Re: [phpesp-dev] ideas, wishlist. etc

[James E. F. <jf...@ac...>]

Anyone who is seriously interested in contributing should
get themselves a sourceforge account, and letting me know
their user name. Probably the best way to handle task
assignment and such is through the "Feature Request" part of
SourceForge, that way hopefully people will not duplicate
the efforts of others.

I have commented (below) on a few of the items you brought
up. I'd like to see other users opinions on them as well.
Then perhaps we can try to assign some of them among those
willing to contribute.

-James

On Sun, 24 Mar 2002, Lou Spironello wrote:

> I'm please you started this development list.
> I've been using phpESP for a while and like it.
>
> I would like to contribute my time to some development things.
>
> I'm wondering if anyone is working on an install script for phpESP
> and if not I would be willing to work on one.
>
> Just a few ideas:
>     install script for phpESP
>     RPMs, SRPMS, deb, zip, formats for phpESP
>     standardize the config directory so users won't have to
>         modify the source files (i.e. references to the include files)

This is a good idea, but isn't possible. The location of
the files must not be pre-determined. Many people use
hosting companies, and have very little control over the
actual web server they are running phpESP on. As of version
1.3 (or maybe earlier) I have suggested that the package
get installed in /usr/local/lib/php/contrib, since
/usr/local/lib/php is typically where PEAR and such gets
installed. Installing in lib requires root access to the
webserver, however. So the option must exist to install in
a user directory. Unfortunately, many people install the
*whole* package in their "public_html" directory -- this
leads to problems because then the config file (phpESP.ini)
is accessible to the world via the web server, hence the
database passwords are also available.

The best solution to this is something you have already
suggested -- an install script. The install script, if
written, must check to make sure the user will not install
the phpESP.ini in a publicly accessible directory, and must
modify all necessary paths depending on the install
location. This should be a fairly trivial operation. In
addition, I would like (tho not necessary) for the install
script to handle the database creation and initialization,
and on checking the user permissions (mysql user).

>     add a stock set of surveys and questionnaires
>     import/export feature which handles XML and other formats
>     use XML and XSLT to generate the HTML pages for reports etc.

I am very glad you mentioned XML. I would actually like to
move a large portion of data out of mysql and into XML. I
would like the backend format for the surveys to be XML.
With a well written DTD (or schema), the XML based survey
format would be much more flexible. It would still be
simple enough to allow a similar web interface to design
basic surveys, but would also allow advanced users to work
directly with the XML to create a more customized layout.
Also, by using XSLT, we add the possibility of themes and
even more flexibility.

>     ability to copy portions of surveys from other surveys
>     change the main maintenance menu to functional areas
>             Survey construction
>                     add, edit. delete, copy
>             Survey administration
>                     test, activate, close
>             Survey reports
>                     view, print, etc
>             Survey authentication
>                     user creation, editing, deletion, copying (i.e.
> duplicate user
>                             privileges)
>             Survey utilities
>                 export (mySQL, XML, CSV, etc), import(mySQL, XML, CSV,
> etc)

The whole interface needs to be redone. I am not a
designer, and clearly the GUI I designed sucks. Hopefully
there is someone who will have the time to rework the
interface.

>     interfaces to other content management systems
>         phpNuke, PostNuke, phpgroupware, ezPublish, etc.

I would like to see an interface to PostNuke first. Note
that there are license differences between most of those
CMS and phpESP, so phpESP cannot be distributed with them,
but I can certainly work with them.

>     Ability to specify a page to include the generated PHP code
>         (i.e. maybe include comment in the HTML/PHP page with a
> begin/end
>             comment such that phpESP could auto insert the php code
> directly
>             into the HTML/PHP page
>                 e.g.
>                 HTML/PHP file.
>
>                     <!--  phpESP v1.4 Survey Start -->
>                             Section to include the generated PHP code
>                     <!--  phpESP v1.4 Survey End -->
>
>         Possibility to manage "pages with the php generated survey code"

I don't quite follow this. I am assuming you mean removing
the step where the user inserts the PHP code into their
HTML template file. Naturally that would be ideal, but
probably not possible security wise (since the web server
executes without user privileges).

>         Display phpESP version on Maintenance Page

It is in the "title" tag of the page. :-)