Developers' Blog

BuildCMS Has a Facebook Page

Tuesday 4th October 2011 8:52 AM

You can now keep up to date with the latest news, changes and upgrades to BuildCMS on our Facebook page. Hop over there now, like us, and you'll get BuildCMS news posted straight to your news stream.

www.facebook.com/pages/Build-CMS/243445422332369

Posted 8:52 AM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Quick Tools are Back! Now with Template Switcher.

Friday 23rd September 2011 1:44 PM

Some users may have noticed that BuildCMS's Quick Tools have been missing for a while. We disabled them until we could tighten up their security. But now they're back, and we've added a new, very useful tool.

In case you're not aware, Quick Tools allow you to edit your BuildCMS pages directly in the front end of your site. As long as you're logged into the back end, a small button appears at the top-right of every page. Just click it to reveal several useful tools, allowing you to, among other things, rename your page, change its menu position, move it to another section, and for standard pages, even to edit the page's content.

Read more about the original Quick Tools post. http://www.buildcms.co.uk/developers_blog/post/2297/title/new_quick_tools.htm

Template Switcher

The Quick Tools now include a new option: you can switch which template is used to display your page. Just choose whether you're changing the template just for this page, for the entire section which holds the page or the whole site.

Open the Template Switcher by clicking on this icon, . A pop-up will show:

Then it's just a case of choosing which template to use, and at what level to apply it. Either open the dropdown and click the template you want, or start typing and the dropdown will intelligently narrow down the available options.

We hope that seeing the templates you select change right before your eyes will will make it easier to perfect your site's look. Enjoy!

Posted 1:44 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

New Feature: Rename or Replace Option for Uploaded Images

Wednesday 29th June 2011 1:29 PM

Ever wanted to tweak an image on one of your BuildCMS pages? It's now much easier with a new option we have added to the Image Uploader. Now, to replace an image you don't have to find it and delete it first, you can just click the "replace" radio button and upload an image with the same name.



But don't worry. The default option is still to rename uploaded images if there's already an image with that name on the site - you won't go replacing images randomly unless you mean to.

We hope this new feature will help keeping your site fresh as easy as possible.

Posted 1:29 PM | Permalink

New Quick Tools

Friday 11th March 2011 4:25 PM

BuildCMS now boasts another great new feature - Quick Tools.

Ever wanted to make a quick change to a page? Maybe you needed to correct a spelling mistake, add a new member of staff or change a telephone number. Or needed to move a page to a different section of your site.

Now you no longer need to navigate to your tools pages to do so. If you see this button at the top-righthand corner of your screen when viewing a page, you can edit the page using Quick Tools.

Click the button and it'll open a menu bar like this:

From here you can easily do any of the following:

• Change the title of the page (or the name it appears under in the menu).
• Move the page to another section
• Move the page to another position within its current section
• Lock the page using BuildCMS's Security Groups feature

Plus you'll see extra buttons on some other pages. Standard (dynamic) pages, for instance, allow you to edit the page content while Blog pages allow you to edit posts.

Areas which can be edited are highlighted. They are outlined in a green dashed line which fills up with tranparent green when you hover the mouse over them. Click "Edit" or anywhere in the green area to open the edit popup.

Or you can click "Hide" to hide all highlighting (this will save your preference so that the highlighting will nto appear again until you turn it back on from the Quick Tools toolbar).

If you don't see the Quick Tools button, try visiting your tools pages and logging in. If you still don't see them when you return to the page in your site's front end, that type of page may not be editable. Try visiting a Standard or Blog page to try the Quick Tools out.

We hope that Quick Tools will make using BuildCMS a simpler, easier and quicker experience.

Posted 4:25 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Homebuild is Now BuildCMS

Friday 4th March 2011 4:50 PM

As you may have noticed we have rebranded Homebuild as BuildCMS over the last few days. The platform has moved on so much from its humble roots that we thought it deserved a name more fitting its current form as an advanced contact management system. Over the years we've kept pace with the best CMSs out there (in fact we were around before the term CMS was much in use) and, as BuildCMS, we plan to keep up with the cutting edge of web technology, bringing new features to our users so they never fall behind the curve.

In other news...

We have released some new search engine optimisation tools into BuildCMS. You can now add keywords and descriptions on a page-by-page basis when using Standard and Mailform Pages. Other pages will offer the same ability very soon.

Also, you can add keywords that appear in the title bar after the site name using your General Settings tools page. This can slo help boost your search engine rank and the number of visitors you receive.

