[contrib] video tutorials??

Gocom · 2009-02-03 21:45:54

Sorry to say it, but Textpattern is really an empty canvas. Because of that, video examples can only give restricted and small view of things. On top of that, Textpattern is just too simple to use. What should those videos instruct you? How to write XHTML or CSS? How to write Textpattern tag? Yes, what should they teach you after reading Textbook’s basics pages (which takes you 10 minutes to read).

Last edited by Gocom (2009-02-03 21:50:54)

mrtunes · 2009-02-03 21:52:02

i sort of disagree Gocom. It took me a great amount of time to get up to speed on basic TXP usage myself, and i still often struggle with a lot of new plugins. I will admit though that yes CSS is probably my biggest annoyance more than the actual software.

here’s a good topic for a video – plugin devs should consider making a video on how their program works and what effects the various tags have – i’m sure they will see the 50 page forum thread reduced by plenty!

anyways i’m still brainstorming what i’d do a video on, but at the moment i would just show how a basic one of my sites works. like my main homepage which uses TXP to pipe songs into the mp3 players. i’m sure if people saw how i do it they could either learn from me or offer suggestions on how to make it better.

Last edited by mrtunes (2009-02-03 21:52:49)

MattD · 2009-02-03 22:04:51

mrtunes wrote:

i sort of disagree Gocom. It took me a great amount of time to get up to speed on basic TXP usage myself, and i still often struggle with a lot of new plugins. I will admit though that yes CSS is probably my biggest annoyance more than the actual software.

here’s a good topic for a video – plugin devs should consider making a video on how their program works and what effects the various tags have – i’m sure they will see the 50 page forum thread reduced by plenty!

anyways i’m still brainstorming what i’d do a video on, but at the moment i would just show how a basic one of my sites works. like my main homepage which uses TXP to pipe songs into the mp3 players. i’m sure if people saw how i do it they could either learn from me or offer suggestions on how to make it better.

Not really a video tutorial but a video demonstration. I could see a benefit in that.

mrtunes · 2009-02-03 22:13:29

MattD wrote: Not really a video tutorial but a video demonstration. I could see a benefit in that.

yes, it’s a demo. i guess if we saw all types of them though, we’d have a better understand as to how we all use the program differently.

els · 2009-02-03 22:14:41

mrtunes wrote:

here’s a good topic for a video – plugin devs should consider making a video on how their program works and what effects the various tags have – i’m sure they will see the 50 page forum thread reduced by plenty!

I don’t think the lack of documentation is causing the high number of pages in certain plugin threads. Most of the plugins in question have documentation almost as extensive as the threads :) A more plausible reason for ongoing discussion in a plugin thread is that those plugins are so flexible that users keep finding new ways to use them. And that is (in my opinion) exactly the reason why video tutorials, at least for those plugins, will never be good enough :)

lister · 2009-02-03 22:58:22

Gocom wrote:

Sorry to say it, but Textpattern is really an empty canvas. Because of that, video examples can only give restricted and small view of things. On top of that, Textpattern is just too simple to use. What should those videos instruct you? How to write XHTML or CSS? How to write Textpattern tag? Yes, what should they teach you after reading Textbook’s basics pages (which takes you 10 minutes to read).

Well thanks for feedback…

lister

MattD · 2009-02-03 23:08:06

Els wrote:

here’s a good topic for a video – plugin devs should consider making a video on how their program works and what effects the various tags have – i’m sure they will see the 50 page forum thread reduced by plenty!

I don’t think the lack of documentation is causing the high number of pages in certain plugin threads. Most of the plugins in question have documentation almost as extensive as the threads :) A more plausible reason for ongoing discussion in a plugin thread is that those plugins are so flexible that users keep finding new ways to use them. And that is (in my opinion) exactly the reason why video tutorials, at least for those plugins, will never be good enough :)

A long support thread is something plugin authors are proud of!

mrtunes · 2009-02-03 23:25:56

i remember gerhard lazu did one for his custom fields plugin fwiw.
i can’t remember if it was useful or not, but i think it was. can’t even find it any more.

anyways gocom makes some interesting points about textpattern that continue to make me wonder why Wordpress is the wunderkind of the CMS world as of late. overall it doesn’t get much easier than this program. my blood pressure actually skyrockets whenever i open up a drupal or WP install.

nonetheless i think we can pool together to come up with some videos this year, even if i’m not the most qualified on the subject :)

Destry · 2009-02-18 09:27:13

I’m in the middle of the road about the value of videos, but I’m going to call them multimedia presentations because I think that’s a better fit for what I have in mind.

I don’t think we need a lot of these, and certainly not for plugins (though if plugin authors themselves put these together, no complaints from me), but I can think of at least three very good subjects for multimedia storytelling:

Txp’s Semantic Model (a visual representation — lots of creativity potential here)
“Russian Doll” Construction of Txp Sites (forms within forms within pages)
The Story of Tags (dozens of ways to approach this)

These are the core concepts upon which all user questions are based. (Plugins being something later.) Yes, there’s documentation on this but the forum is proof that people still have questions, still find Txp to have an initial learning curve. That suggests there’s room for something like this, and it could really benefit users who learn easier from visual story telling. A lot of people do. Especially if they have difficulty reading or English is not their first language (etc).

These would make great additions to the main Txp site too if they were really tight and top-notch.

smdnetau · 2009-02-18 20:30:24

Perhaps another way to approach producing video tutorials is to make them based on an example site (eg a custom blog design or an image gallery… or both). Most of the 3d modeling video tutorials I have use this approach, and (from memory), I think the the Txp Solutions book does also. There’s no way to explain and explore every nook and cranny of txp – that’s the joy of using a cms and should be left up to the user – but having a complete example can be inspirational too.

lister · 2009-02-19 00:10:35

This is exactly the sort of things newbs would like to see.. I have spent a few good weeks going over the TXP Solution book and know that there’s just too much to cover in a video.. But like in some of the above posts, multimedia presentations seem a more fitting idea. To present the building blocks to start the ball rolling, could be a great intro for aspireing TXP newbies.

lister

hilaryaq · 2009-07-02 09:07:17

Hi guys! I’m currently making video’s for my clients, just to show them the back end, how to add content, delete, add categories, that kind of thing.. I think I will do a series of videos for customers, and another series for designers/developers.. since txp gave so much to me, it could be a good way to give back.. the first tutorial is below, but if anyone has advice, or requests, on the tutorials the community would want, please list them here and I can do them no problem!!

http://www.proximowebdesign.ie/blog/creating-content-using-textpattern-video-tutorial-01

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#13 2009-02-03 21:45:54

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#14 2009-02-03 21:52:02

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#15 2009-02-03 22:04:51

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#16 2009-02-03 22:13:29

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#17 2009-02-03 22:14:41

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#18 2009-02-03 22:58:22

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#19 2009-02-03 23:08:06

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#20 2009-02-03 23:25:56

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#21 2009-02-18 09:27:13

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#22 2009-02-18 20:30:24

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#23 2009-02-19 00:10:35

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

#24 2009-07-02 09:07:17

Re: [contrib] video tutorials??

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