Simon Wells
Simon is also author of Simon Says the official K2 document site.
Website URL: http://k2joom.com
At last, some serious news regarding the future of K2 MultiNotify.
Many of you have been asking about when Multinotify for Joomla! 2.5 will be released.
My previous blog posted stated that it would be released and a date provided, unfortunately I have been let down by a couple of "developers" wasted a lot of time, resources and money to get this updated.
Thanks to some great people in the Joomla!/K2 community, I can confirm that we are a couple of steps closer!!
I have been testing a new version this week and ironing out some issues. In parallel, an independant developer has been working on this too, so it a race against time to get this released.
Intially, it was planned to pull support on the Joomla! 1.5 version and just roll out a 2.5 only version, but I appreciate that there is still a large amount of sites running 1.5 and being updated that need 1.5 support.
With this in mind, it will most likely mean the new version will be Joomla 1.5/2.5 ready.
I really appreciate everyones patience and support, it has been a difficult transition of ownership, but we will get there together.
Thanks
It has been a while since I last wrote a blog post, a lot has happened from holidays to illness to new projects and some important changes.
Many of my valued subscribers to MultiNotify have been eagerly and patiently waiting for the latest version for Joomla! 2.5.
It hasn't arrived on schedule.
I apologise.
Unfortunately, our partner and the original developer of the MN extension, Jiliko.net, has had some professional and personal issues which caused us to miss several planned release dates.
After a lot of careful reflection, he has decided to pass all of his extensions over to K2Joom to continue to distribute, support and manage.
I too have had to make some tough decisions on the direction that K2Joom should take.
A lot of time and resources were put into creating a new dedicated support site for K2 users to help fix their issues and provide training.
On a business level, it made sense as I was recognised for my knowledge and support for K2. There were lots of personal jobs for support coming in, too many in fact.
On a personal level, I really just did not feel it was what I wanted to do, I just like styling and css more than coding.
So now there is a new plan!!
Templates
- A bigger focus on K2 templates is my primary goal, it is what I love doing the most and is part of what got K2joom up and running in the first place.
- A review of my current K2 templates has been made. Rounded, Profiler and Bloq have proven to be the most popular whilst other templates have had very low downloads, even by template club subscribers. These lower priority templates will not be updated.
- Templates such as Mello, although may look nice, just dont fit in to a Joomla! template, so more focus will be made on the layout of content and not the individual styling unless it is specifically requested.
- A new template has been created for Joomla! 2.5 K2 V2.5.7 that will be launched soon.
- My focus on creating more K2 templates will have to come at a sacrifice, general K2 support!!
I will only be providing support for templates and extensions released on K2Joom - The original K2 Documents that I created, which were part of the offical K2 support docs, will be updated to reflect changes in recent versions of K2 and then released.
- Previously unpublished or lost (Ning), Tips and Tricks for K2 will be published.
Extensions
- A review of extension popularity needs to be conducted to determine which extensions to upgrade.
- The first extension that will be updated to Joomla! 2.5 is the most popular, MultiNotify.
I have been in discussion with several developers to rewrite the whole code, whilst retaining but improving the current functionality.
It is hoped that a developer will be appointed by the end of this weekend I have today (Friday 6th July) appointed a developer to create MN2.5, with a view to have a release by the end of this month following successful testing. - If you have purchased a MN subscription, since January 1st 2012 until the new release date and it has expired, then I will give you a FREE 3 month extension so you can get the new version.
Thats about it for now, I would just like to finish off by saying a big THANK YOU to all my subscribers, both new and old that have continued to support K2joom.
The K2 Category Dashboard is the centre for your K2 category management and the layout is relativley self explanatory.
This guide is relevant to both V2.4.1 and V2.5
The view is split in to several columns across the page and so I shall describe from left to right.
- # Column
Used to indicate which line item we are looking at. - Tick Box Column
Used to select an item so that an additional function can be carried out. - Title Column
Displays the titles of the K2 categories that have been created. - Order Column
Allows you to reorder the K2 categories within a specific Category, this is useful for certain types of display ordering.
