[Zope] Invitation To Brag, Boast, or Simply State Solutions with Zope

[Jonathan Cyr]

This is a Brag, forgive me for the rambling, just getting it out there...

Here's my project...

I've been working on my project, around my consulting gig, for 2 
years... It's called WeddingWeblog.com, and yep its an automated Weblog, 
and wedding event management system.

It's a weblog designed for newbies, rather than the IT geek & journalist 
audience that regular weblogs serve. I've made it feel more like a 
scrapbook or diary, than a weblog.  It handles events, gift registries, 
RSVPs, and photo galleries and more.

I had been watching Zope for a year, in my previous corporate life, just 
itching for an excuse to use it... When the company restructured and 
moved IT ops... I moved to my own consulting business... App Hosting, 
WebSphere Mgmt, etc. and I got started with Zope.

I started out on Zope 2.6.1, on WinXP on my laptop, then migrated to a 
separate server system, still WinXP, and kept up with Zope through 2.7.  
I got a VerizonWireless Broadband card on my laptop, and between Zope 
TTW & HomeSite 5 FTP features, was able to develop anywhere, and did.  
This Zope TTW freedom allowed me to sit in my car at my favorite 
lighthouse, and code days at a time.  (Beavertail Light, Jamestown, RI, USA)

As I finished development last week... I moved the environment to Suse 
9.1/2.6 kernel on generic 3Ghz Athlon boxes, set up ZEO on Zope 2.7.2.  
The system is based on two Python Products, and about a dozen custom 
ZClasses.  The only add-ons that I've used are Formulator, which allowed 
me to create beautiful validated wizards in my ZClass components, with 
robust error messages for newbies...  I've used PIL, raw to process 
photos on upload, anti-aliasing in 1.4 works great... VarImage for 
making custom on-the-fly thumbnails for the photo galleries, as well as 
for on-the-fly importation into Flash-based scrapbook photo-collages 
(Photo & Photo Folder would not manipulate a PIL-generated image, 
VarImage is better for my needs)... and ZEO, because, if I need more 
horsepower, I can just throw boxes at the problem.

I didn't use CMF because, at the time, I needed to abstract this one 
level out.  The system needed to create whole weddings on-the-fly, and 
CMF seemed to need a person to create the instance, as well as the added 
complexity of CMF wasn't needed for this project.

My background is varied, Having an Engineering degree, my experience has 
taken me into Marketing, Web Design, Software Design, Graphic Design, 
DBA, and on.... Jack of All Trades, Master of None... in a good way.  A 
Team of One.  Every bit was done by me.

I've integrated some Flash pieces and some client-side Java applets into 
Zope.  My Flash photo collages allow users to zoom and scale photos in 
custom multiple photo frames.... I've used a 3rd party applet called 
JUpload, which provides photo uploads in a drag n' drop multiple photo 
tool....  I've used Microsoft's  EOT, Embedded OpenType fonts to enhance 
the romance of the weddings, using formal, calligraphy, and handwriting 
fonts especially licensed for embedding.

I like these Zope features and why...

DTML - Being an HTML/CSS expert in a text editor, DTML provided 
everything I needed early on, and ZPT's ability to use WYSIWIG tools 
removed control, rather than adding it.

ZEO - I read some great thoughts on the Zope list, comparing Java 
strategies or .Net strategies to Zope... Zope is a little slower, but 
with ZEO, you scale so easily, who cares... just throw boxes at it... slick.

TTW - Through the Web management of the site is awesome, I can remotely 
make changes anywhere... being a team of one, this flexibility is fantastic

ZClasses - I like ZClasses, the concept is sound, and works nicely for 
simply constructs... If you try to make them do things they're not made 
for... problems arise... but they work great as website component 
objects for my project.

Nightmare Components for me

- Photo and Photo Folder - Great tools for Zope, one problem... if you 
modify a JPeG with PIL, these components can't use them... Used VarImage 
instead and added Photo Folder features.

- FSCounter - As I upgraded Zopes from 2.6 to 2.7.2... FSCounter broke 
everywhere, stripped it out... oh well

- TransparentFolder - Tried this early, wanted to move like scripts into 
organized folders.... Great idea, evidently not sustainable as Zope 
versions increased.  Stripped it out, after much pain.

Anyway, I hope this little brag helps folks see what I've done with 
Zope.... and anyone getting married, give me a shout, we'll work out a 
special Zope user deal.  We're just getting started on the marketing... 
so I've got no numbers or success yet... will report back.

Thanks for the brag, who's next,

-Jon Cyr
 WeddingWeblog.com
 cyrj at cyr.info