Solved "public" blog

[Gummibeer]

I believe that a lot of us have something to share but don't want to create a blog for 1-2 articles or because they don't have the time to host one!?
How about a webwide hosted blog where all members can publish. I would think about a review process to categorize/tag them all properly and prevent spam or inappropriate content.
One feature I would like to request would be the option to add a redirect URL if the author created his own blog and moved the article. The owner should still be the author, so he should be able to move the content and in best case without losing the webwide visitors. Because of this the comments should be a separated thread that's only linked to the article but are still available after a redirect.

 

[Adam]

You are an ideas machine @Gummibeer. I had a similar idea but was wondering if anybody would contribute. I like the idea of retaining ownership and being able to redirect. This would be a improvement over similar community blogging platforms such as Medium or dev.to. It would be possible to create a thread automatically for each post and grab those posts as comments. Posts could have a little feature in the sidebar!

Would love to hear a few other peoples thoughts but definitely up for this. 👍

If it was a static site it could be a public GitHub repo open to PRs for submitting posts?

 

[Dominic]

What sort of content do u have in mind?

 

[Gummibeer]

If it was a static site it could be a public GitHub repo open to PRs for submitting posts?

Love the idea! But wouldn't this limit the authors to devs? What about the designers and so on?

 

[Gummibeer]

What sort of content do u have in mind?

Everything that somehow relates to webwide. Could be framework related, articles about mental health, how to do something in PS or whatever. I would say that we could keep this very open - because this community is very diverse.

 

[ek1]

I'm not very backendy so correct me if I'm wrong but linking posts/comments to threads here doesn't seem super future-proof. Is there another way to do it? The github PR is slick and simple but I do agree it might limit designers etc.

All in all love the idea, especially since it furthers Webwide as not just a community but as a hub, you know?

 

[Gummibeer]

I'm not very backendy so correct me if I'm wrong but linking posts/comments to threads here doesn't seem super future-proof. Is there another way to do it? The github PR is slick and simple but I do agree it might limit designers etc.

All in all love the idea, especially since it furthers Webwide as not just a community but as a hub, you know?

The idea, technically, would be to have a, hidden, category where threads are created if someone publishes a post. These threads will hold all comments are would be displayed as comments below the article. The idea behind is to don't lose the comments if someone moves his content. So for the users it will look and work like a regular blog with a comment section. Only the technology behind will split the comments from the article.

 

[Adam]

Love the idea! But wouldn't this limit the authors to devs? What about the designers and so on?

Great point. Something like Ghost or WordPress has author/editor approval functionality and are straightforward enough. There’s already a bridge out there for XF/WP accounts so could use a single sign in.

I'm not very backendy so correct me if I'm wrong but linking posts/comments to threads here doesn't seem super future-proof. Is there another way to do it? The github PR is slick and simple but I do agree it might limit designers etc.

All in all love the idea, especially since it furthers Webwide as not just a community but as a hub, you know?

Thanks for valuable feedback! Could you elaborate on what you mean by not being very future-proof? Longevity and future-proofing is a big focus for me so would love to hear your thoughts.

 

[ek1]

Could you elaborate on what you mean by not being very future-proof?

Not really! It just seemed breakable if in the future you change how something up the line behaves, but after clarification from @Gummibeer it doesn't seem like a problem.

 

[Gummibeer]

Great point. Something like Ghost or WordPress has author/editor approval functionality and are straightforward enough. There’s already a bridge out there for XF/WP accounts so could use a single sign in.

Hosting a wordpress only to use it's editor? Hasn't @JoyFreak posted/use a XF plugin for articles?

 

[Gummibeer]

You are an ideas machine @Gummibeer.

As long as I don't have to develop all my ideas I can throw you to death if my ideas would be cotton balls. 😂
That's why I have tons of ideas for other projects but not my own. 😫

 

[Dominic]

It would be nice if it would both work with github pr's and a graphical editor. Perhaps something like netlify cms?

 

[Dominic]

What about design?

 

[Gummibeer]

It would be nice if it would both work with github pr's and a graphical editor. Perhaps something like netlify cms?

Git-backed CMS for Gatsby, Gridsome, Eleventy, Hugo, VuePress, Jekyll, etc. would work perfectly for this.

 

[Gummibeer]

What about design?

I would keep it close to the current forum design. At all it's a webwide "product" and should show this. The author link should link to the XF profile which should have a new articles tab with all published articles in it. So it should work very well with XF.

 

[Adam]

Not really! It just seemed breakable if in the future you change how something up the line behaves, but after clarification from @Gummibeer it doesn't seem like a problem.

Gotcha! Understandable. Integrations can always be kinda finicky but as long as someone is around to fix them if there's breaking changes should be fine. 😄

 

[Adam]

Hosting a wordpress only to use it's editor? Hasn't @JoyFreak posted/use a XF plugin for articles?

I think the freedom to work outside of XF on this one could be nice and even accept community input on the development if anybody was so generous as you suggested with a variety of open source repos. Security of this site is a #1 priority for me so the less that's directly interfacing with it the better.

 

[Gummibeer]

Something to keep in mind is the legal part. Every author should be responsable for it's own content - not Adam. It should also be stated if affiliate links/ads are allowed or not. For Ads I would recommend to let Adam do it via Reach Designers and Developers with Carbon Ads which are the least distracting/interruptive ads I know.
So there is a lot to clear out before doing it and it shouldn't be done too fast.

 

[Gummibeer]

I think the freedom to work outside of XF on this one could be nice and even accept community input on the development if anybody was so generous as you suggested with a variety of open source repos. Security of this site is a #1 priority for me so the less that's directly interfacing with it the better.

Okay, but i would recommend Ghost (v3) for it. It's faster, smarter and more focused. It should be clear that it's only a blog and will never integrate a woocommerce shop or whatever WordPress could be abused for. 😉

 

[JoyFreak]

Hosting a wordpress only to use it's editor? Hasn't @JoyFreak posted/use a XF plugin for articles?

There’s actually a plug-in for blogs too by the same add-on developer. He is well known and respected and his work is professional. I would highly recommend all of his add-ons. Feel free to drop him a message, he’s always up for answering any questions. His name is Bob on XF. @Adam