Textpattern's face to the public

Bloke · 2025-08-26 19:55:59

Those playful dots are wicked cool, in principle, if the page weight can be minimised.

Love the idea.

wet · 2025-08-27 01:32:22

@giz Sorry, you are right. This was not my intention. Please forgive and keep up the good work.

jakob · 2025-08-27 08:04:31

giz wrote #340294:

No one has anything to say about wet’s take on my intentions with the project?

I wanted to stick to the good vibes :-) Speaking for myself, I can see wet’s point of view as far as the working process and inclusion of other team members are concerned. The rest went too far. And I value his opinion too: Robert has lots of experience having previously led the dev team and I’ve certainly learned a lot from him and his code over the years.

My prototype, where I left it.

Wow, you’ve already progressed quite far… looks mind-boggling to write.

Algaris · 2025-08-27 11:17:13

giz wrote #340294:

Thanks for the positive vibes, jakob & Algaris.

No worries. I didn’t want you to feel despondent and give up.

giz wrote #340294:

No one has anything to say about wet’s take on my intentions with the project?

I was being careful not to make things worse and wanted to focus more on encouraging you. I felt uncomfortable reading Wet’s reply, but his apologies are the most important thing.

While Wet was harsh, he did have a valid point. There’s a reason there’s a working process for the Textpattern project. It’s better to work within that process and involve the other team members, including Phil Wareham, as the Core Designer.

I understand your frustration. When I’m working on a project, I just want to code and get my ideas out. This is fine when I’m testing things (which you’re currently doing), but before I know it, I’ve coded a lot of stuff without committing anything. Then I have to backtrack and figure out what I’ve been doing so that I can commit sensible chunks of code that make sense. It’s an iterative process, and I constantly fight against the part of me that doesn’t want to think in logical structured branches, features, and commits, just wanting to create something.

Keep at it. It’ll be worth it, especially when you get to work directly with the Textpattern team and see how your code could be integrated into the main project.

giz wrote #340294:

My prototype, where I left it.

Feed back time. 🙂

Your prototype is looking very interesting! Those dots are super fun, but I noticed that every time you scroll, it resets the loop. It also feels better when there are only a few dots rather than a whole bunch.

Your animated logo is awesome! I love it, although I do miss the colour from the current design.

Also, this is purely a personal preference, but I think it looks a little flat. I’m a big fan of shadows, subtle textures, gradients, and buttons with raised edges and drop shadows to make them stand out. I understand you’re probably still in the blocking things out stage, so take this with a grain of salt. 😉

—Edit— I completely missed the yellow gradient you have. That does look nice.

Keep up the good work! It’ll be interesting to see where this goes.

Last edited by Algaris (2025-08-27 11:24:24)

gaekwad · 2025-08-27 11:46:34

On the topic of build tools on macOS – totally get you, that drives me up the wall with the amount of detritus scatted around the place.

An unsolicited piece of feedback for Git stuff on macOS while you’re finding your way:

github.com/apps/desktop

Free, works with various repository sources, and is ‘good enough’ to get you started.

My initial foray into learning Git in anger was to volunteer as a cdnJS librarian, and I pushed that hard for about 6 months in 2014…to the point I burned out after getting some abusive emails. Check the commit graph here:

github.com/petecooper?tab=overview&from=2014-12-01&to=2014-12-31

That first half of the year was mad busy, and then I imploded. I knew Git well enough, so it ticked that box as an experience, but I used the GitHub Desktop app for the most part and it did the job just fine.

giz · 2025-08-27 21:04:27

wet wrote #340296:

@giz Sorry, you are right. This was not my intention. Please forgive and keep up the good work.

Thank you, Robert.

jakob wrote #340297:

Wow, you’ve already progressed quite far… looks mind-boggling to write.

The css is all mine, but the GSAP animation is way beyond my js capabilities. My friendly LLM did all the heavy lifting, from comparing the pros and cons of GSAP and three.js, to abstracting my requirements into incredibly complex code (at least for me). If I was building this solo, I would still be researching how to do things on the GSAP forums, and taking too many paths which end up as cul-de-sacs.

