Matthew Dalberto

Kentico CMS promises rapid site development, open and extensible architecture, user-friendly interface, full control over design and 13 built in modules. Price packages range from free to $4,500. In the 2 days allocated to reviewing it, here are some of my notes.

Requirements: Windows XP+, SQL (or express) 2005+, Visual Studio 2005+, IIS or Visual Studio web server, .Net framework 2+.

My testing environment: Windows XP, .NET framework 3.5, IIS6, SQL express 2005, Visual Studio 2008. I put the Installation directories in Inetpub, opened that in Visual Studio, and hit play to start the local web service.

Installation: Installs “CMS Site Manager”, “CMS Desk”, optional pre-packaged sites, page template, and the models.

CMS Site Manager:

SCRUM agile software development. “SCRUM uses the real-world progress of a project — not a best guess or uninformed forecast — to plan and schedule releases. In SCRUM, projects are divided into succinct work cadences, known as sprints, which are typically one week, two weeks, or three weeks in duration. At the end of each sprint, stakeholders and team members meet to assess the progress of a project and plan its next steps. This allows a project’s direction to be adjusted or reoriented based on completed work, not speculation or predictions.

Philosophically, this emphasis on an ongoing assessment of completed work is largely responsible for its popularity with managers and developers alike. But what allows the Scrum methodology to really work is a set of roles, responsibilities, and meetings that never change. If Scrum’s capacity for adaption and flexibility makes it an appealing option, the stability of its practices give teams something to lean on when development gets chaotic.
http://scrummethodology.com/

PIG ROLES (our bacon is on the line)

1. ScrumMaster – one who maintains the project
2. Project Owner – one who represents the stakeholders
3. the Team – cross functional group of about 7 people who do the actual analysis, design implementation and testing of the project

CHICKEN ROLES

1. Stakeholders
2. Managers

ARTIFACTS

1. Product Backlog – High level documentation of the product. Contains a backlog items: The wish list, the “what will be built”. Property of the Product Owner. Business value is set by the Product Owner. Development effort is set by the Team.
2. Sprint Backlog – Document containing information about how the team is going to implement the features for the upcoming sprint. Features are broken down into tasks; as a best practice, tasks are normally estimated between four and sixteen hours of work. With this level of detail the whole team understands exactly what to do, and anyone can potentially pick a task from the list. Tasks on the sprint backlog are never assigned; rather, tasks are signed up for by the team members as needed, according to the set priority and the team member skills.
   The sprint backlog is the property of the Team. Estimations are set by the Team. Often an according Task Board is used to see and change the state of the tasks of the current sprint, like “to do”, “in progress” and “done”.
3. Burn down – Publicly displayed chart showing remaining work in the sprint backlog. Updated every day.

I’d like to talk to day about an open source Javascript library called Jquery. It’s main features include DOM manipulation, AJAX, event handling, CSS manipulation, and animation effects all with the goal of using the least amount of code as possible. It’s starting to make a huge presence on the web and here is why.

1. It’s open source.
2. It’s light weight. The minified file is 24k.
3. It has a massive community of on line tutorials and free plugins.
4. Cross browser tested (ie6 – ie8, Firefox, Chrome, Safari).
5. Has powerful animation abilities that can replace some Flash elements.
6. It has been blessed by Microsoft and added to VIsual Studio 2008’s intelnsense.

Here are some examples:

1. “Pretty Box plugin” – a lightbox that allows linking to .swf files (click on the “view video” links
   http://matthewschmidtdesign.net/air-liquide/
2. “Jflow plugin” – SB Design (top banner with arrows)
   http://www.sb-designs.co.uk/
3. Rounding Div corners
   http://www.malsup.com/jquery/corner/
4. Sliding column tool tip
   http://www.sohtanaka.com/web-design/examples/side-nav-popup/
5. Skinning dropdown menus – Contact us form at bottom
   http://clients.mattbotdesign.com/riordan/
6. “Colorbox”
   http://colorpowered.com/colorbox/
   http://www.square2marketing.com/portfolio_cogs.php#
7. Dropdown Nav
   
   http://www.queness.com/resources/html/dropdownmenu/index.html
   http://css-tricks.com/simple-jquery-dropdowns/
8. Slideshows
   http://blueprintds.com/2009/01/20/top-14-jquery-photo-slideshow-gallery-plugins/

google maps real estate! http://maps.google.com/ check off “real estate” under the More tab #fb