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Written by Flavio Adalberto Kubota

I got some progress these weeks: Compare two differents versions and publish any version.
When you compare two versions, you can see what was changed between these two version. I'm doing this based in colors. Green color for added content, red for deleted and yellow for changed.
And an user can choose which version of the content he wish to publish. But because of this, to continue my work I need to make a choice and I need a feedback.
In editing content, I have two possibilities if implementation, the first is:

When a content is opened for editing, always is presented the lastest version.
Or edit the version that is publish.

Both options are viable. The first one, keep a sequencial logic, while the second, let the user edit what is displayed in the site. In the first case, to edit an old version, it would be necessary to recover this version to be the last version, and then edit.

Any feedback is appreciated to help me to choose which one to code.

Thank you for this and thank you for all comments in the blog.

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38 Votes

7 Comments

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James makes this comment

Monday, 14 July 2008

::nods::

Exactly.

Thanks for giving us the chance to be involved/provide feedback on this project Flavio! If there is anything we can do in terms of testing or other feedback just let us know. Version Control is such a *vital* part of a CMS system once you start using it with a community, I think you've got the best project of the lot.

James and Susan
Flavio Adalberto Kubota makes this comment

Friday, 11 July 2008

I think all of you are rigth, publish make it the latest revision, but edit the latest version, do not mean to publish it. I was worried if users will learn to use some of these methods and if they are confused. I think your idea is the most simple and easier to understand.

James and Susan, I just compare two versions and show the differences between them, but I liked the way you proposed to see if there are multiple edits. It would be like a blame of subversion, showing who has edited each version. I also think it is important to limit user to publish a content when edit. It is possible to make it configurable.
James makes this comment

Friday, 11 July 2008

Should there be admin control of whether or not changes should be immediately visible on the the site? I can see it being appropriate in some cases and not in others...
James makes this comment

Friday, 11 July 2008

When opening it for editing I think I would default to opening the latest version with the all edits since last publish highlighted as described. That way an editor can see right off if they are duplicating edits someone else has already made.

I agree that republishing should increment the version number to that the published becomes the newest revision as of the time it is published.

How are you thinking of handling it if there are multiple edits but the original has not been reviewed and republished?

Perhaps instead of just colors, go with colored text that has a superscript (like a footnote) indicating what revision number that change comes from? That way you could show multiple changes all in one document, and a community could collaborate on fine tuning the wording with everyone adding their comments until an editor makes the final call and republishes?

James and Susan
Flavio Adalberto Kubota makes this comment

Thursday, 10 July 2008

I see your point, it keep simple, but the idea of publish any version is editing a content without publish it. User would edit an article, but keeping an old version published.
I liked what you said, about showing a link for an old revision, I haven't thinked about this.
Shannon Quinn makes this comment

Thursday, 10 July 2008

I echo Luis' statement. Even if you go back and edit an old revision of the file, publishing it should make it the newest and latest revision. Some way of showing that link (again, as Luis mentioned) would be extremely useful. Perhaps following Subversion's method of differencing updated files would be helpful, since each file stores the history of itself up to that point, and publishing a previous version would be like branching the trunk. I may be way off base with all this, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
Luis Antonio Galárraga Del Prado makes this comment

Wednesday, 09 July 2008

Hi, I think publishing an old revision of the article should generate a new version equal in content to that one but with a new revision number. In that case you will always publish the last revision. Maybe you could add some metadata indicating that this revision came from an old version to inform the user.