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#1 2012-05-09 23:49:07
- nardo
- Member
- From: tuvalahiti
- Registered: 2004-04-22
- Posts: 743
Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
A bit out of touch with current Txp methodologies. For an events website, would you recommend using article timestamps as the event start/finish date/time … or use custom fields with a datepicker?
I have previously used article timestamps, but I always run into some issues around timezones & daylight savings.
Is it cumbersome to work with custom fields to control event dates? e.g. listing all articles with a start date or finish date in the future … which is trivial with an article tag … ?
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
My personal preference is to use custom fields, because I think the article timestamps have an inherent meaning that relates to the article, rather than the content of the article. But it does make it more cumbersome to extract/sort/etc on the custom fields ie. you lose the inbuilt Txp functionality that works with the article timestamps.
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
nardo,
I’ve tried both methods, and find that the article timestamps seem to work the easiest for me.
It’s also easier to explain to clients IMO.
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#4 2012-05-10 02:06:18
- nardo
- Member
- From: tuvalahiti
- Registered: 2004-04-22
- Posts: 743
Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
Thanks Anura, Tom
Am leaning towards using the article date fields for ‘event date’, but custom fields for ‘time start/finish’ …
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
I also found the article date field easier to work with. And I also ended up using custom fields for other particulars about the event (like end time). But I will try to dig up some more info from threads i created because this is one area of txp that I’ve given a lot of thought to.
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#6 2012-05-10 03:22:15
- nardo
- Member
- From: tuvalahiti
- Registered: 2004-04-22
- Posts: 743
Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
Thanks Elliott – also have you experimented with smd_calendar? I think I had some timezone issues the last time I used it, but from a quick scan of the plugin thread, looks like that bug has been squashed
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
I have done both methods successfully. On a site where events are listed in chronological order I used a custom field to indicate the date of the event. On a site that uses Bloke’s excellent calendar plugin, smd_calendar, the published date is the date of the event.
In both cases non-technical users have had no difficulty in understanding and posting events to the site.
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
I really dislike these discussions, because it then makes me wonder whether I shouldn’t go back and rework everything!
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Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
i did found smd calendar to be great, but at the time i used it i needed more styling options. i also found that events clogged up the backend interface a bit and got in the way of articles. so i have been looking into feeding google calendar into my sites instead.
msd_admin_datepicker plugin will help should you want to go the route of using custom fields for dates.
{Edited to repair link. – Uli}
Last edited by uli (2012-05-10 15:26:23)
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#10 2012-05-21 10:28:30
- a7atylor
- New Member
- Registered: 2012-05-21
- Posts: 6
Re: Events website - dates/times as article timestamps or custom fields?
The timestamps are particularly useful when an article requires an end time as well as an end date. I often use this with a job vacancies list for example
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