Zikula Tour
New in Zikula v1.0
While Zikula v1.0 has many new features for developers, you should also note
that the end user was also taken very deeply into consideration throughout
its development. New technologies integrated into the system with
useful and accessible libraries give you easier control, manipulation, and
performance.
AJAX
AJAX libraries are now part of the core, giving modules easy access to
these technologies. Technology integrations such as this give your site the
feel of an modern drag and drop interactive application rather than an old
static, point, click, and refresh one. AJAX is no longer a buzz word used to
create useless demos, it is being used by Zikula to create useful, intuitive,
and simple to manipulate applications.
Theme System
From Xanthin 2.0, the Xanthia 3 is now renamed "Themes". Themes are
reworked into a new easier-to-use interface. You are given control of your
themes in a more open-ended logic. You can easily use your knowledge of HTML
and CSS languages to reflect into your Zikula design. The separation of
presentation and design over function is widened, giving you the ultimate
control of your site's look and feel.
Templating
Core modules are fully-templated. You no longer have to rely on the
original layout logic of the module designer. It can be at your whim to
rework and template for a given module to suit your needs.
WorkFlow
Workflow is another buzz word. But what is Workflow? Workflow allows you
to create a procedure for getting tasks completed. Material can be passed
through a hierarchy to complete work in an efficient and effective manner.
For example an article would move from draft, to edit, to review, to publish.
With the workflow enabled quality of work can be increased and easily
managed.
PageLock
Pagelock is simply the checking out of a resource. Any given resource can
only be manipulated by one user at a time, to ensure concurrent changes are
not being made at any given time. For example if you are editing an article,
only you can edit it while you have it checked out.
Development Made Easy
Zikula boasts continued expansion of the core functions to improve
development time. Use of core functions allows you to spend more energies on
actual module development rather than implementing core components into a
module. The use of pnForm for information gathering and user
error input generating will allow you as a developer to focus on your modules
features and functionality, rather than countering and predetermining user
input mistakes. DBUtil allows you as a developer to reduce
the code needed to access and filter through the database, by providing the
technology for you. PNObject introduces a component model, separating module use cases from object-specific behavior, allowing the reusing generic functionality for several object types, at the same time improving upon maintainability. But that is just the beginning, there are CatergoryUtil,
standardization of module frameworks, standardiztion of API calls, AJAX,
enhanced search functionality, and so on.
With development technologies in play, you can develop or expect
development of new and exciting modules!