MySource Matrix Developer

MySource Matrix Developer Newsletter Issue 68
Friday 31st March 2006

covers versions 3.6.6 stable, 3.8.0 stable, 3.9.0 development

News

New Releases Monday

New stable releases of MySource Matrix will be released on Monday. Versions 3.6.7 and 3.8.1 will be bug fix releases and will not contain any additional functionality.

Two Developers Leave the Team

The MySource Matrix development team says goodbye to two developers this week. Both Nathan and Pratibha have left the team to pursue other interests. Nathan was best known for his work on the Java asset map and the Bulkmail package, while Pratibha developed the Data package and the RSS Feed asset.

New Features

Print Current User Attributes in Design

Added to: 3.9.0 development

You can now use the MySource_PRINT tag in a parse file to print out any attribute or keyword for the current user. For example, the following code will print the current user's email address and the value of the keyword (the value of the metadata field called "favourite colour" for the current user):

<MySource_PRINT id_name="__global__" var="current_user" attr="email" />
<MySource_PRINT id_name="__global__" var="current_user" keyword="asset_metadata_favourite_colour" />

Multi-Occurrence of Tags in Remote Content

Added to: 3.9.0 development

The remote content page has always allowed you to only show the contents between two tags (the start and end tags). The default behavior is to include as much content as possible. So in a situation like this:

<div>Testing this <div>Now</div> HERE</div>
<div>Test that</div>

if the start tag is <div> and the end tag is </div>, the remote content page would display the entire example contents.

A new option has been added to the remote content page that allows you to stop the matching of multiple occurrences of the start and end tags. In this example, having the multi-occurrence option disabled would only return:

<div>Testing this <div>Now</div>

ie. from the first occurrence of the start tag to the first occurrence of the end tag.

Set ALT Text for Search Button Image

Added to: 3.9.0 development

When using an image as the search button in a searchbox design area, you can now configure the ALT text of the image. Previously, the ALT text was always set to "search". The ALT text is now set to the value of the "Submit button text" field.

Linking Screen now Paginated

Added to: 3.9.0 development

For assets with hundreds of links, the linking screen became hard to use as the list of links displayed was too long. The linking screen is now paginated so only 50 parent assets (and their links) are displayed at one time.

Trigger Action Fail

Added to: 3.9.0 development

From the "what would I ever use that for?" department comes Trigger Action Fail. This trigger action allows you to generate a custom error message if the defined trigger conditions are met, and also block the execution of the event that is being performed.

For example, you could implement a business rule that stops users from deleting user accounts, preferring to deactivate them instead. To do this, create a trigger that listens for the "before asset deleted" event and checks that the asset is of type User. Add a fail trigger action and have it generate an error message informing the user that accounts should be deactivated instead of being deleted. Make sure the trigger action blocks execution of the event by setting the blocker option.

For added fun, use the new email trigger action to email an administrator and let them know that someone is trying to delete user accounts instead of deactivating them. Just ensure this trigger action is ordered before the fail trigger action in the list.

Retain Expanded Asset Map in WYSIWYG

Added to: 3.9.0 development

When inserting images, links or movies in the WYSIWYG, the asset map that appears in the popup will now remember where it last was and will auto-expand to that location. Each of the different WYSIWYG popups remember their last position independently, so the image asset map will remain in the image library while the link asset map will remain in the site, for example. Logging out clears the asset map's memory.

Visual Display of Triggers in Asset Map

Added to: 3.9.0 development

When you expand the trigger manager, the triggers you have created in your system are now displayed in the asset map. They are listed in alphabetical order with disabled triggers at the bottom of the list. Triggers can now be edited and deleted using standard asset map functionality rather than having to go through the "Triggers" screen of the trigger manager.

Planned Development

Proxy Authentication

To be added to : 3.9.0 development
Estimated start date: already in development
Estimated end date: 7th April 2006

A new feature will be developed to set Proxy Authentication settings which will be used by assets that require to retrieve remote content (i.e. Remote Content Page). This solves a problem where servers that used proxies to access external networks could not validate or access remote URLs correctly.

Show DIV/TABLE Status While Editing

To be added to : 3.9.0 development
Estimated start date: 3rd April 2006
Estimated end date: 7th April 2006

A new feature will be developed to display the status of a DIV or Table in the bodycopy's edit contents page. This allows for an editor to quickly see which pieces of content require approval while editing.

Upgrading

3.9.0 Development

Additional queries:

Additional comments: 

No additional upgrade steps are required.

New Bugs Added To Bug Tracker

Notes:

Bug #1192 (Deleted Questions Show up in Keyword Drop Down list in Page Contents) was submitted by Deborah B on the 21st of March but was marked as Can Not Replicate after the bug could not be replicated in any latest version. This bug was most likely fixed in the last release.

Bug #1194 (Text Question Complex Rule doesnt work) was submitted by Deborah B on the 21st of March but was marked as Can Not Replicate after the bug could not be replicated in any latest version. This bug was most likely fixed in the last release.

Bug #1207 (Export of submissions to csv file includes wrong char for new line) was submitted by coolvik on the 24th of March but was marked as Can Not Replicate after the bug could not be reproduced by the developers and the bug poster did not reply to recent comments.

Bug #1221 (Search report logs are not rotated daily) was submitted by Brendan but was marked as Can Not Replicate as it appears this problem is specific to a particular system and could not be replicated by a developer.

New Feature Requests Added To Bug Tracker

Bugs Fixed In The Bug Tracker

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