Nice CMS with a lot of features - Some ideas (addon, site translations, custom code, etc)

[sgirard84]

Hi,

First of all, thanks for your great work! Recently I was using Flextype CMS but it's no longer supported and the version with admin is still limited to php 7.x And I'm not php expert enough to migrate to php 8 as it has so many dependencies and libraries I'm not familiar with. I'm running a modified version for which I added some concepts that already exist on Formwork (like the ability to limit the type of content under a parent item). I also built a plugin that display a full screen calendar and within its own configuration, I can define the source based on content already defined. It's basically a different view over a specific content about public events.

I'm playing with Formwork-beta-2 since two days and I love it. It has all the custom layout and fields to adapt any content, built-in multi languages support (admin and frontend), user stats and it's lightweight with less dependencies.

-- Addons

Now I was wondering if there is any plan to add a notion of addons/plugins/extensions ? This would make this CMS even more customizable.

-- Custom code based on events

I also like one concept of Cockpit CMS (I built one website with this one too) where you can place a bootstrap.php file into config folder with custom code based on events triggered by CMS. For instance, if you wish to do more complex validations or logic before an actual content item is save, you can add a function like " app->on('content.item.save.before, function(param){ }) ".

-- Translations

Ability to add a folder 'translations' under 'site' folder and get it automatically loaded.

-- Maybe differentiate concept of 'pages' vs 'data' ??

With schemes, you can define any type of content, not only pages. For instance, I could define a collection of categories, which are not pages. Then, what if I could reference this collection of categories under a specific page. Example: on a page, having a field 'select' where I can define a dynamic source like categories (define the source, the value field and the label field). Also something I made for Flextype.

The folder "pages/schemes" could become "data/schemes", and having a property 'content-type: page|data'. Then the admin UI could have a distinct menu for pages vs data. From a user's perspective, it would avoid confusion, and not see random content mixted with pages.

Edit: how to get access to discord chat to ask questions ?

[giuscris]

Hey @sgirard84, thank you!

Your proposals make sense, even if my plans for now are to finally end the development of Formwork 2.0.0 as soon as possible since it's almost ready and has been taking years.

I'm already planning to add events in a subsequent release, maybe Formwork 2.1.0, which in turn could unlock extensions.

Do you feel having site translations could help the development of templates? I can definitely add it now, it's a simple change.

A data section could make sense too, if I understand correctly, you could define global data separated from pages, which in turn you could reference in them. But what would be the difference if you extend the site scheme, since it's already a global object, being the parent of all pages and take data from it?

I've removed the discord channel from the readme due to inactivity. But you can join here if you want.

[sgirard84]

I'm glad you are working to make it an official release soon.. so far the latest beta seems stable and I don't have any issue on my windows machine (Laragon with php 8.3)

For the site translations, I was thinking to put in there any messages, form labels, or other specific text found on the front end, that are not defined by the content itself. Example: on a contact page with a contact form, define the various field labels and success/error messages inside translations files.

---

For the content/page idea, maybe I can explain with a basic example of a photography portfolio website. I'd create a parent page 'gallery' with child pages 'photo' (similar to a blog). Then I'd create a parent item 'photo-categories' with childs 'photo-category' with something like 10 categories of photography. Each category translated, with maybe a short description and a cover picture.

First question.. with the current version, is it possible to add a dynamic field on 'photo' scheme that would create a dropdown field with all 'photo-category' listed. So on the front end, user could click on a category and get pictures related? It was not possible with Flextype either, so I made a custom field where I can specify a content (on the YAML definition), and UI will read all child items.

Second, categories in that example are not 'pages' but just content managed by the user, and used as a property of photos. So I was thinking about a way to separate them over pages. But to be honest, it's not a big issue, if everything show up under 'pages'.

Maybe another example of various content is: when a visitor submit a contact form, I'd have a controller that will send the email, but also create a new record under a content scheme 'form-submission' to keep track of emails received.

Thanks again for all your work.

[giuscris]

Yes, you can already define a tags field in the site scheme to define the categories, and dynamically reference it from the pages.

For example you can add this field to site.yaml:

    photos.categories:
        type: tags
        label: Photo categories
        icon: image

And the corresponding reference layout section:

    sections:
        # ...
        photos:
            label: Photos
            collapsible: true
            fields: [photos.categories]

To have this field in the site options:

Then you can always add a select field to any page scheme. Something like this:

    photosCategory:
        type: select
        label: Photos category
        options@: site.photos.categories
        translate: [label] # Translate the field label only

And like before the corresponding reference in the layout section, maybe as the last field in content section:

    sections:
        content:
            label: '{{page.content}}'
            active: true
            fields: [title, content, photosCategory]

To have this:

[sgirard84]

Yes, you can already define a tags field in the site scheme to define the categories, and dynamically reference it from the pages.

Then you can always add a select field to any page scheme. Something like this:

    photosCategory:
        type: select
        label: Photos category
        options@: site.photos.categories
        translate: [label] # Translate the field label only

And like before the corresponding reference in the layout section, maybe as the last field in content section:

    sections:
        content:
            label: '{{page.content}}'
            active: true
            fields: [title, content, photosCategory]

Thanks but I also figured I can do this:

category:
type: select
label: Category
options@: site.findPage('categories').children

[giuscris]

Of course this works too. But since you're referencing a page, a page field would be more appropriate.

Can I ask why you're creating a page for each category?
Do you want to have a content taxonomy you can reference from a route?

[sgirard84]

Of course this works too. But since you're referencing a page, a page field would be more appropriate.

Can I ask why you're creating a page for each category? Do you want to have a content taxonomy you can reference from a route?

You are right, I should check at pages field and use the option to list childrens of a specific parent page.

For you other question, CMS stands for 'content management' and a content is not limited to a page, it can be anything (pages, references, form submissions, etc). That's why I like Flextype using the term 'entries' rather than pages.

Category was just an example. But even in this example, I might want to create a 'page' for each cataegory to use the benefits of structured content and define have multiple fields for each category like: 'published', 'description', 'cover image', etc. Same with a more complex product taxonomy structure.

I'm still playing with Formwork and feels a bit more confortable each day. I'm working on a concept for plugins.

[giuscris]

Hi @sgirard84, I've added support for site translations with commit a533fab.

[RWDevelopment]

maybe think about integration with flat-file databases like https://github.com/Lazer-Database/Lazer-Database or https://github.com/SleekDB/SleekDB

it will be like flex-objects in grav cms