So don't forget to check your Google Analytics account to see how these are helping your rankings (or just set Analytics to email you a report every month).

Posted 4:50 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Mailforms Revamped

Friday 18th February 2011 4:52 PM

Following hot on the heels of recent improvement to the Homebuild blog and gallery, we are happy to announce the release of improved mailform pages. Mailform pages are also known as contact pages; they're the pages which allow your visitors to get in touch with you.

Before describing the new features we've introduced, a word of reassurance: despite the overhaul, all existing mailform pages will continue to work, although with the newly available types of fields it's probably worth revisiting them and using the new email, website or telephone fields for those types of data.

So, what's new?

Secondary Content

Many modern sites include alternative means of getting in touch alongside a contact form. Now Homebuild does, too. You can easily add your addresses, telephone numbers, even an interactive Google Map to your mailform pages and they'll appear beside your form.

Sections

Long forms can now be divided up into sections. This makes it easier for visitors to understand your form by giving context to the fields rather than just displaying one long list. Just log into your in your tools pages, add some section breaks, choose the "blocks" format, and each section will get wrapped in its own block.

Wizards

Even more powerful than sections are wizards. Here each section is placed on a separate page. Seeing only a section at a time prevents visitors being overwhelmed. And once they have filled in the initial section, they are more likely to proceed through all the steps to complete your form. Again, creating a wizard is as simple as adding section breaks to a form and choosing the "wizard" format".

Wizards even auto-create a graphical header showing which step the user is currently on, although this can be switched to a simple message such as "2 of 6" if you prefer.

Widgets

All the fields on Homebuild mailforms are now interactive widgets. This means they can do things normal web form fields cannot. For example, many of them now check what has been entered and won't let the form be submitted until it's correct. This saves visitors from waiting for the page to reload exactly the same form when they make a mistake. Moreover, many will even give popup hints as the user types.

Widgets can also do cool things like changing names so the first letter is in upper case or popping up a calendar when a date field is clicked upon.

All in all, we've increased the number of field types from 6 to 19. Here's the full list:

• text
• password
• number
• email
• web address
• telephone
• currency
• textarea
• checkbox group
• simple dropdown
• combobox dropdown
• radio
• radio grid
• date
• time
• slider
• star rating
• upload
• captcha

Some of these should be obvious (email, web address, telephone, currency), while others will be familiar from the previous mailforms (although even they have been widgetized).

A few may need more introduction:

Combobox Dropdown

A dropdown where users can also type, narrowing the results shown as they type each letter. Very useful for long lists.

Radio Grid

Used for questionnaires, this field allows you to pose a series of questions, each with the same set of answers (often ratings such as Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Don't Care, Agree & Strongly Agree).

Slider

Users move a graphical slider along a bar containing options. This unusual field can break up the monotony of long forms, and suggest that the options are related to one another along a scale.

Star Rating

A very intuitive field. Users click to choose from one to five stars.

Captcha

Used to prevent spam. Visitors must type the word displayed in an image before the form can be submitted. Captcha stands for "Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart".

Textarea

This field has been supercharged compared to the original. It now allows you to control the height and allow users to format the text they type, for a Word-like experience.

Validation

We have made it easier to control what happens when your visitors submission is rejected. All fields now allow you enter a custom error message. And the titles above fields change colour when submission fails, making it easier to tell where the errors lie.

Security

All form data is now cleaned before being added to emails. This keeps your computer and website safe and helps reduce spam.

Fade In

Forms now fade into view when the page has loaded, providing visual impact and focussing their attention.

Stored Submissions

Want to see every response you've had to a form or to analyse the data? Now you can download an Excel spreadsheet of all your responses

Improved Tools Pages

Your tools pages now give you more information about your mailform pages, submissions and fields without having to click right through to the forms. We've even added an animated chart of recent submissions at the top of the page so you can see how your mailforms compare to one another.

As always with Homebuild, we have tried to make the new mailforms easy to use, so please feel free to explore them in your tools pages, and soup up your site with beautiful, dynamic, widgetized mailforms. And if you have any ideas for improvements, please get in touch.

Posted 4:52 PM | 1 Comments | Permalink

Simple Steps to Improve Your Google Rankings

Tuesday 15th February 2011 11:04 AM

Search engine optimisation doesn't need to be rocket science. In fact, there are some simple questions you can ask yourself to help you improve your site's rankings.

What Does Google Want From your Site?

Google wants your site to provide the best answer to a user's question. If it does you'll get the top spot in its listings. Your site needs to be the definitive resource for whatever Google's user (and your potential customer) is searching for.

