Bending the ExpressionEngine Control Panel

Often we have an opportunity to spend more time customising the client’s ExpressionEngine control panel experience. At EEUK13 I walked through examples on how to make the largely underused ExpressionEngine Dashboard a useful stop for your clients, using available add-ons and creating custom widgets for others. I also went through case studies on various other customisations created specifically for clients in the control panel.

Presented at EEUK2013 17th of May, 2013 http://eeuk.org/

Resources available here http://johnhenry.ie/articles/bending-the-expressionengine-control-panel

Transcript

1. ⚙ Bending the ExpressionEngine control panel ⌂ JOHN HENRY DONOVAN EEUK.13
2. Introduction
3. I create, therEfore I am
4. data info knowledge + +
5. data info knowledge
6. BRIEFLY ABOUT ME
7. HELLO, I’m @Johnhenry_ie
8. ‣ Client Aftercare ‣ Documentation ‣ Training ‣ A Post Launch Review ‣ Adding instructions to your EE fields ‣ Adding 404s, optimising performance, browser testing ‣ Adding something that you know will help the client in the future ‣ Providing the client with useful data and info The Extra Mile
9. contemplate the client’s long term solution rather than the fast sell
10. BENDING
11. THE PITCH
12. WHAT WINS YOU A CLIENT?
13. Never Say WordPress When Selling a Web Design Project http://speckyboy.com/2013/04/18/never-say-wordpress-when-selling-a-web-design-project/
14. “We spend as much time creating a customised user experience on the front-end as we do the back- end of your website.”
15. See how long you can go without mentioning ExpressionEngine
16. themes
17. Republic cp theme simple and clean, responsive theme with high resolution and custom made icons http://dvt.ee/repthme Republic FACTORY
18. SASSY-CP THEME Built on the sass css preprocessor. extends the default theme, cleans some rough edges and improves user experience. http://dvt.ee/adIcOnr kyle cotter
19. nerdery THEME removes all pink, reduces the rounded corners and cleans up some general alignment/padding/margin issues. http://dvt.ee/nerdcp brian litzinger
20. NSM Override css Adds consistency, improved contrast and great user experience. 10 different colour themes http://dvt.ee/adKp6CG leevi graham
21. Minimalist optimised user interface for EE. improves accessibility and includes a night mode http://dvt.ee/ad1hC3G Seamus Holman
22. responsive cp makes the control panel work better on mobile devices and also allows you to add your logo to footer of cp http://dvt.ee/adFoOtJ ben croker
23. add-ons
24. CP ANALYTICS Display your GOOGLE ANALYTICS Statistics in the control panel using an accessory tab, widescreen homepage line chart and dashEE widget http://dvt.ee/adrLHya derek hogue
25. republic ANALYTICS Display google analytics charts and the stats right in the control panel http://dvt.ee/adzhL3O republic labs
26. ZOO flexible admin Lets you fully customise the control panel per member group. Create more intuitive menus http://dvt.ee/flxadmn Expressionengine zoo
27. STRUCTURE Lets you create pages, generate navigation and manage content through a simple interface. http://dvt.ee/ad07TrP Travis Schmeisser & Jack mcDade
28. REpublic STRUCTURE tweaks Some tweaks for structure to make it better without messing with it. http://dvt.ee/structtwk republic FACTORY
29. ZENBU VERY powerful entry list manager and replaces EE’s EDIT CHannel entries. Searching and filtering options http://dvt.ee/zenbu NICOLAS BOTTARI
30. SUPERFISH EE CONTROL PANEL Adds superfish hover intent to the ee cONTROL panel http://dvt.ee/sprfsh JOEL BIRCH
31. dashee dashee is a fully customisable expressionengine control panel dashboard alternative http://dvt.ee/adp1DuG chris monnat
32. WHAT IS A DASHBOARD?
33. A document presenting the most significant information about a subject on a single page - Collins English Dictionary http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/dashboard
34. EXPRESSIONENGINE DASHBOARD
35. A document presenting the most significant information about a subject on a single page - Collins English Dictionary http://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/dashboard
36. CMS DASHBOARD DESIGN
37. DRUPAL DASHBOARD
38. Joomla DASHBOARD
39. Pyrocms DASHBOARD
40. Concrete5 DASHBOARD
41. WordPress DASHBOARD
42. CRAFT DASHBOARD
43. SENSE-MAKING
44. Sense-making is the study of how to make sense out of what is going on
45. All data and information is global all knowledge is local
46. The EE DASHBOARD
47. EXPRESSIONENGINE DASHBOARD
48. PMachine DASHBOARD
49. EE1.x DASHBOARD
50. EXPRESSIONENGINE DASHBOARD
51. DASH-ee
52. dashee dashee is a fully customisable expressionengine control panel dashboard alternative http://dvt.ee/adp1DuG chris monnat
53. DEMO
54. SETTINGS
55. DASHEE SETTINGS
56. DASHEE SETTINGS CHOOSE NUMBER OF COLUMNS TO SHOW ON DASHBOARD
57. DASHEE SETTINGS Save Multiple layouts with load functionality
58. DASHEE SETTINGS Use a different layout for different member groups. Lock layout functionality to stop users editing widgets or moving widget layout
59. WIDGETS
60. dashee DEFAULT WIDGETS ‣ Blank Widget – empty widget whose title and content can be configured using widgets settings ‣ EE Create Links – create links as seen on default EE CP home ‣ RSS Feed Reader – configurable to read any valid RSS feed ‣ EE Modify Links – modify links as seen on default EE CP home ‣ New Members – shows 10 most recent EE website members ‣ Recent Entries – shows 10 most recent EE entries ‣ EE View Links – view links as seen on default EE CP Home ‣ dashEE Welcome – welcome widget with links to further resources
61. Creating a simple widget Create a new widget file called wgt.simple_widget.php Place in /expressionengine/third_party/dashee/widgets/
62. Creating a simple widget Create a class called Wgt_simple_widget in your file. Each widget must have at least a title variable and a function called index
63. Creating a simple widget Set the title variable to what you wish the title of your widget to display and return the text you want displayed in the content area.
64. CUSTOM ENTRIES Displays a customised listing of channel entries. Allows you to choose Widget title, Channel ID, # of entries to show and whether to show comment totals. https://github.com/john-henry/dashEE-Custom-Entries-Widget
65. shows list of pending members and their join date. Clicking member’s name throws a lightbox which shows registration info for review PENDING MEMBERS
66. ALSO shows list of pending members and the date they started filling in an application form. Progress of form is shown with a percentage and option to email applicants via the communicate tool APPLICANTS
67. shows recent replies in the ee discussion forum with text, date and link to replies recent discussions
68. shows ee discussion module forums with total topics, topics per day, total posts and posts per day discussion statistics
69. shows results for poll add-on from eeharbor with original options. Has setting to choose poll id poll results
70. connects with fluidsurveys api and pulls in recent surveys with responses and links to csv and online reports surveys
71. shows total members, members per group and quick registration stats for 24hrs, 7 days and 30 days member stats
72. shows number of members per country with alternative pdf download of table members by country
73. ‣ The extra mile ‣ don’t sell the technology ‣ provide wiggle room for sense-making ‣ a dashboard is not just for one particular person or group of people. ‣ Expressionengine actually has the advantage in dashboards ‣ widgets are addictive TAKE AWAYS
74. thank you