investigating Non-Developers Guide to Customizing Jamroom

Just now I noticed the following Youtube video:

"Developers Guide to Customizing Jamroom"

For those of us living in the parallel universe, the following would be VERY useful:

"Non-Developers Guide to Customizing Jamroom"

There is already lot that can be done without knowing and using css, but the information has not been systematically arranged in one place (though it is mostly findable, within Jamroom).

Of course, what can be done without css is limited, but that's OK. In fact, that's the point. We are looking for maximum flexibility with maximum ease, not the infinite flexiblity that (god-like) developers can work with.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 09/03/15 11:40:17PM

When i hear "maximum flexibility with maximum ease" it strikes me sort of like "High quality, inexpensive, and fast"- pick two out of three.

The more control and flexibility you seek, the less 'ease' comes into play, because 'ease' implies that the options are pre-selected and laid out for you, purposely limited so it's less confusing for a non-coder. Where does one draw the line between flexibility and ease?- the line would be drawn in a different place for each person.

For me as a non-coder, my journey involved months of getting my bearings on this platform, learning and reading how to tweak this, adjust that, pick colors, create header links, change 'order by' lists...not 'developer stuff' by any means, but very empowering tips nonetheless. Stuff I can use in modifying and running my site.
The other tool is to ask for help on specific tweaks or changes for your site. There is no 'here is how you do everything without using SiteBuilder' guide- it would have to be a War and Peace saga of EPIC length.
I found it vital to just keep a big notebook and organize my lists of things I need to tweak or change on my site...and I then focus on one or two aspects at a time in a certain order. Just speaking from my own experiences so far over my 8 month Jamroom journey so far. I still feel like a baby in terms of coding, but I can do a lot of simple things on my site now and I know a whole lot more about what's 'under the hood' than I did when i started. It's an ongoing process for me that will likely never end. That's not necessarily a bad thing.


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

It is very hard for developers to speak in non technical terms at times, if any such documentation was to be drawn up it would need to start with the community. The ones that are learning the system will be able to explain their methods. People could use their blog on here to communicate their development ups and downs as I do, but I am alone in that here.

Personally given the amount of tutorials available on html/css and smarty documentation, not even mentioning the two Jamroom courses on Udemy there is plenty. Jamroom team should continue doing what they are doing.

Some of the modules could do with being explained a bit more however.
updated by @garymoncrieff: 07/17/15 01:15:28PM

Perhaps one way around the problem is for JR or someone working with JR to build a series of template sites that demonstrate some of the range of what can be done with JR, from simple to complex, e.g.:

Minimal interactive
1. A text library site, with searchable catalogue, and a single tier of membership.
2. A music library site, with searchable catalogue, and a single tier of membership.
3. A video library site, with searchable catalogue, and a single tier of membership.
4. A photo library site, with searchable catalogue, and a single tier of membership.

Maximum interactive
5. A subject-focussed site, with forums and pages for several sub-categories, and profile options that allow members to set up different profiles in each sub-category.

A sales site
6. Single company website with searchable forum for interaction with customers, a searchable sales catalogue, and a sales page.
7. Multiple company site, each with independent searchable forum for interaction with customers, a searchable sales catalogue, and a sales page.

In each case, the same site could be shown with (a) the basic JR look, and (b) a fully-styled version.

The above set of templates could then be remixed by users according a 7! matrix, i.e. using the templates in 7x6x5x4x3x2 different combinations. One potential high-value customer group for JR sites may be large museums that want to develop interactive multi-media databases that showcase collections and allow visitors to submit information and ask questions. On top of this, all the content needs to have machine searchable URLs that allow individual museums to integrate their content with other museums, while retaining control over their own content. I think JR can support all of this, but it would need a JR developer to work with a museum systems developer to build and demonstrate this. Perhaps a company museum like the Toyota Company Museum could sponsor this kind of development work.

I agree that the present small JR development team has more fundamental work to be busy with, but ultimately, the user-friendly presentation of options is what non-developers need to see in order to judge if they want to use JR.

With templates, it is possible to have a page explaining exactly how each site is constructed, and to have a systematically constructed set for display, as a JR shopfront. This is different from the unexplained variety of existing JR sites that are currently displayed as examples at JR.


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PJ Matthews, Kyoto
Migrated from Ning 2.0. Now at Jamroom 6 beta and using Jamroom Hosting for The Research Cooperative (researchcooperative.org)
updated by @researchcooperative: 07/17/15 09:30:46PM