Algaris wrote #340298:

…but before I know it, I’ve coded a lot of stuff without committing anything. Then I have to backtrack and figure out what I’ve been doing so that I can commit sensible chunks of code that make sense. It’s an iterative process, and I constantly fight against the part of me that doesn’t want to think in logical structured branches, features, and commits, just wanting to create something.

I hear you, ‘though I’ll be holding off on commits until I have a solid grasp of where the various class components live in the current sass structure (a single class can appear in many other partials, which is the opposite to how I do things). When the time comes, I can call on LLM to help tame the complexity ;-)

gaekwad wrote #340300:

github.com/apps/desktop

Thanks; it’s what I use. Simple enough, but I regularly confuse it (or the other way around) :)

Ev’ryone

Thanks all for the advice and comments.

.

I’ll continue with my prototype after a break; familiarity breeds contempt — don’t get me started on my Apple Music ‘Personal Radio Station’ (I listen to music non-stop); its turned tracks I used to love into !love.

etc · 2025-08-28 06:50:12

The main risk (as I’ve learnt it at the price of the ephemeral version 4.6.1) is beginner dev fat fingering.

Should we meditate on restricting the designer role a bit more, forbidding modifications of live assets?

giz · 2025-08-28 17:39:57

etc wrote #340315:

The main risk (as I’ve learnt it at the price of the ephemeral version 4.6.1) is beginner dev fat fingering.

Should we meditate on restricting the designer role a bit more, forbidding modifications of live assets?

I thought the procedure of making commits a repository, and subsequent perusal by devs covered this?

This smacks of ‘come here, fuck-off’.

Why are you suspicious of designers?¹²

¹ BTW this ‘beginner dev’ designer is somewhat experienced in developing css (which would be my core contribution).

² Have you ever considered that a reason for Textpattern’s lack of popularity might be due to the design of textpattern.com? I think Phil did a great job, but website design (particularly css) and public perception have moved on since then.

Last edited by giz (2025-08-28 17:41:56)

Bloke · 2025-08-28 18:16:29

etc wrote #340315:

Should we meditate on restricting the designer role a bit more, forbidding modifications of live assets?

Do we have privs for dev vs live? I can’t remember. If so, it does enforce a stricter workflow, so the Txp designer role becomes more advisory and can only operate on dev assets to showcase designs prior to acceptance?

Would the role be “promoted’” to operate on live assets if the dev lane was switched off in prefs? Seems a bit confusing. If someone is given the Designer role inside a Txp instance, they should be able to push their creations to the live site without needing a managing editor or publisher to step in and do it for them?

Or does it make sense to do this, since we limit Freelancers in the same regard: they can create articles but can’t publish them until a role of Copy Editor or higher does it for them. Is limiting designers likewise more consistent in this regard?

Last edited by Bloke (2025-08-28 18:18:15)

gaekwad · 2025-08-28 19:01:32

giz wrote #340324:

I thought the procedure of making commits a repository, and subsequent perusal by devs covered this?

This smacks of ‘come here, fuck-off’.

Counterpoint: it doesn’t smack of that. Commits to a repository – any of the many project repositories we have – mean that anyone can see the code / changes, whether they’re developers, veterans, newbies, weekend warriors, or passers-by. It doesn’t mean the code is to a certain standard, or guaranteed to be bug-free, or objectively the ‘best’ way to do a thing. If you sift some of the commits on the main repo, you’ll find each developer / team member improving things others have written…and corrections with apologies when (very occasional) clangers get through the net.

I have a repository that I use purely for building VPSes from scratch for this project, and other hings I’m involved with. It’s a collection of text files with snippets I can copy & paste into a terminal window to build a web-ready server in a few hours. I’m approaching 9,500 commits to that repo, and I expect to roll past 10,000 commits this autumn. Some of my code is amateur drivel that gets a task done but would make purists wince, and other stuff I’m really proud of. It’s iterative, and the crud gets replaced with better things as I learn how to do things more efficiently, effectively, and so on. Iterate, iterate, iterate.

