[TYPO3-UG US] Status of TYPO3.us

[Alex Heizer]

Hi Dom,

Dom Stockdale wrote:

>Alex Heizer wrote:
>  
>
>>Any opinions, anyone?
>>    
>>
>
>Yeah. At the end of the tutorial the user wants to go away feeling like
>they learned something they can go on to re-apply and use in a real way.
>  
>
Exactly. So a TS/HTML/CSS would be the way to go.

>It's unlikely that it would be that useful to them to produce
>a website in pure TypoScript because in real life that would be a really
>hardcore way to do things, but it is definitely nesseary for them to go
>through a number of exercises with TypoScript so they understand it.
>  
>
I agree. The pure-TS method needs to be in there, but the basic learning 
course should be the TS/HTML/CSS way.

>... teaching people
>these heavily TypoScript laden methods has never been as well received
>as doing things with TemplaVoila.
>  
>
True. But answering "what is an HMENU?"-type rudimentary questions for 
the 200th time on the support lists has been just about as well-received 
on our end. There is a time for quick patch-jobs, and a time for 
learning the correct way to accomplish a task. There is already an TV 
tutorial. This project is to teach people the correct way to learn how 
to do everything in T3 from beginning to end. This will include TV, but 
in its proper place, as an extension on top of a solid foundation of 
doing it correctly.

>When you show people how to do templavoila they're very quickly
>satisfied with the results and it's a great motivator, especially for
>the windows users - worshippers of the gui. 
>
Yes, and many of us who support Windows knows just how easy it is to 
troubleshoot and customize Windows when you want to deviate from the 
preinstalled options.

>Then since it's more fun
>they learn more. It is sort of like they're learning backwards as you of
>have to show them about TypoScript later on but strangely they get it
>more readily than if they'd done it first of all probably because they
>want to understand what's going on behind things.
>  
>
Not in my experience. In my business, I have seen many people who have 
tried to learn using TV, then have either gone back to doing it the 
traditional way, or have asked us to redesign their site using the 
traditional way, both out of frustration at the fact that their sites 
were a mess. Perhaps that's a difference between European and US 
markets, and maybe your clients just pick it up better once they've 
learned the TV way than we do over here. However, I digress. Again, 
there are already resources to learn TV and the automake, and MTB 
methods. This project is designed to provide a straight path for a new 
user to learn how to take a PSD or image file and end up with a TYPO3 
Website and a solid foundation of how T3 works, and how to set it up. 
This means, from the start, the new user will learn the basics, and 
build upon them as they read, not jump back and forth between the 
various bells and whistles that can be added to your installation.

While TV is a great extension and a lot of work has been done on it, and 
it does make it easier for people to create a Website quickly, please 
let's not forget that it is still beta and still in the works with some 
of the core features. To use a beta extension that may change regularly 
in the future as the foundation for learning the correct way to create a 
TYPO3 site doesn't make sense when we have the opportunity to teach 
people the correct way to learn the entire TYPO3 system. Then, any 
sections that include extensions can easily be updated in the future, 
rather than redoing the main body of the package.

>Anyway I was going to try and be diplomatic but I've just rambled, I'm
>the wrong side of the Atlantic anyway, so my vote goes for Templavoila,
>CSS Styled Content (and probably CSS Styled Image Text) and forget the
>old school.
>
Well, thanks, Dom. I didn't mean to come across as overly critical. You 
raised some good points about TV and your experiences with the different 
ways of using and learning T3. As T3 grows in usage, it will always be 
important for everyone to share their  It's just that for this project, 
the emphasis needs to be on learning the foundation from the beginning. 
There are already several manuals on doing things each way, but nothing 
comprehensive that provides a steady path towards learning the 
fundamentals from beginning to end.

Alex