nb development updated

I've spent this weekend (28th -> 30th) Updating NB Development to the latest version of Community Server, as well as giving the front page a bit of a face lift.  I really hope you like the new look.

I'll be doing a few Webcasts (Yes I know, Webcasts), on how I went about configuring Community Server to do what I want it to do, as well as a few other things.

First thing you will notice on the new look NB Development, is the flip box, with quick images about the main sections, this is ALL CSS, yes all CSS, no JavaScript in sight there.

This addition to the site, brings a touch of Community Server's flip box, but only better, lol, since this one is all CSS, and it works in IE.

The next thing you will see is a custom drop down menu, this has been a request ever since Aero 2.0, and finally it's here.  No more having to hack your code to get it to do that, it does it automatically, it even pages it for your.

This is all done via Aero 2007's brilliant way of handling these boxes.  First off you have XML configuration files everywhere for configuring everything about Aero, you then have the theme configuration to customize the look.  Then you have the orb menu.

Adding a custom menu couldn't be easily in Aero 2007, you simply open up your siteurls.config file, get the "name" of the item you want to add a drop down menu to.  Open ~/themes/aero2007/dropdown.XML, and add this:

If you wanted to as well, you can even tell it to use a Blog, yes that's right, a blog.  So you could have it list the posts in a blog (paged of course [6 per page]), and Aero will dig those links up.  And coming, before Friday, will be overrides for the Drop Down Menu.  So you could get it to list a blog, override the sorting so it sorts via post date, not post subject.  Or tell aero to replace text in the subject, or even replace text in the URL.  The URL will be useful on NB Development with the showcase button.

The next thing you'll notice, is the new section, Learn More, in here are 4 pages (Learn More index page, About nb development, contact nb development, and Services & prices), each page contains a little bit of information about nb development.  The services and prices page, gives you a run down on what each price bracket in my pricing structure represents, ish.  lol.  Just to make NB Development feel that bit more professional.

The next thing you'll see is the Showcase button, which takes you to a subdomain of NB Development, with pictures of all the sites NB Development has made, customize, or influenced.  If you run aero, then get in contact with me to add you site to the show case.

Not very exciting, it's just a single blog running on the subdomain, lol, like techienick.com, and cs-listings.com.

The last thing to show you, is the blog lists on the front page, these use the <csblog:weblogpostlist> control shipped default with Community Server 2007.  They are then linked to the individual blogs.  All apart from Dev Log, have there Post URL's edited to link to the correct site.  CS-Listings was a *** to get working, since by default, it's post are hidden from indexing, etc...

Each item is collapsible, via a tiny bit of JavaScript.  And each blog as a link to it and it's RSS feed.  Collapsing has qwerks too.  Collapse all but one, and you'll see what I mean. lol.  Qwerky but nice. lol.

I'm planning on releasing Aero 2007, in RTM, on Friday 4th May 2007.  2 days after my CNET exam, and 1 day after elections.  So enjoy.  Aero 2007 RTM will have almost everything I've shown you today in it, lol, as well as a few new additions, like overrides in both variant.config and dropdown.XML files.

Until Friday

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