Future of ClubStarterKit project

It's been almost a year since I started the ClubStarterKit project as an open source project up on Codeplex. Since then, we've released Version 2, which added functionality to the original starter kit, and the first Beta of Version 3, which tried to change the data architecture with SubSonic.

The problem is that I've sort of abandoned the project for a while to work on my personal projects. But in that time, I've been really looking at better ways to put together the ClubStarterKit. This post is sort of a Version 3 feature list/roadmap that hopefully we can stick with!

 

The Data Layer

We tried to do something cool by redoing the data by using SubSonic. In my eyes, this was only a partial success. The reason I chose SubSonic in the first-place was because the original app really was just a presentation of data, there wasn't really much that went on and from a programmer's perspective, there was a lot of logic just encapsulated in the SqlDataControl. Having inline SQL in a SQLDataControl is really unmanageable and can be a pain to update. With SubSonic, it's easy to update a data sequence to contain an additional field.

What I want to do next is have a Data Provider. I realized that not everyone wants to use SubSonic. Some people want to use ADO.NET and I'm sure that some people want to use LINQ now that it is available. What I want to do is give people the option in the provider. The default will still be SubSonic, since I strongly reccomend it, but we will also natively support ADO.NET and LINQ and possibly anything else you guys might want us to support :)

 

Wiki

I've wanted to build a wiki for quite some time. Our CMS does do some pretty cool stuff, which we will be building upon with the final release, but I also want to build a wiki for those clubs that need such functionality. I'll be evaluating some of the wiki stuff I want to put into the ClubStarterKit's wiki engine, but I definitely want it's functionality.

 

Photo Album

I really want to revamp the Photo Album functionality. I really want to make it almost Flickr-like with commenting, tagging, etc. But I also want to add the functionality of a sweet photo-album with effects. I would love to add something like the Lightview since it's really amazing to look at :)

 

What about all the questions I have in the forums?!

I know that I have fallen behind on my forum answering. For that, I TRUELY apologize. I do have a life, you know :) But there really isn't any excuse for not answering people's questions. In the next couple of weeks, I will be cleaning out the issue tracker, taking care of some things, and get those forum questions answered! There are WAY too important for me to just blow them off.

 

New Website?

I am considering building a website for the project. Codeplex is GREAT, but there are some things I would really love to just make myself into a website. It would most-likely run off a modified version of the ClubStarterKit (which I WILL post for you guys to download) and will show off what a modified version could look like. More on that later.

 

If there are any question about the roadmap, the project, or feature requests, PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT! If you have an urgent issue or you just want to talk with me one-on-one, email me (zowens@eagleenvision.net). I really want to start getting this rolling again as this starter kit should be on the cutting edge of ASP.NET design!

Thanks to the community and the contributors of the project on your feedback and we hope to start getting your ideas and suggestions into the product!

33 Comments

  • Now your cooking!

    This is what I have been waiting for. Thanks for the update and info.

    I am looking forward to your website and the next version of ClubStarterKit.

    Do you think there will be an upgrade path for Version 2 to 3?

    Thank you.

  • We will have an upgrade path by the time we release. I'm not expecting much by Beta 2, but the RC and the Final WILL have an upgrade path of some sort.

  • Did you say that you can't upgrade v2 from v3?

  • Not at the moment... but there will be an upgrade path by version 3 RC and Final for sure.

  • I would like to use the 3.0 ClubStarterKit as the foundation for another project.
    Do you have an expected available date for a "working" site?
    KyleQ

  • Any more dates/thoughts on Club starter kit?

    Thanks

    Dan

  • First of all Zack, I think the work you've already done is great so thanks for your effort, you've saved me days of keyboard bashing! I'm looking forward to the next version.

    I'm using the current version of the club site to put together a website for my rugby club.

    I'd have really liked a sponsors control. Any plans? I'm going to write one for the current site, would you like it when I'm done?