Is Your Content High Quality?

You should be adding plenty of high quality content to your site on a regular basis. Google likes quantity and quality... and freshness. Google downgrades the importance of content that has been on your site for some time.

Add blog posts, how-to guides, definitions of industry terms, news from your community or industry as well as your own business, advice, spotlights. As long as it's relevant, written to a good level and would be of interest to your visitors, keep drip-feeding it into your site.

Do You Have a Niche?

Google analyses your site to discover what it is about, what it offers and whether it is relevant. This allows Google to decide if your site should be offered as an answer to a searcher's question.

To help Google, you need to ensure your content is focussed. You want the same thing as Google: for your site to appear when it's relevent to the searcher.

Before adding content, take a moment to think how it links in with your core business. Irrelevent content will actually lower your rankings, watering down your position. Use keywords (although not too much - spamming them will get you blacklisted), ensure your articles and blog posts are linked to your business or area and think around your business for areas you may not have covered.

Check What Google Thinks of You

Homebuild is integrated with Google Webmaster Tools and Google Analytics. Use these powerful tools to get suggestions for keywords, see which pages Google is pushing and which are flagging, and to monitor your popularity with Google (by seeing how many visitors they are giving you).

Posted 11:04 AM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Homebuild Gallery Update

Tuesday 18th January 2011 12:59 PM

As users of Homebuild gallery pages may have noticed, we've implemented a few improvements.

Overall the pages should be more responsive as we've made the code base more efficient.

We have also added more spam filtering to the comments. Now, as wel as the CAPTCHA validation word, you can set a spam filtering strength to check for words commonly used in spam and a maximum number of links. Spam comments often contain many links so by rejecting any with too many, you can weed out the fake comments from the real ones.

Finally, we've cleaned up the interface. It should now mesh better with your site, and it contains several widgets to give a more modern, interactive experience (try adding a comment on a catalogue-style gallery...).

We hope you find the improvements useful and, as always, if you have any suggestions, please get in touch.

Posted 12:59 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Homebuild Integrates With Social Networks

Tuesday 23rd November 2010 2:06 PM

Users of Blog and News pages will notice we have upgraded the social networking links on these pages.

No longer are you stuck with a dreary row of confusing icons. Your visitors will now see a dynamic social networking element which allows them to "like" the page (on Facebook), Tweet it, Digg it, email it or use one of many other social networking and bookmarking services, including some which didn't even exist last time the social networking element was updated (we're looking at you Google Buzz and the all-new MySpace).

Harness the power of social networking and let your visitors market your site for you. All you have to do now is give them something to share.

Posted 2:06 PM | 0 Comments | Permalink

Homebuild Update 1.8

Tuesday 22nd December 2009 1:11 PM

Our latest upgrade to the Homebuild system has mostly concentrated on improving Homebuild's performance. To accomplish this we have made improvements throughout the platform Homebuild runs on as well as to Homebuild itself.

We have upgraded the Homebuild servers to the latest hardware, upgraded the operating system, upgraded PHP (the computer-programming language Homebuild it written in), added various technologies to cache and speed up Homebuild pages; we have even upgraded our connection to the internet to allow for massive amounts of bandwidth without Homebuild slowing down.

Which all contributes to a massive 200% - 300% speed boost for Homebuild!

As well as the usual under-the-hood improvements, there are some notable additions to Homebuild itself inthis update.

Homebuild Shop: Google Base Integration

Shop owners are now able to have their products appear in Google search results. By adding your products to a Google service called Base, your products can now appear alongside others in Google's shopping results (just hit the "Shopping" tab when searching in Google).

Shop: Expanding Menu

Previously, customers navigated the shop by clicking into categories and products in the main listing. This allowed the maximum screen space to be given over to products. We have added a second option, however. Shops can now include an expanding side menu, allowing customers to quickly "drill down" through their categories to find the product they want. Existing shop owners wishing to include this new option may require a new template for their shop to allow for the reduced space left for product listings. Contact us and we'll talk you through your options.

Google Analytics: Track Downloads

You can now see which files your visitors are downloading in Google Analytics (previously you could only see which pages they looked at).

Better Tooltip Popups for News and RSS Pages

We have implemented a new type of popup for calendar-style news and RSS reader pages, bringing a fresher look and more reliable positioning to your pages.

Although, we have tested the new setup thoroughly, with such a massive overhaul, some bugs may have slipped through. If you find any problems, please let us know immediately and we'll fix them.

Posted 1:11 PM | Permalink