Together with releasing beta 4 of CiviCRM, we introduced first version of new documentation layout. It's been a while since our docs came through major overhaul and it was high time to start doing something about this.
Blogs
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March 5, 2009
By Dave Greenberg Filed under CiviCase, CiviEvent, CiviCRM, Drupal, JoomlaThe fourth BETA release of version 2.2 - including CiviCase, Personal Campaign Pages, Soft Credits, Multi-value Custom Fields, cool new hooks for developers, and more - is now available for download. This release includes approximately 25 bug fixes. as well as some community-requested improvements: Allow a user to register multiple participants using the same email address, and allow additional participants to be added without requiring email addresses for them. Make it easier to explore CiviCase by including sample case types with configuration files in the codebase distribution (learn more...). You can also try out these sample case types - "Housing Support" and "Adult Day Care Referral" on the public 2.2 demo. Configuration option to "turn off" the double-opt-in process when users subscribe to a mailing list via a Profile form. Ability to Send Bulk Email from the Find Members search screen. New hook to discount event fees when a user is registering multiple participants (e.g. you get a 5% discount for each additional person you register). Option to completely replace CiviCRM dashboard content using the Dashboard hook. You can use the automated upgrade script to upgrade from 2.1.x OR from any previous 2.2 alpha or beta release. This release will be fully upgrade-able to any additional beta versions as well as 2.2 stable. Please help ensure a quality stable release by downloading and testing 2.2 beta against a copy of your site and data.
... If this is your first look at 2.2, check out the 2.2 Roadmap for a good overview. Or you can review a compete listing of new features, improvements and bug fixes on the issue tracker.March 2, 2009
By kurund Filed under CiviCRM
We plan to make usability / UI improvements a major focus of the 2.3 release. We will be working on and putting up prototypes and mockups of many of these changes over the coming weeks - and will be looking for folks to give us feedback on them.
One area we're looking at is the "selectors" - lists of records - which appear throughout CiviCRM. These are used to list search results (lists of contacts, contributions, etc.) and many other records (profile fields, activity types, etc.). Currently a big part of the horizontal space for these is taken up by "action links" - Edit, View, Delete, Disable, etc. This can cause horizontal scrolling and limits the number of columns we can show / include in each row.
We've developed an alternate approach for this - where there is a single "action icon" on each row. Clicking on it gives you a list of available actions. You can see this approach here on our new trunk sandbox (where we will be showcasing lots more changes and "experiments" going forward):
Profile Listings
Please take a few minutes to try this out and give us your feedback / thoughts on this. Will it be helpful or confusing for users?
NOTE: For this "review" please just focus on the Profile listings in the main section of the page. Don't worry about the input box and "bar" above the page header - we're working on something else which we'll put forward in a separate blog.
Update:
Based on feedback we made few changes to Action link UI
Profile Listings
We have also implemented context menu for Contact Selector. So when you right click on contact selector rows, we show menu with commonly used actions.
Contact Search
February 26, 2009
By Dave Greenberg Filed under CiviCRM, Drupal, Joomla
The team has released version 2.1.6 stable with approximately 10 minor bug fixes.
NOTE: Due to a technical glitch - we are "skipping" 2.1.5 the release label. You can upgrade directly from any prior 2.1 release.
Download You can download CiviCRM 2.1.6 from our download page. Select from the civicrm-stable section. The filenames include the 2.1.6 label: civicrm-2.1.6…. Be sure and download the correct version for your CMS (Drupal / Joomla!). Select the Drupal download for Standalone upgrades. Upgrading You can upgrade directly to 2.1.6 from 2.1.0, 2.1.1, 2.1.2 or 2.1.4. We've also made a few changes to simplify the upgrade process a bit. Upgrade instructions are available on the wiki for Drupal, Joomla and Standalone. If you're still running CiviCRM 2.0 - "making the move to 2.1" has gotten a bit easier as well (we've eliminated a few steps in the upgrade). Of course you'll still need to upgrade from Drupal 5 to Drupal 6 or Joomla! 1.0 to Joomla! 1.5. This could be a good time to look at requirements and support for any other components / modules you're using. Complete upgrade instructions for 2.0 sites are on the wiki for Drupal and Joomla!.February 26, 2009
By Dave Greenberg Filed under CiviCase, CiviCRM, Drupal, JoomlaThe third BETA release of version 2.2 - including CiviCase, Personal Campaign Pages, Soft Credits, Multi-value Custom Fields, cool new hooks for developers, and more - is now available for download. This release includes approximately 40 bug fixes., as well as some improvements in the personal campaign page functionality under Joomla! We've also integrated a Configuration Checklist which should make it easier for site administrators to complete initial configuration tasks on new installations. You can use the automated upgrade script to upgrade from 2.1.x OR from any previous 2.2 alpha or 2.2 beta 2. This release will be fully upgrade-able to any additional beta versions as well as 2.2 stable. Please help ensure a quality stable release by downloading and testing 2.2 beta against a copy of your site and data.
... If this is your first look at 2.2, check out the 2.2 Roadmap for a good overview. Or you can review a compete listing of new features, improvements and bug fixes on the issue tracker.February 26, 2009
By lobo Filed under CiviCRM
We had a good phone meeting with the Advisory Group yesterday. We also used the CiviCRM IRC Channel as the back channel for questions and related chatter. The planned agenda and pre-meeting discussion is documented on this wiki page.
Dave Greenberg did a great job facilitating the meeting. We had all 10 of the advisory group members there (go group!). Here is a brief summary of what transpired and a few action items from the meeting:
Advisory Group Process
Accomplish and get done at what you commit to doing for the month
Attendance expectation: 2 excused absences a year (this is common with most professional groups)
Term limits: 2 year term. The first group is special, since half the group will only have a 1 year term. This allows us to maintain continuity and momentum within the group
Group review every 6 months
The mailing list and wiki will be the main coordination tools
Eat your own dog food
February 19, 2009
By lobo Filed under CiviCRM, Drupal, JoomlaThe CiviCRM team is pleased to announce the formation of the CiviCRM Advisory Group. We chose folks that could represent the various constituencies and different regions, and who have been active in the community. Without further ado, the advisory group members are:
February 13, 2009
By xavier Filed under CiviCRMOn every installation, you need to categorise your contacts, by what they are (journalists, volunteers, members of your organisations, big donors, politicians...), by what they are interested in (a specific topic, a specific region, age group, type of activity you offer...), by how you interact with them (do they receive your mailing list ? are they invited to your next event....)
February 12, 2009
By chrisivens Filed under CiviCRMI recently finished writing an addition to the events system that will allow pa's etc to book places for people to events and then return at a later date to confirm the names. As far as I know, this is in progress for v2.3 but basically I need it now. Apart from some testing the system should work without too much trouble.
February 12, 2009
By Dave Greenberg Filed under CiviCRM, Drupal, JoomlaThe second BETA release of version 2.2 - including CiviCase, Personal Campaign Pages, Soft Credits, Multi-value Custom Fields and more - is now available for download. This release includes approximately 20 bug fixes, as well as some improvements in the personal campaign page and custom data / multiple records features.
