By toddgator on

I am looking for a database / CMS for a project that I run called CoverBase. It is an online database of free CD cover art (see http://www.toddalbert.com/cover_art for an example) for live music. The site whould allow users to do the following:

  1. Enter new covers, including Band, Date, Venue, URL, designer, and possibly upload a thumbnail and the covers themselves
  2. search for covers based on any of the items above (band, date, etc.)
  3. browse covers by on any of the items above (band, date, etc.)
  4. rate the covers (voting system, or stars)
  5. report dead links
  6. comment on covers

Is this a job for Flexinodes? Is there some other opensource solution? I have been using Drupal on my personal site, but I have no experience with Flexinodes, and I can't really see how to impliment my needs for CoverBase in Drupal.

Also, I'd like to import the THOUSANDS of covers alread in a MySQL database into the new CMS.

Your help is GREATLY appreciated!

Thanks,
Todd

http://www.toddalbert.com/

⋅ Categories: Drupal 4.7.x

Comments

tclineks’s picture

tclineks commented

Most of what you describe here is offered with flexinode+others without touching any code.

You may eventually want modifications outside the scope of flexinode/other modules and then you can roll your own (which is easy) for additional control and flexibility.

A promising note is that the later data processing (batch exporting or the like) is easy with flexinode's table layout/relationships.

While stock Drupal+modules only gives you 95% that's likely better than other setups and further, its design allows you to accomplish the last 5 in a beautiful manner. I don't think you'll be disappointed choosing Drupal.

toddgator’s picture

toddgator commented

Thanks. I just saw http://www.activefarming.com/classifieds-for-drupal which seems to offer a step-by-step approach for those looking at how to setup Flexinodes. I haven't read the directions yet, but their classifieds gives a sample of the search options I want. I'm still not sure how to accomplish #1 without risking security. I'll have to use Captcha, or some sort of spam protection.

As for choosing Drupal, I am happy with it for my personal site (which is much more diverse than a simple blog), but I also am hoping that there is something out there that is better for the particular needs of Coverbase. Also, I really like the AJAX elegance of a CMS like Typo. I can't wait for Drupal to catch up.

Any other suggestions??

Cheers,
Todd

http://www.toddalbert.com

tclineks’s picture

tclineks commented

I haven't developed with TYPO so I can't comment on ease/cleanliness of such an endeavor.

The project sounds like Drupal would fit it perfectly. I doubt you'd hear non-Drupal suggestions with such a question on these forums =)

toddgator’s picture

toddgator commented

True that I won't likely get too many suggestions for other CMS, I just thought someone might know of another solution that might work. I've been trying all day, and I can't seem to get Drupal to do what I need it to for Coverbase. For example, do all nodes *have* to have a title? This is frustrating.

Thanks,
Todd

http://www.toddalbert.com

Folkert’s picture

Folkert commented

did you look at the category module and helper modules like category_menu, category_display etc etc.
Does have a confusing setup but if you are 'in there' it's pretty powerfull and should be very capable of dealing with your Coverbase

toddgator’s picture

toddgator commented

You're right... Category looks promising, but it is actually confusing things at the moment.

What I want is this:

  1. A simple form for users to enter a cover (band, date, venue, designer, URL, thumbnail)
  2. Pages will display these "nodes" in a table or list format
  3. Sorting and searching should be available by band, date, venue, designer, URL, and vote ranking
  4. Browsing by Band, Year, and Designer should also be an option

The Flexinode module seems to allow me to do #1 above, but the form is not simple. For example, what does the user enter for "Title", a required field that I did not add to my Flexinode, but is hard-coded into Drupal for all node types. It also seems to allow me to do #2 with a little bit of tweaking. I am not yet sure how easily #3 can be done.

The category module seems to make #4 above a snap. I can create categories for each band and each year (although all users would need to be able to create their own categories as they add new bands, etc. I've created a category heirarchy, such as:

  • Grateful Dead
    • 1966
    • 1967
    • 1968
    • 1969
    • ...
    • 1995

Each year then displays the number of nodes within it.

The problems are that (1) the category module does not seem to recognize Flexinodes as nodes, and (2) when flexinodes are listed, they are listed by Title, the one asset that I don't want them to have! I suppose I just need to change "Title" to "Date".

Any other advice or suggestions on getting this to work?? Any examples of something similar??

Thanks,
Todd

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toddgator’s picture

toddgator commented

This is far from perfect, but it is getting there. I am using Flexinode to enter the URL and thumbnail, and using taxonomy to free tag the designer, band, and location. I used the locale module to change the Title to Date. This works great for entering data. Now I just need to figure out how best to display it. Using the flexinode tables is good, but I will need a taxonomy list of some sort, like a list of bands, a list of designers, etc.

Thanks for your help so far!
-Todd

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