My read on etc’s question was to consider whether something Textpattern has right now is the ‘correct’ way to do things. That’s an invitation for Textpattern users – veterans, newbies, weekend warriors etc – to get involved in the process of discussion. After some consideration, there may be a change made…or maybe not.

One of the pulls of this project for me is the community, and the knowledge / spirit in it. I’ve proposed some stuff that, in hindsight, wasn’t really very smart. At the time, I thought it was a great idea, but the reality checks here are invaluable. Is it frustrating when I can see the value in something and a whole raft of people are giving other perspectives? Yes. Do I get over it when I see their point of view in the larger project? Also yes. Will this stop me proposing dumb shit ideas? Absolutely not.

¹ BTW this ‘beginner dev’ designer is somewhat experienced in developing css (which would be my core contribution).

Maybe I’m seeing a different side of this, but I didn’t read etc’s comment as a personal jab at you, giz. I took that as etc looking at a (new) designer – not you personally – and considering whether what we’re doing is the best fit for them…and doing this in the user forum for the users to comment on. I didn’t read it as a sleight on you at all. I’d go as far to say as I’ve never experienced etc be anything but respectful, courteous, and considered here.

² Have you ever considered that a reason for Textpattern’s lack of popularity might be due to the design of textpattern.com? I think Phil did a great job, but website design (particularly css) and public perception have moved on since then.

Phil did (does) a bang-up job for Textpattern. All the assets & build components are publicly available for scrutiny and improvements. The site is quick to load. It’s accessible. It hits all the core web vitals and other checkboxes we need. The construction is logical and scalable.

Textpattern is a small project on a small operational budget run by a handful of volunteers in some of their spare time. It’s growing in popularity, if download & GitHub metrics are to be believed. The consideration and attention that this project has for its product and users is way up there compared with some other projects.

From my perspective, the main website is a net positive for the project. Constructively, the project would benefit from some third-party themes…and we have an in-progress themes website in the works. We’re working on the docs site. We’re working on a CMS release that has had over 2,000 commits made to it since 4.8.8.

giz · 2025-08-28 19:24:11

I must be an overly sensitive petal then, as I read etc’s post as another designer jab from ‘senior management’, following on the heels of an earlier one.

etc · 2025-08-28 19:28:57

giz wrote #340324:

Why are you suspicious of designers?

Let’s all be hearts and not suspect each other of suspecting each other. I’m absolutely not suspicious of designers and of you even less, sorry if it sounds this way. Just saying that everyone can fat-finger (me first), and pushing commits live without testing by others can be hazardous.

I thought the procedure of making commits a repository, and subsequent perusal by devs covered this?

It might, but looks cumbersome. The changes you commit are mostly visual, so we need to preview them so that anyone agrees that everything works fine. How do we do it? We can not test them live on textpattern.com, right? So, create a fork, a staging site? Copy textpattern.com content to it?

There sure is a way, but, on the other hand, we advertise txp unique features like behind-the-scenes developing on the live site in dev preview mode. Couldn’t we benefit from it here, given that textpattern.com is driven by Textpattern?

Textpattern CMS

Textpattern CMS support forum

#37 2025-08-26 19:55:59

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

#38 2025-08-27 01:32:22

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

#39 2025-08-27 08:04:31

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

giz wrote #340294:

#40 2025-08-27 11:17:13

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

giz wrote #340294:

giz wrote #340294:

giz wrote #340294:

#41 2025-08-27 11:46:34

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

#42 2025-08-27 21:04:27

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

wet wrote #340296:

jakob wrote #340297:

Algaris wrote #340298:

gaekwad wrote #340300:

Ev’ryone

#43 2025-08-28 06:50:12

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

#44 2025-08-28 17:39:57

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

etc wrote #340315:

#45 2025-08-28 18:16:29

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

etc wrote #340315:

#46 2025-08-28 19:01:32

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

giz wrote #340324:

#47 2025-08-28 19:24:11

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

#48 2025-08-28 19:28:57

Re: Textpattern's face to the public

giz wrote #340324:

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