Changelog Request / Suggestion

I'm in the process of creating a custom template. One of the things I'm worried about is the updates to the modules. Everyday there seems to be an update to a module and I fear that I'm going to update a module and break my site's template.

For each module I see that there is a change log which is very helpful in understanding what was changed on a basic level. Since I'm not using one of the Jamroom themes I can't use the compare to see what has changed or needs to be updated in the templates.

I would like to request a couple additions to the changelog. Maybe there already there, if they are, please let me know.

1. Security Priority. Since I'll need to check each one of my templates for each modules that is being updated, having a security rating in the changelog would help me determine if I can wait to make the module update or not. I believe the other day there were 7 modules that I needed to update. It would be great if I knew which one I should update first vs. which one could wait. Having a security rating would allow me to put off modules with a low rating and focus on the modules with a high rating.

2. Template / Variable Modification. Maybe this could just be a "Yes" or "No" in the changelog which would tell me that some variable has changed in the template. Obviously, my CSS and HTML is going to be different. But if some variable has changed then having this would let me know that I need to check my template against the provided module templates to see what variable has changed.

3. Template / Variable Add. Another "Yes" or "No" letting me know that a new variable has been added to a template.

4. Anything other information which would provide a better workflow for a custom template creator.

There are going to always be updates, I just don't want to worry when I click the update button... even though most of the time it will be tested on my local system before I update to my live system.

Thanks!

updated by @jimmy: 03/20/15 10:14:29PM

This tells me you might be going about the customization incorrectly - you should:

- make sure you are not using a default skin (sounds like you are not)
- make sure you are OVERRIDING the module templates in your skin.

For example if you have customized the modules/jrAudio/item_list.tpl file, then you DON'T want to change it there - instead you need to make this file:

skins/YourSkin/jrAudio_item_list.tpl

that will ALWAYS be used before the one that comes with the module, so you never need to worry about the module template changing due to an upgrade and changing your site.

As for outlining what variables have changed, it's not something we're likely to do - that's "too much information" in our changelog, and frankly one that would take us A LOT of time to manage.

Make sure you have a development site you test everything on BEFORE you roll it to your live site - that way you can test everything out before going "live" with it.

Let me know if that helps.

Thanks!


--
Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

I'm not messing with the module template files. All of my template files are inside my skins directory.

Though I haven't run into a problem as of yet, I could see what I issues happening in the future.

I'm not asking you to outline what variables have changed. I'm asking you to put a "Yes" or "No" in the changelog to indicate that there has been a variable change in the template or not. I wouldn't expect you to list every variable that has changed. I only want to know if I need to spend time looking over the JR template changes to see if I need to change something in my custom template.

As for the security (number 1 above) it would allow me to set a priority to know what modules I need to update first. Most of the software I use, including the CentOS repo has a security level determination like in this example notice: "CentOS Errata and Security Advisory 2015:0164 Moderate" adding something to the changelog about security I think would be helpful.

updated by @jimmy: 02/13/15 10:55:34AM

Can you let me know what issues you think you might run into? Maybe that will clarify it for me so I better understand what you're hoping to avoid happening.


Sure - if we have a security update I can mark it "high priority" or something - most likely you'll see a forum post about it too.

Thanks!


--
Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

Let's say I've got a custom template which I made based on the variables of the Elastic Template. I'm just stating this as an example - if you decided to change


to


or spotted a place where you misused != and not it need to be ! instead.

or if you added a completely new variable to the template:



Just put a "yes" or "no" in the changelog letting me know that something other than HTML or CSS has changed.

I'm only using the above as examples. But assuming that most people will create a template based off of the existing templates, they'll be a lot of code coming from the JR templates and used in the custom templates.

Obviously, if only the module PHP code changed in the PHP files, or there was a HTML or CSS change then the Variable notice would be "No" meaning I wouldn't have to look over my templates for a code based change.

Not asking you to list the changed variable, just a notice that a variable has changed and custom skinners would need to look over the code in the template files.


That would be great. Someone who has a highly custom site that isn't going to just click the update button might need to determine which update needs to take priority. I would actually love to see in every changelog Security Level: Low, Moderate, High at the top of each update. I'm sure you would agree, security is one of the most important things to know about. Putting it in every update as the default first line would also tell other developers of modules - put security on the first line versus include it if there is a security issue.

updated by @jimmy: 02/13/15 11:19:49AM

Another example: I see the jrUser has an update. Right now it says:


So, was this change made in just the module PHP files or in the template file? If it was in the module PHP files I wouldn't have to do anything - because I haven't modified the module files. If there was a template modification, I would only like to know I need to look at the template variables for some kind of change.

I'm not saying that for each separate change there needs to be a Variable Notice - but rather just a general notice for each total update letting me know that I need to check out that modules template files or not.
updated by @jimmy: 02/13/15 12:12:35PM

This was in a PHP script - no templates. Typically if we change a template we will say so - i.e. "item_list.tpl updated to have a better image".

So we'll make sure and always include the template if we change a template.

Hope this helps!


--
Brian Johnson
Founder and Lead Developer - Jamroom
https://www.jamroom.net

That would be prefect! Having the specific template file would narrow it down to what I needed to update.

Yes this is a good thing- to name the template that has been changed.


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...just another satisfied Jamroom customer.
Migrated from Ning to Jamroom June 2015

Just for interest, theres a github project looking at changelogs:
http://keepachangelog.com/

All I use the Jamroom changelog for is to quickly look to see what has changed before updating the module from the marketplace.

If I need to know where code has changed I compare (diff) directories so that the code is right there in front of me when I click on each change. I do that directly in my text editor (BBedit), but there are many stand alone tools as well. I can't imagine how inconvenient it must be to want a list of changed files and line numbers in order to look up changes.


--
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Education, learning resources, TEL, AR/VR/MR, CC licensed content, panoramas, interactive narrative, sectional modules (like jrDocs), lunch at Uni of Bristol. Get in touch if you share my current interests or can suggest better :)
updated by @ultrajam: 02/18/15 02:36:11AM