Geeklog Forums

Hi all,
I am working on setting up a social networking site and have a developer helping me as I don’t have any web development experience myself. I have the basic specifications defined and we are using these as an initial guide.

Basically I want to setup a community surrounding physical goods and user interests. The basic outline is as follows:

Profile
-user picks which camera bodies and lenses he owns, as well as defining interests and location
-user can upload pictures and tag them in multiple ways (body and lens used, location picture was taken etc.)
-user is shown relevant forum posts, products etc (lenses that fit his camera, memory cards (SD if he has a body that accepts SD, CF if it takes CF, camera bags etc)
-forum posts of interest are automatically identified (based on profile and user-identified areas of interest)
-user can search other people with similar interests and/or equipment
-user can generate a blog and tag it for other users to see (e.g. camera shoot London with Canon Rebel/400D concerning airshow on 2/2/2009)

Product page
-a product page has a template that allows for comparison with other products (weight, focal length etc)
-tagged pictures from other users are automatically linked (similar to user uploaded pictures on Amazon)
-similar products and relevant forum posts are identified
-user generated reviews/ratings and wiki functionality

Events
-users can generate events in a calendar that is distributed to people in the same geographic region and/or interest (think bird watchers on a photo shoot)

Classifieds
-users can create classifieds that then get presented to other users based on suitability and/or interests (e.g. an ad for a SD card wouldn’t be shown to another user who has a camera which takes CF cards)

Forum
-posts can be linked to database entries to facilitate searching/filtering (text searching is not great—try searching for AC [Air Conditioning] on an automotive forum, the string is too short and also returns results unrelated to the discussion)

We are evaluating different frameworks that can be used to produce my vision. Some of the options we have shortlisted (though not necessarily evaluated) include:
Elgg, Drupal, Joomla, SocialEngine, Dolphin, Geeklog/AptitudeCMS, DZOIC, TYPO3 PHPizabi, Pligg, vBulletin, Okphp, prosems, introNetworks, ThePort, etc…
Many of these were found on www.techcrunch.com/2007/08/14/34-more-ways-to-build-your-own-social-network/ as well as general research.

In evaluating the popular scripts (SocialEngine, Dolphin) it appears they are far from what I envision—they seem more catered to dating sites. To get them to the functionality required would require a lot of ‘hacking’—modifications that would likely ‘break’ with new revisions.

For that reason we are leaning more towards a CMS-based solution. Taxonomy is very important and ideally the user would ‘tag’ things using the database versus user-defined tags (avoids spelling error, makes filtering easier etc.).

My developer has extensive TYPO3 experience and is good at PHP/MySql if that matters, though he is mainly helping me with the short listing and perhaps initial launch.

Any feedback regarding the options and best forums to discuss this topic would be greatly appreciated. Also any guesses as far as development time (cost!) would be very useful.

Cheers,
Matt

Hi Matt this sounds very interesting but extremely complex. I`d say, try Geeklog with some plugins like Forum and Gallery2 http://codex.gallery2.org/Main_Page http://www.flashyourweb.com/staticpages/index.php?page=g2bridge_readme. Then you have a small rock solid system you can learn to adminster. It is also easy to make changes to the design / layout. I don`t know all the other systems but maybe compare that with Drupal. I`d not look at Joomla as it is rather entry level. Typo3 is complicated and you hardly find a developer who has spare time so you may get stuck.

If you ask people what CMS to choose you will get a lot of biased answers. Look if they only recommend 1 system or if they contrast their answer with showing their knowledge of several systems.

What is the overall goal of your site :

Geeklog isn´t really made for a social network, but it offers a rocksteady framework. I´m not familair with the GL gallery plugins, but perhaps the Autotags plugin will help you out (when supported bij the gallery plugins), since this makes it possible to ´automate´ lots of custom tags for the Tags plugin.

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

I wouldn`t say so. Take into account that mrbeau is a newbe and that the above is his VISION!

The usual problems are very often on another basis like you have the best camera and huge equipment but no opportunity to use it or in other words you have a big site but nobody is joining. And if people join they want things to be different anyway -> either have a lot of experience or grow slowly.

I`d start with a Geeklog because it contains everything to begin a good blog, add a nice forum and gallery and then see if it attracts fellow users. You can arrange user blogs and user galleries and it can grow.

I had another case where a non for profit society also wanted a sort of social network thing. I thought about a totally minimalistic version with Geeklog because they didn`t have money. It was a perfect solution but they chose a wiki because they knew what a wiki was :pray:


Anyway, there is some developement going on in the direction of a social network plugin. http://www.geeklog.net/forum/viewtopic.php?showtopic=82903

OK, Markus, perhaps I should ay it this way:
Geeklog is originally not made for a social network, but it offers a solid framework/blogsystem to build a social network.

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Thanks to everyone for your comments. Based on the responses I have the impression that GL may not be 'prime time' enough for my current vision as well as potential issues in finding developers. Right now I'm leaning towards Drupal but would love to have more discussions on the pros/cons of different frameworks--is there a good forum where I might be able to get this sort of feedback?

Thanks again.

Cheers,
Matt

There are forums ( http://php.opensourcecms.com/ http://www.cmsmatrix.org/discussion ) but I wouldn`t know which one to recommend. Always see HOW the persons argues. There is not 1 perfect system. Back in 2003 I liked Geeklog better than Drupal because of the easy to change theme and the quick and friendly support.

It also depends on the person who will be helping you what he knows best. Just try one way, it can`t be wrong nor perfect.

If you compare the template files and structure from Geeklog and Drupal, you will see that Geeklog is a lot easier. I´ve hired some freelance developers for special plugins a few years ago, and none of them had any troubles or complaints about Geeklog.

Geeklog does´t look very sophisticated compared to Drupal and Wordpress, but that also gives you the advantage to begin with a simple base as a start.

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net