Inherit Parameters From Column
Displays which category inheritance is chosen, this allow to replicate all the category parameters from the selected category. - Associated Extra Fields Groups Column
Displays which extra field group that may have been assigned to the category. - Access Level Column
Displays if the K2 Category has been assigned with Public, Registered, Special access. - Published State
Allows filter of K2 Items by either Published or Unpublished states. - Image Column
If a K2 Category image is added then this field will show an image icon, indicating that a K2 Category Image has been included. - ID Column
The displays the incremental number that is assigned with every new K2 Item created.
The K2 Items Dashboard is the centre for your K2 item management and the layout is relativley self explanatory.
This guide is relevant to both V2.4.1 and V2.5
The view is split in to several columns across the page and so I shall describe from left to right.
- # Column
Used to indicate which line item we are looking at. - Tick Box Column
Used to select an item so that an additional function can be carried out. - Title Column
Displays the titles of the K2 items that have been created. - Featured Column
If you set a K2 item to be featured, then a green tick icon will be displayed, as default, featured is off and will display a red cross. - Published Column
Displays if a K2 item had been published, with a green tick or is unpublished with a red cross. - Order Column
Allows you to reorder the K2 items within a specific Category, this is useful for certain types of display ordering. - Category Column
Displays which category each K2 item is publish in. - Author Column
Displays the author of each K2 item. - Last Modified Date
Every time you update a K2 Item, then this field will reflect the changes. - Access Level Column
Displays if the K2 Item has been assigned with Public, Registered, Special access. - Created Column
Displays when the K2 Item was created, or the date it was set to create. - Modified Date Column
Displays when the K2 Item was last modified. - Hits Column
Displays how many times the K2 Item has been viewed on the front end. - Image Column
If a K2 Item image is added then this field will show an image icon, indicating that it has a K2 Item Image included. - ID Column
The displays the incremental number that is assigned with every new K2 Item created.
In addition to these columns, there are some tools to assist in filtering your content, these include.
- Filter
Similar to a search box in that it will display all the content with titles containing the entered word. - Current/Trash
Displays either any active K2 items which are published or unpublished, or any K2 Items which may have been deleted for recovery. - Select Featured State
This allows you to filter K2 Items which may or may not have been marked as Featured. - Category Filter
Allows you to show K2 Items from one particular K2 Category. - By Author
Allows you to filter K2 Items by a particular author. - Published State
Allows filter of K2 Items by either Published or Unpublished states.
You should have your Joomla site setup and have downloaded K2!
If you don’t already have the latest version of K2, you can obtain it from www.getk2.org and it is certainly worth keeping a copy for future reference.
To install K2, it is exactly the same as any other extensions installed through Joomla.
1. From the Joomla top menu, click Extensions then select Install.
2. Click on the Browse button and find your copy of K2.
You may also point directly to the K2 download on www.getk2.org
3. Click on the Install button.
4. When K2 has been installed correctly, you will see a confirmation.
K2 is now installed and ready to be used, just remember that at the moment you cant see anything K2 on the front side of your site just yet.
Go ahead and take a look around the K2 control panel, click on some of the functions like Add an Item to see what is included.
Lets take a look at the K2 Dashboard.
OK, so now K2 is installed, lets pop over and take a look at the dashboard.
K2 Installs in the top menu under components and also to the main control panel.
If you start at the menu option, you will see the following image. If you want to remove the Joomla dashboard from the main control panel, then we have a guide which explains how to remove it.
Along the top of the K2 dashboard we have the following choices, we shall cover these in more depth in the following lessons..
- Dashboard: This will return you to the screen.
- Items: This is the equivalent of an Article, but much better..
- Categories: K2 only uses categories, no more Sections and Categories, the benefit is you can create sub, sub, sub, sub categories etc.
- Tags: Much like that used in Wordpress, use tags to help relate your content
- Comments: K2 has a built in commenting system, so you can see what has been posted here.
- Users: Used to see all your users.
- User Groups: K2 allows you to set access levels per user group, add users to to this group.
- Extra Fields: Use for adding specific information per item, such as weight, price, colours etc.
- Extra Field Groups: Organise your fields into groups to make it easier to assign them.
- Information: Displays information on your system, K2 modules and plugins athat you have installed.
There are also some graphical equivalent icons too, plus a few extras which point to options within the main K2 menu.
Pay attention to the Joomla Import and Parameters in the top right. You will be needing those shortly.
