There is a very interesting proposal/debate going on on the Smart-Thinker Forums regarding the leveraging of multiple customer's buying power to pay for Sponsored Enhancements (Crowdsourcing) to increase the Smart-Thinker productivity output.

The basic idea is that a list of estimates is done for all major feature requests. Customers can then "bid" to sponsor a feature and have a say in the specification and requirements for the feature. When the full amount for the project is reached and the majority of project sponsors agree on the spec and deliverables then the enhancement is developed. The majority once again must sign it off for it to be accepted. The full detail of the proposal can be found Read More »

The Smart-Thinker Social Networking Product Suite allows you to integrate any 3rd party module with the profile feed. As of UserProfile version 4.3.14, the popular Ventrian News Article module (version 0.7.17+) now publishes events to the profile feed. It also integrates with the Ifinity Google Sitemap Provider so you can output a list of all your profiles to your Google Sitemap (more on that later).

Here is an example of a poker blog that was commented on by this

As of UserProfile 4.3.12, any module can now publish event actions to the StoryFeed view (have a look at this profile on PokerDIY (bottom right) if you have not seen the feed). For example, if you had a Gallery module you could publish an event whenever someone uploads a new picture, or if you had a News article you could send an event whenever an article was published or approved. Hopefully by the time this blog is posted the Ventrian News Article module will be published events to the Smart-Thinker UserProfile feed.

Do you use CodeSmith and the original DNNJungle C# templates to generate your DAL for your DotNetNuke Modules?

We've made some small changes to keep them up to date with the core changes, the main enhancment being the addition of the IHydratable Interface in the Info object. You can download our C# template set from our Free DotNetNuke Downloads page.

This module allows users to create private or public groups of users. Groups can be public and joinable or closed to new membership, and the group owner can decide if new members require approval or not. Users can search groups by Category, Country or freetext tags. If the group allows new members then they can join the group. The group owner can send Private Messages to the group or invite groups to Events. This module was based loosely on the MySpace and Facebook Groups implementation.

 See the Poker Groups on PokerDIY for an example of an implementation (here is an example of a Alabama poker group).

The new version of the UserProfile module mainly has SEO enhancements and bugfixes. Before upgrading, please read this post about the CSS changes and what you need to do. This version is neccessary if you are using the Wall module 4.3.2

You can see it in action on PokerDIY (feel free to set up an account to test) or you can download a trial version here.

Objective: I wanted to customize the look of the FCK Editor on PokerDIY and allow users to select poker card icons as custom smileys in all modules that use the Rich HTML Editor, for example, Private Messages, the Poker Forums (in particular) and on all Wall posts (for example on Poker Player Profiles and Event Walls).
After reading my web usability book ("Read More »

I have recently implemented Google Translate tools on PokerDIY so that you can browse the site in a few different languages (apparently everyone plays poker these days!) and I thought I would mention it as not everyone knows about this great translation service. Go to PokerDIY and click on the flags in the top right corner to view the site in another language.

I do plan on doing a full-blown multi-lingual site one day when I can afford the cost of a translation service and have the time to implement it, but there are a LOT of poker FAQs and help text that would be expensive to translate and maintain (every upgrade and site change would require a new translation and documenting the change - it's a management nightmare). I therefore decided t Read More »

The Smart-Thinker Wall module allows you to attach a Facebook-style Wall to a Group, Event, UserProfile or other entity. This allows users to collaborate, discuss or simply leave comments (It is not designed to replace the Forums module).This was a sponsored enhancement/project and is based loosely on the Facebook Wall design and is fully templatable/localisable so you can change the look and feel to match your site.

To see this module in action, have a look at my PokerDIY profile, this Read More »

I often get asked how best to integrate the Smart-Thinker Product Suite with a Gallery module. I also get a lot of requests to write a gallery module as part of the UserProfile module, but I dislike reinventing the wheel and prefer to concentrate on integration with a dedicated gallery solution.

I recently had this very requirement myself on PokerDIY and have implemented the UltraMediaGallery 5 module with the Smart-Thinker UserProfile module (as mentioned in the UMG UserGuide) and it really is a great looking match.