    Something else that I've had to change is the way that the teams - games - players relationship works. The problem is that rather than players in teams you quite often find that players in games would be a better relationship, especially for the game stats link up. The team I play for could field over 60 players from the club in a single season. I don't want to put all the members in all the teams to resolve this. I'm adding a players in game table to resolve the problem. I still need the players in team relationship for the notional player to team link, its just that a lot of players play for more than one team within my club at some point or another in a season.

    Finally I've Added to the teams, I found it useful to flag whether a team is a home team or away team. On the stats page I've filtered to just the home teams in the left nav. I didn't want a huge list of opposing teams from the league we play in gumming up the page.

  • Hi Zack

    Can you please release the code in c# for those of us who barely use Vb.net

    thanks!

  • Great Job Zack! Glad to see the project moving forward again! :)

  • Definitely awesome Zack
    I'm learn a lot from you!

  • I think it is great what you are doing.
    I know that you must put in a lot of time and it is difficult to combine it with your privet life.
    I am waiting a long time for the new version.
    Can you give me a time line when you want to release the next version.

  • Is there still a future, not much happening here lately?

  • Zack,

    Anything new with CSK 3 beta?

  • Since the project seems to be again abandoned, perhaps the developer would consider asking if there are any developers that would like to take the project over so the many folks out there that would like to upgrade and move forward with their websites would be able to do so.

  • @jerrydean

    Sure.

  • Thanks for the response, maybe if you made a formal statement someone would come forward and offer to continue your great work. Thanks

  • @jerrydean

    I'm not going to make a formal proposal, since I don't at present wish to bring down the CSK as a project, but I would be open to this alternative.

  • Zack,

    JerryDean has a worthy idea. If your time no longer allows you to invest time in the CSK project, you owe it to your own hard work in the past to make sure CSK has a future. If you truly want what is best for the project, it sounds like there are some decisions on your part that need to be made about it's future and what's best for it.

  • @Matt

    Right... I will have the time in about 3 weeks, does that count :) My problem really is that I can't make a full-time commitment. I do understand that CSK deserves better, but that's what other devs are for, right? To lend a hand? I has basically done this whole thing by myself with the help of a few people. For the most part, I have been the one developing it and getting the blame for when we miss deadlines. It happens... just look at SubText.

  • Zack,

    Thanks for understanding. We hope you hit the next published date.

  • Very interesting! Thanks :-)

  • Any progress or news to report? It has been about 3 weeks.

  • Any thoughts Zack?

  • I'm going to continue in a few weeks (1-2 im thinking) or so. I've finished some big projects at work. First order of business is SubSonic 2.1 RC1!

  • I think it'd be awesome if somehow you implemented a way in the photos section that when a user is uploading a photo, the photo will automatically be shrunken down to a smaller size which would allow more photos on a small web space! I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. I think Myspace uses this technology to shrink users photos to a normal viewing size, but not the normal huge size which comes straight out of the camera.

  • @josh Could you explain this further? Maybe send me an email (zowens@eagleenvision.net). We already shrink the photos.. but is there another way that would be more presentable??

  • Zack - somehow I thought you were dumping the whole SubSonic idea. It hasn't really worked out very well so far. Is it responsible at all for the delays in another beta or gold code for CSK3? Are you still going to do the Data Provider things you laid out in the blog? Sounds like a lot of people don't want to be stuck with SubSonic.

  • We're sticking with SubSonic and making it possible to use LinqToSql. I will be building the LinqToSql stuff after csk3 is released. We will use "Data Providers" to make it changeable.

  • Any new news on the project?

  • FINALLY! A SEMI-PRODUCTIVE MESSAGE!

    I am writing a blog post now. I'll keep you posted.

  • http://weblogs.asp.net/zowens/archive/2008/07/29/clubstarterkit-where-do-we-go.aspx

  • For those out there, that watch this post. I would lve a simple site for my club. The one we have looks like it was built in 1980. Going through the asp.net forums and this codeplex issue tracker, which to use? I am not looking into any added functionality the Events, News Photos, links etc, are just all I think I need.

    Thoughts?

  • The call for coders and support to further the CSK is out, please see this thread.
    http://forums.asp.net/t/1376917.aspx

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