The K2 Category Dashboard is the centre for your K2 category management and the layout is relativley self explanatory.
This guide is relevant to both V2.4.1 and V2.5
The view is split in to several columns across the page and so I shall describe from left to right.
- # Column
Used to indicate which line item we are looking at. - Tick Box Column
Used to select an item so that an additional function can be carried out. - Title Column
Displays the titles of the K2 categories that have been created. - Order Column
Allows you to reorder the K2 categories within a specific Category, this is useful for certain types of display ordering.
Inherit Parameters From Column
Displays which category inheritance is chosen, this allow to replicate all the category parameters from the selected category. - Associated Extra Fields Groups Column
Displays which extra field group that may have been assigned to the category. - Access Level Column
Displays if the K2 Category has been assigned with Public, Registered, Special access. - Published State
Allows filter of K2 Items by either Published or Unpublished states. - Image Column
If a K2 Category image is added then this field will show an image icon, indicating that a K2 Category Image has been included. - ID Column
The displays the incremental number that is assigned with every new K2 Item created.
The K2 Items Dashboard is the centre for your K2 item management and the layout is relativley self explanatory.
This guide is relevant to both V2.4.1 and V2.5
The view is split in to several columns across the page and so I shall describe from left to right.
- # Column
Used to indicate which line item we are looking at. - Tick Box Column
Used to select an item so that an additional function can be carried out. - Title Column
Displays the titles of the K2 items that have been created. - Featured Column
If you set a K2 item to be featured, then a green tick icon will be displayed, as default, featured is off and will display a red cross. - Published Column
Displays if a K2 item had been published, with a green tick or is unpublished with a red cross. - Order Column
Allows you to reorder the K2 items within a specific Category, this is useful for certain types of display ordering. - Category Column
Displays which category each K2 item is publish in. - Author Column
Displays the author of each K2 item. - Last Modified Date
Every time you update a K2 Item, then this field will reflect the changes. - Access Level Column
Displays if the K2 Item has been assigned with Public, Registered, Special access. - Created Column
Displays when the K2 Item was created, or the date it was set to create. - Modified Date Column
Displays when the K2 Item was last modified. - Hits Column
Displays how many times the K2 Item has been viewed on the front end. - Image Column
If a K2 Item image is added then this field will show an image icon, indicating that it has a K2 Item Image included. - ID Column
The displays the incremental number that is assigned with every new K2 Item created.
In addition to these columns, there are some tools to assist in filtering your content, these include.
- Filter
Similar to a search box in that it will display all the content with titles containing the entered word. - Current/Trash
Displays either any active K2 items which are published or unpublished, or any K2 Items which may have been deleted for recovery. - Select Featured State
This allows you to filter K2 Items which may or may not have been marked as Featured. - Category Filter
Allows you to show K2 Items from one particular K2 Category. - By Author
Allows you to filter K2 Items by a particular author. - Published State
Allows filter of K2 Items by either Published or Unpublished states.
Lets take a look at the K2 Dashboard.
OK, so now K2 is installed, lets pop over and take a look at the dashboard.
K2 Installs in the top menu under components and also to the main control panel.
If you start at the menu option, you will see the following image. If you want to remove the Joomla dashboard from the main control panel, then we have a guide which explains how to remove it.
Along the top of the K2 dashboard we have the following choices, we shall cover these in more depth in the following lessons..
- Dashboard: This will return you to the screen.
- Items: This is the equivalent of an Article, but much better..
- Categories: K2 only uses categories, no more Sections and Categories, the benefit is you can create sub, sub, sub, sub categories etc.
- Tags: Much like that used in Wordpress, use tags to help relate your content
- Comments: K2 has a built in commenting system, so you can see what has been posted here.
- Users: Used to see all your users.
- User Groups: K2 allows you to set access levels per user group, add users to to this group.
- Extra Fields: Use for adding specific information per item, such as weight, price, colours etc.
- Extra Field Groups: Organise your fields into groups to make it easier to assign them.
- Information: Displays information on your system, K2 modules and plugins athat you have installed.
There are also some graphical equivalent icons too, plus a few extras which point to options within the main K2 menu.
Pay attention to the Joomla Import and Parameters in the top right. You will be needing those shortly.
