Well I said things should come together quickly, and they have. Moving over to XML for a lot of the data storage and XSL for much of the page rendition has definitely shortened development time.
Currently we have 20 templates available for the user to choose from. These include images on the left, right , top and bottom, large blocks of text and small. What is great about this though is that they all come from the same piece of XML, so the data does not get lost when you choose a new page layout.
This is achieved by having an XSLT stylesheet for each layout that transforms the XML into a chunk of valid XHTML that we can then insert into a page. There is then another XSLT stylesheet that handles the transfer back into a layout neutral xml file. Thus a customer can swap from one layout to another as often as they like without ever losing the actual page data.
Next week the plan is to add the javascript to make this process smoother and more intuitive. We have changed the actual page creation and deletion page too so this will hopefully once finished have a very easy drag and drop style to page manipulation.
If things continue at this pace, then a viable Beta is a distinct possibility before we break for Christmas.
I’m going to regret saying that aren’t I?
2 comments
Comments feed for this article
December 17, 2007 at 9:42 am
Graham Armstrong
You may well regret saying that Stuart, but each and every week you are working on it brings it a week closer to our customers being able to use it. I know its taken longer than was originally thought but you just know the wait is worth it. I guess it’s a bit like those family days out, we are like the kids in the back seat who keep asking “Are we there yet? Are we there yet?” Just how annoying is that?
But like the day trip to the seaside, when you get there the smell of the sea, the ice cream, the sandcastles and the fantastic dreams you have when you fall asleep on the way back make you forget the excruciating wait.
I just have one more thing to add Stuart.
Are we there yet? Are we there yet?
December 17, 2007 at 11:15 am
rapidsite3
@Graham,
well I still feel Rapidsite will make for a “Grand day out” as they say in my part of the world.
Yes it has taken longer than expected, but much of this has been down to the product refining itself as the project grew. That and one or two distractions along the way.
So, we’re nearly there, not far now. Who can be the first one to spot the sea?