interface and seems easy to use.
Keith
Blyth, Northumberland, England
Capture The Moment
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Re: Marketing TXP
And this (from the comments on what I found to be an excellent and entertaining article):
Not to knock Wordpress users, but I find TXP sites are always that little bit more unique and interesting by comparison.*
*Design-wise, that is.
That’s more or less what I say a few posts back…
Last edited by keith (2008-06-09 15:45:57)
Keith
Blyth, Northumberland, England
Capture The Moment
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Re: Marketing TXP
Here’s the improved idea I mentioned earlier in this thread – the one that will pull Textpattern from obscure invisibility into the glorious sunshine of global popularity :) I emailed it to Kevin Potts, Robert and Ruud so they could approve it and spruce it up for total world domination. But they are so flabbergasted that they haven’t got back to me yet. So perhaps you’d like to discuss it while they recover from the shock…
Textpattern’s main audience are web designers who want a free CMS to serve a variety of purposes. Successful web designers have promotional skills besides design skills. Many have blogs and a way with words too.
If lots of web designers and others with similar skills were to write relevant articles on a Textpattern web site, to an audience of mostly other web designers, the interest in this Textpattern Blog would surely increase Textpattern’s visibility and popularity.
But why would they want to do that? After all they already write articles and tell their friends and clients about Textpattern and maybe donate money to developers and plugin makers. Well, to be part of such a project would be exciting and add to their status and prestige. If each had a separate section to style as they like, with their own About page to customize as they like, they could really make the website zing. Page Rank would rise quickly, especially if this was an official Textpattern site. They would gain a wider audience for themselves as well as Textpattern. And, of course, they would get the satisfaction of giving something back to the software coders and community they love.
Such a lot of creativity on one site is a mind boggling prospect, imho. I think it would create a buzz bomb that would reverberate for years to come. Not only will the contributors be endorsing Textpattern, but they could demonstrate its flexibility and freedom through the design. At one article per week, 13 contributors would only need to write an article once every 3 months. With 26 contributors, once every 6 months. So this is sustainable, not just a flash in the pan.
This second site would unite rather than split Textpattern. There could be a download page with documentation aimed at bloggers and it would still not be a split, but just be a part of a great site populated by Textpattern lovers. Textpattern Blog could be listed in directories and comparison sites under ‘blog tool’ in addition to textpattern.com being listed under ‘cms’ etc, so increasing visibility in that way too.
The public side of Textpattern at the moment is mostly of a technical, possibly nerdy, nature. Textpattern Blog would show much more of the design and human side of Textpattern. As users are mostly design-oriented this has to be a good thing.
I put some docs on textpatternblog.com together with an eye-catching stunning unique design the like of which you have never seen before but no devs, kevs or visitors have gazed on its splendour so far. So be the first, start a trend, give me some feedback.
Edit: I forgot that some people have no sense of humour, so please note that I am exaggerating in the opening and closing paragraphs. And when I ask for feedback it is about the idea not textpatternblog.com which is little more than a blank canvas awaiting the brush stroke of a master.
Last edited by zero (2008-06-15 11:08:15)
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Re: Marketing TXP
one thing i would change about txp is the logo.
-no offence to the designer. its just to stone age
:}
edited to say that -
There were some good points made about marketing. Weakness in branding is probably a reason some potential users overlook txp. I think the online documentation, forum and website are fine just less flashy than the others I’ve seen.
Last edited by kvnmcwebn (2008-06-14 13:07:02)
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