Who am I?

I have been working with webdevelopment off and on, mostly on for about 8 years now. I follow closely CSS, xhtml, Accessibility Guidelines and Web Standards. I am a member of the Web Standards Group and work to bring sites up to those standards for future compatability. Took two years off work eight years ago to take the Microsoft Systems Engineers course, and an additional year college upgrade.

Not a programmer, though I am comfortable digging in and making changes in small ways and figuring out stuff. I end up making changes that work "somehow".

I have spent a LOT of time redesigning Movable Type to NOT look like a blog for business use, now trying to design a TWiki that is a blog. Go figure. lol

What can I do?

Templates and style issues mostly, I basically consider myself a webdeveloper/designer. I have for almost two years now been redesigning stylesheets and the templates for Movable Type and other programs. I am comfortable taking templates apart and redesigning them, even adding code from other applications and hacking it in to work.

ie: New Topic on my twiki site was removed from tigerskin and the template, cgi program and code was added into my new ones, then the site and templates redesigned to match an Expression Engine site.

An existing TWiki program was torn apart and redesigned as a one web simple twiki. I then integrated it completely with Movable Type with new templates and stylesheets. Anil Dash of Six Apart calls it the best MT Wiki integration he has ever seen. I would like this to be an MT Addon for fee release with part of the proceeds going to twiki org if possible.

I also work/belong with the developers network at Movable Type on a limited membership level only, and belong to the Canadian Association of Journalists. Brice Dunwoodie of CMSwire is asking me to do some articles for the magazine on some of this which would be good promotion.

Aside from the Movable Type integration I am also working on a twiki version only along similar lines, and working on navigational issues and menu/topic organization. In my free time I try to convince my wife I'm not addicted to it all.

Why do I want to do it?

I seem to be addicted to TWiki ;-), which is growing, the liking part of it. Partly as a result of taking the MCSE course, and knowing what is available I see TWiki as the most advanced system available with a LOT of potential.

I have a vision of it being also available to the average Joe with very limited skill set as a one web - simplified TWiki that can be downloaded and installed in minutes on any webserver by almost anyone with ftp access. A personal edition and a small business edition would follow this line.

ftp upload these files to server, change these six lines path, chmod these files, Done. Happy twikiing. Add what you like for plugins. addons and content after you are used to it from TWiki org.

I would like to see a set of styles that can be added on to change layout and appearance by changing the stylesheet only. Not changing templates and all with a complex skin install. As per W3C recomendations, this would entail a further separation of content and structure from style. Perhaps "Themes" based on Patternskin.

I see myself as an idea man, looking at things from a simpler perspective from the viewpoint of common sense and simplicity. Site motto is:

Simplicity by Design

If you want a REAL Wiki - get TWiki.

-- BruceRProchnau - 16 Apr 2005

I think you have a lot to bring to TWiki. I am looking forward to work with you.

-- ArthurClemens - 16 Apr 2005

I also support Bruce's application.

-- MartinCleaver - 16 Apr 2005

I spoke with Bruce on TWikiIRC last night. I fully support his "application" (really, we've prodded him into getting SVN access)

-- WillNorris - 16 Apr 2005

We need more people with Bruce's perspective. Programmmers grow on trees, but people with style are a rare commodity.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 16 Apr 2005

I do have one request of Bruce though... in the recent conversations, it was often difficult to get through what is actually being proposed... for example, while the site http://www.bkdesign.ca/twiki3 has been mentioned many times as an example of a trimmed down twiki, it still is not clear what actually was trimmed and what other changes had to be made to generate this site. When participating in this collaborative effort, one needs to aim to clearly spell out proposals...

-- ThomasWeigert - 16 Apr 2005

I agree Thomas, completely. I have realized that to be of a help I have to make changes to my approach. Before it was a lone ranger thing, and the above site only the idea. I didn't at that time have the idea of actually taking part on codev. Doing so will mean new ways, rules, and clarity, and a positive approach. I don't know who put this request in, it wasn't me, but maybe is the best approach. Up to you guys really.

