MODX.RU - a new start!

    Today, our team happened remarkable event - we are announcing the launch of a completely new project MODX.RU . As before, the goal of the site is to popularize the wonderful MODX CMS management system among Russian-speaking web developers and end users of the system. We hope that the new features of the project will make it much better.

    A bit about the history of the project


    The site modx.ru appeared in June 2006. The sole owner of the project at that time was Maxim Korinets [ yentsun ], better known in the MODX community under the nickname Yentsun. Thanks to this person, the basic description of the still very young project modx.com was translated, the design was made, and some of the functionality came almost unchanged until the completion of the first version. Thank you, Maxim! Without you, this project would not have happened at all.

    After some time, Maxim moved away from direct development on MODX and decided to transfer the project under my control. For some time I continued to develop MODX, but at a certain point in time I realized that I could not keep it up to date alone.

    As the “veterans” of MODX are probably aware, the site modx.ru in its former guise has long been outdated morally and physically. The last couple of years, unfortunately, it has not developed at all, which even led to reasonable requirements of some users of the MODX community to close the project, so as not to scare away new users with their appearance. It could not last so long, so the decision was ripe to stop the project and somehow solve this problem completely.

    Therefore, in the end, the project was completely transferred to the company, where I continue to work, therefore I am writing this article on behalf of the whole team. Without the efforts of each member of our company, we would not be able to create the project that we are presenting to you.

    The new future MODX.RU


    We decided that simply shutting down the project would be too big a loss for the MODX community, to which we also rank ourselves. Our team loves this management system, and who else, no matter how we do, will take up the development of the MODX.RU project. However, to develop the site further in the form in which it was, no longer made any sense. Therefore, the company held a general brainstorming session, where each employee was able to offer their ideas for a quality update.

    When we started discussing architecture, we realized that at MODX of this level, projects probably had not yet been created. There was a great temptation to use third-party solutions or frameworks. For example, the idea of ​​using the Yii framework was discussed. However, the team was firmly convinced that all the planned functionality can and should be implemented using only MODX Revolution.

    And the work began to boil.

    So, after many iterations (hundreds of closed tasks in to-do lists) and a long period of site development (more than six months and almost 900 man-hours), we are happy to report that we did it! We launched the updated modx.ru!

    In the new project, we tried to implement the most useful functionality from our point of view, which will allow users to receive information about MODX CMS in the most convenient and interesting way.

    About innovations in the project


    1. Informational content

    The new portal contains up-to-date information about MODX versions, the history of occurrence and frequently asked questions. Information was transferred directly from modx.com with the permission of MODX developers.

    2. Authorization on the site

    Previously, commenting and many other user actions were anonymous. In certain cases, this is even good, but more often than not. Now on the site for commenting, for rating in ratings and for performing other actions, you will have to log in. By the way, authorization is allowed through various social networks and OpenID.

    3. News and articles

    We decided not to leave the current trend and made it possible to add user manuals for MODX and news. In articles, the program code is highlighted automatically.

    4. Question-answer

    A new section for the site modx.ru “Question-answer” allows some users to ask their questions regarding the development of MODX, and other users to help them. This is not a replacement for the previous forums, but we hope that the innovation will become an additional way to get a quick and professional answer to your questions.

    5. Directory sites

    Previously, the gallery of sites developed on MODX was a catalog of sites without an author. More precisely, the author was - and his name was indicated - but there was no unambiguous connection between the author and his site. Often, different authors indicated the same name, which created confusion in the directory.

    Now each site will have a unique link to the profile. We tried to transfer all sites (more than a thousand of them!) From the old MODX.RU catalog to the new one, however, for obvious reasons, they do not yet have a link to their authors. If you have ever added your site to the old directory, please link them to your new profile - this can be done immediately after authorization on the site.

    6. Rating of companies and individual web developers on MODX

    The previous version of the site modx.ru was often subjected to well-grounded claims related to the rating increase of individual sites and their authors. Previously, the rating almost entirely depended only on the perseverance of individual authors :). To wind it was not worth almost no effort. In the new version of the MODX.RU project, we tried to fix this problem.

    Three interdependent components were implemented: the rating of individual sites sorted by various parameters, the rating of web developers and the rating of companies working with MODX. We understand that ratings are often perceived ambiguously, so we tried to implement a ranking mechanism that seeks maximum objectivity.

    The real formula for calculating the ratings of web developers and companies turned out to be quite large. It takes into account parameters such as the total number of user sites, the rating of each user site, its articles, comments and answers to questions, etc. In addition, over time, the rating will gradually decline.

    The total rating of companies directly depends on the rating of users who are members of this company.

    7. Work on MODX

    This is also a new section for MODX.RU, which publishes customer requests for the development of software solutions using MODX CMS.

    We hope you enjoy the updated MODX.RU, and guarantee that its improvement will now be permanent. We still have a lot of plans for the future, and we really rely on users whose ideas we will also try to implement in the project.

    Thank you for your attention, we are waiting for you on MODX.RU ! :)

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