https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/ Discussion Board en-US Wed, 03 Jun 2026 23:31:46 +0000 wpForo 60 https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/user-modules-for-efiction/ Fri, 20 Jan 2017 10:30:57 +0000
Anyway, forces above (wife) have made me get back in gear, and while I'm still puzzling with the story edit thing and all the shenanigans involved like re-moderation and that, I remembered that people were asking about modules.

So I started with a small one, that as an example will be able to do some sort of banner rotation.
This is only a starter, basically for me to see how well it integrates without having to alter the code too much on the user-side.

Currently, it would be called in template by one simple call ( {{ ModulesBanner::rotate()}} ). It can easily be extended to accept parameters or whatnot, can load data from DB and use custom templates.

More to come ...]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/user-modules-for-efiction/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/non-standard-characters/ Tue, 23 Sep 2014 23:59:09 +0000
eFi 5 will support full UTF8 character set for login, names, passwords, everything (not emails, but that's to comply with RFC standards). Just tried it out with russin login, worked like a charm, just registered a user named ЗВЕЗДНЫЙ on the test plattform, so I'd say anything else should work also.

Btw, anybody need more than UTF8 to support their language? That's quite beyond my scope, spoiled European here ...]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/non-standard-characters/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/admin-panel-finally-moving-forward/ Sat, 23 Aug 2014 22:46:02 +0000

]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/admin-panel-finally-moving-forward/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/old-links-module-redirect-to-the-rescue/ Thu, 07 Aug 2014 23:02:26 +0000
Thought I'd drop a note of what I am doing right now - as stated somewhere else, I am enjoying holidays, and weather does not disappoint, today's rain gave me time to work on "project save old links/bookmarks".

Ok, what does it do?

It's a feature that will ensure old links and bookmarks will still work after upgrading to eFiction 5, usually that would not be the case, since the entire engine running the script has changed, but mod_rewrite (Apache) to the rescue, using .htaccess and a parser module with a translation matrix.

English, please?

Let's assume you had a bookmark to http://awesomefanfic.mars/viewstory.php?sid=1701&chapter=4, the server would figure this is an old URL, and send you to http://awesomefanfic.mars/?action=redirect&source=viewstory&sid=17&chapter=5. At that point, visitors will be informed that this page is now running a new version and remind to update bookmarks and links, and then redirect to the "proper" URL.

Meaning, that although everything would change once updating, bookmarks and links would still work - hope you will love it :)

Now, back to work - I promised a first look this year before fall, and time is running. (Should anyone here have to powers to manipulate the time-space continuum, let me know).
]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/old-links-module-redirect-to-the-rescue/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/license-question/ Sat, 07 Jun 2014 09:48:57 +0000
been getting asked about the license to be used in an upcoming release, and honestly I am not sure about which one to take, or which one can/should be used that doesn't interfere with the license for jQuery that is used in this project.

However, jQuery is released under the MIT which should not give much restrictions, so here's the question: Has anybody already been into the license issue and can help?

It should allow modification, yet make sure all modifications have to be available for everybody, and that the software may not be redistributed under whatever circumstance.


Thanks]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/license-question/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/external-frameworks-and-why-most-likely-not/ Sat, 07 Jun 2014 08:43:56 +0000
since there's often the question whether, and then which, framework we will be using, let me do some explaining here:

Definition: Frameworks, for those that don't exactly know what that is, should take from developers the need to take care of every single small thing, like reading/writing from/to the database, user/session management and all these pesky things that need to function in order for the whole thing to function.
From that point of view, even a selfmade class that provides database functions is some kind of framework.

Decision: eFi5 will, so far, not be using any of the major frameworks out there.

Motive: While eFiction 5, like all its predecessors, strives to be as good as the people behind it can make it, there is no interest in being elitist. That said, a lot of these frameworks require far more than a simple upload directory, PHP and a MySQL-server (today's basics). They require installation of modules/programs, something that can only be done on root (Linux for Administrator) level, and not everybody has that, and that makes this an entire no-go. It's my intention to make this thing work out of the box within a few minutes time, requiring nothing more than any other script, being an upload path and database access.

But: Yes, there may be other frameworks, but the smaller they get, to the point where they don't require massive server configuration, their advantage gets reduced to a point where, in order to get a little bit convenience out of it, a lot of work has to be put into it, and the project would then be stuck with a piece of external software.]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/external-frameworks-and-why-most-likely-not/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/moved-fd-table-of-contents/ Sat, 17 May 2014 19:27:16 +0000 Feature Discussion.

http://forums.efiction.org/index.php?topic=8681.0]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/moved-fd-table-of-contents/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/status-report/ Sat, 17 May 2014 13:45:14 +0000
Colour legend:
pretty much done
on it's way, but needs work (was thinking yellow, but barely readable)
skeleton parts exist
planned, but not more

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Updated 21.06.2015]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/status-report/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/query-add-ons-to-be-included-with-ef5/ Sat, 17 May 2014 13:36:37 +0000 since it's going from scratch, I was wondering which modules people feel should be included in the initial release.
They will be optional to use, obviously, but if the majority uses them, it would be convenient to at least make sure database elements get the proper love.
So hit me with the ones you feel deserve to be there from day one, maybe include a description/link.]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/query-add-ons-to-be-included-with-ef5/ https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/about-efiction-5-and-why-its-5/ Sat, 17 May 2014 13:33:06 +0000
I'll use this topic to clear up some questions people may have about the reasons for this major version leap, how it came to be and all that.

Where did it start:

To be honest, what is currently in the works as eFiction 5 was not supposed to be any eFiction whatever, it started when eF was still alive, because frankly, there were a lot of things I was unhappy with, beside the lack of major updates.
So I decided to start a fanfic management system of my own - well, my wife decided I should, so blame her - called phpFiction. Very inventive name, I know. Then, we got the call that efiction.org was about to expire, and a new owner/manager was needed. Since full world domination has to start somewhere, we decided to start by dominating the world's fanfiction scene.

What happened to #4
eFiction 4.0 was under developement by Tammy, but apparently abandoned at some point, last activity was June 2011  :omg:
Since we didn't recycle any of the code, we decided to skip this number. Also, MS-DOS 4 was pretty bad, so maybe unlucky number.

Where are we now?
Well, this is subject to constant change, but I'll give an impression of where the project was when it became eF5:

I decided to start pretty close to the database structure of ef3.x, focusing on the ease of update.
So along with the developement of the script was a constant development of the conversion tool (now better called updater).

Table count has gone up a bit, lot of stuff was moved to relational tables, allowing for faster search by story properties.

Story reading/browsing is at about 90%.
The UCP (user control panel) is pretty well on it's way, so far you can add and edit stories, adjust privacy settings for your favourites, bookmarks.
The PM system is about half way done.

The next steps:
The temple system is counter-intuitive beyond description, so this is the main thing being worked on right now.
Un-messing the code.

(Status: 17.05.2014)]]> Dev blog Sheepcontrol https://efiction.org/community/dev-blog/about-efiction-5-and-why-its-5/