-- BruceRProchnau - 16 Apr 2005

Bruce, what precisely did you mean in MinimalistTWiki when you said "I didnt request it someone put my name in." Where you referring to BruceRProchnauWouldLikeToCheckIn?

-- ThomasWeigert - 17 Apr 2005

Yes I was

-- BruceRProchnau - 17 Apr 2005

But http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/Codev/BruceRProchnauWouldLikeToCheckIn?rev=1.1 shows BruceRProchnau as the author of this topic...

Am I misunderstanding "I did not request it" or is there something wrong with the rcs archives on twiki.org?

-- ThomasWeigert - 17 Apr 2005

All I meant was that I didnt start the Topic request. Someone else put it in. I seen it, so filled it out. This topic, the one here. Sorry if I didn't clarify more.

-- BruceRProchnau - 17 Apr 2005

I rolled around the floor for a while, laughing at us all, when I finally figured out what happened

On DevelopBranch, there's a simple piece of TML, (

[[%SCRIPTURL%/edit/%WEB%/%WIKINAME%WouldLikeToCheckIn?templatetopic=TWikiContributorWouldLikeToCheckInTopicTemplate&topicparent=%TOPIC%&t=%SERVERTIME{$hou$min$sec}%][Create %WIKINAME%WouldLikeToCheckIn]]

either way, personally, I've been trying to get you to volunteer, so I'm all for it

-- SvenDowideit - 17 Apr 2005

heh, that is funny i moved that text to the "Want to take part in development?" section to hopefully make it less confusing.

-- WillNorris - 17 Apr 2005

*shrug*, that piece of TML is really basic stuff. It really isn't necessary to have write access to SVN in order to support the development, cause there are enough patch monkeys around.

-- FranzJosefSilli - 17 Apr 2005

Speak for yourself, matey - I'm a patch baboon I am.
-- CrawfordCurrie - 17 Apr 2005

Crawford, you are wrong. You are one of the great twiki heroes... it only feels like a patch baboon at times...

Sven, impressive detective work....

Will, that little query in "Further CodevCommunity members with access" is misleading. It lists every topic with the name ending in "WouldLikeToCheckInTopic" whether there is indeed access or not. We might want to put something into these topics so that we can really pick out only those that should be listed....

-- ThomasWeigert - 17 Apr 2005

On this topic, why don't we let Bruce finish his current work on http://www.bkdesign.ca/twiki3 (in particular, the documentation and explanations of how one achieves such integration and simplifications) first? Usually, we want to see some contributions (code, patches, applications, plugins, documentation, requirements documents, etc.) before opening up the develop branch. There is a lot of work one can do with read-access to SVN (which everybody has).

By the way, http://www.bkdesign.ca/twiki3 looks very nice as a design. But we need to be able to clearly communicate how one can realize this design before it really becomes a contribution... We also need to separate out the php on that site from the twiki before it really is usefull to the twiki community...

Anyway, I am excited about the prospect of seeing Bruce's contributions. But let's hold off with SVN write until there is a demonstrated need for it...

-- ThomasWeigert - 17 Apr 2005

BruceRProchnauWouldLikeToCheckIn is not a topic I started nor asked for. I don't need any kind of access.

-- BruceRProchnau - 17 Apr 2005

Would Someone please delete this topic?

-- BruceRProchnau - 18 Apr 2005

Would Someone please delete this topic? Thank you to those in support.

-- BruceRProchnau - 18 Apr 2005

Bruce, I will be good to have you on the team... so why don't you just leave the topic active... if you really want to delete it, the TWiki way is to move it into the Trash web...

-- ThomasWeigert - 18 Apr 2005

bruce can't move the page to the Trash web because he's not listed in TWikiCommunityGroup; i tried to add him, but that page has edit restrictions.

bruce, please don't delete this page. i'm sure we'll be back here at some point

-- WillNorris - 18 Apr 2005

Its ok, thank you to all supporting this. It will be great to work with such a great bunch of guys. I have already learned a lot from you all, and its appreciated. I like what I see in TWiki'e future.

-- BruceRProchnau - 18 Apr 2005

Bruce, I added you to the TWikiCommunityGroup, welcome again to the community!

-- PeterThoeny - 31 Aug 2005