Having clients create their blogposts in something like Macdown, for me, has proven ultimately pointless. As in the end I spend more time fixing the miskates than it would take to just do it for them. Indeed, even I make the odd mistake creating them in Macdown, and I’m brilliant ;-)
But don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Markdown is brilliant to use, even for complete techie newbies. My go-to client-side blogging tool at the moment is Alloy, which using a really nice (from my POV) online markdown editor. i have a lot of clients using it, all get along fine once I’ve done a short(ish) how-to Zoom session with them.
Personally, I’d rather see a Markdown editor from end for P2 than any other type, as I’m personally a big fan of MD, and I feel it’s easy for technophiles to pick up.
Sorry, but I beg to disagree. The whole point of Markdown and Repo posts is the simple lightweight application code and ultimate simplicity. I think the suggestions here are misplaced and perhaps a CMS is really needed, where a full set of characters can be used and the post formatting can be fine tuned?
Personally, I am really not great with any sort of code, as many will know, and I have very few issues with creating posts in Markdown with Repo or any other editor. My issues always relate to saving posts outside the main folder.
My way of working is very simple: never create a new post from scratch, simply duplicate an existing post. change the title, post date and insert the post text. I am inserting pictures, links and it works reliably. Even my dumbest, most technophobe client has managed basic text posts successfully on her psychology blog.
Perhaps a suggestion for your clients @Gianluca : a simple template that is easy to change and save with a new name every time a new post is needed? Perhaps we could ask @Jannis if there is a way of creating / using a template in Repo, without it appearing in the post list?
They are not my clients, everything I do is always and only free (for passion) for friends (and I have many friends).
Duplicating is not a professional way of working, but a trick to remedy an existing problem. Already suggested, but write to the Repository editor as it is now, let’s say you could write 4 lines, not a nice post. It is too limited.
LOL. My “worst” client using the online markdown editor for an Alloy blog is also a Psychologist, but even she “get’s it”.
I have a few clients in this sector, and they are by far the worst when it comes to anything techie. What is about them? They can understand the human mind, but fall apart when it comes to anything to do with online!
This is way more than 4 lines 😉 and half of my other of my blog posts were written in Markdown, with Repo. I love the way that Markdown posts seamlessly integrate with P2 created posts.
I have written many freehand, but duplicating is a much quicker way of working. I genuinely think that the system works fine for its intended users but CMS is probably the way forward for most non-techie friends / clients.
First of all, thank you all for your interest. I am really happy about this. I would like to elaborate on the current situation and planning.
Obviously, I am very behind schedule, because of personal reasons (nothing bad 😊). It is getting better and I have more time again. I will be able to dedicate all my development time on this soon after one other update.
Regarding Markdown: In contradiction what I’ve said before, I will not create a Markdown editor for Poster 2. Why? On the one hand side, it would not get much better than the current Repository text editor with markdown file type selection. It’s pretty handy to duplicate an existing post and use this a template for a new one. I do the same for my own blog. On the other hand, Markdown has some clear disadvantages regarding layout and advanced image related tasks. Personally I think Markdown is just a workaround for something I would like to use by myself.
I will concentrate on a simple to use but professional rich online editor I already invested in. I won’t share more information about this for now, but its awesome 🤩
With this, the update will be more than just an online editor for posts. You can image where I am heading to. This update will come with a small update cost. But you will get much more than you have now. The good thing: No migration needed like between P1 and P2 👍
With this said, again, sorry it takes so long. I am looking forward to what will come. I will invite you as soon as possible to an early beta.
Hej Jurgen, so you are not experiencing any problems with users not being able to deal with MD and Repository?
I ask because I had to skip a blog solution based on Poster 2, Repository, and MD because they were unable to even fathom such simple things. That entire site I had to redo with WP and it is one of the worst experiences I ever had. And time-consuming because of my lack of understanding of how WP works. I also had to crawl up the steep learning curve for Oxygen, the builder I used. Time I could not charge these people for. My Goodness.
Yes, of course, I do face issues with users, but compared to my WP experience it’s less stressful… I gave up working with WP because of a number of problems, among them the some in regard to unexperienced users wanting to do everything on their own: editing, creating new pages, uploading images etc. etc. However, this often ended up in a mess which I had to clean up afterwards ;-)
Now, I produce and provide video manuals explaining every step in detail - this helps a lot. I place them in a read-only folder of the repository allowing to be viewed but not deleted by the end user. So, every time I get request by a user, I refer to the video dealing with the issue. Most of my clients appreciated this kind of service.
Meanwhile, after 10 years or so, I completely moved away from WP. I’m happy with what Stacks has to offer.
No. And most probably it won’t arrive until Stacks App comes out. I didn’t decide until now if I want to release it on RWC or not. You’ll be one of the first being informed 👍