1. Introductions (All)

Present were new members Steve Gregory (CO) and Ryan Sierman (IL), Plinkit Steering Committee member Bev Obert (IL), Group Chair Darci Hanning (OR) and Holly Gordon (TX)

2. Review roles/responsibilities of Technical Group (Darci)

• Since we have 2 new members, Darci went over the roles as stated on the Collaborative website (http://www.plinkit.org/about/technical-group/technical-group.html).
• Basically, this group shares technical issues, then forwards any issues to the Steering Committee.
• Requests for new features are not necessarily the responsibility of this group (that comes from end library users), but we test, implement, document, etc. these features.

3. Select Chair (All)

• The Chair responsibilities are also on the website (http://www.plinkit.org/about/technical-group/technical-group.html) and include calling regular meetings, attending and communicating with the Project Coordinators Committee, and attending the Steering Committee meetings.
• Holly Gordon (TX) volunteered, and Darci’s assistance with scheduling the teleconferences.

4. Status report on work being done by Joel Burton (Darci)

Brief history – Joel was hired to conduct Plone and Plinkit training for Texas administrators last spring. This was his first in-depth exposure to Plinkit, and resulted in his offer to produce two “products” for the Plinkit Collaborative. These projects have been delayed due to personal issues for Joel, but are now scheduled for completion by the end of November. Darci will be sending more information soon, including the URL for reviewing these projects

• Plinkit Setup Tool– will greatly streamline the setup of new Plinkit sites. This will basically be a form you would fill out that would then configure new sites for you, including color, email changes, etc.
• "Plinkit 2.0" / Plone 2.5 – will turn Plinkit into a Plone product, incorporated with an upgrade to Plone 2.5

5. Status report from each state

TX – about 10 sites open to public, not a lot of enhancements (though we do have a customized state template). Some systems are early implementers, some not doing much at all. Our big obstacles are all on the management/project level (changes in personnel, loss of control of the server)

IL – In Year Two of project, and have both slow implementers and early implementers. Enhancements include:

• multiple skins libraries can select
• 12 vs 24 hour time modified,
• template added for board of trustees to meet open records requirement
• added links to FirstSearch, etc to template

CO – Now have 8 sites and are looking into skins removal of date on news portlet

OR – Interest has increased lately; she has added many templates to the Collaborative site (go here), such as the “Library Use Value” calculator, Google Analytics, iFrame, fixing layout bugs. Go look at this!

6. Next steps

1. Plinkit Setup Tool & Plinkit 2.0 Deployment Planning
1. Darci will send updates, timelines for testing and task lists soon. To prepare for this, read up on the Unified installer for Plone 2.5. Search for info on plone.org. Basically this is a 1 step install script (don’t have to mess with separate installation of Python, etc.) and all in one directory. This means we will be able to keep old sites, but can start using for new sites and gradually migrate old sites. Followed by a brief discussion about ZEO, clients.
2. Technical writer we have used in the past (Toni) is willing to do the Admin manual re-write for Plone 2.5/Plinkit 2.0
3. Darci will make a list of issues to note about upgrading, but just a couple mentioned were increased memory requirements if you run both versions on the same server, and to run the upgrade Plone on a different port than the old Plone sites. However, it should be straight forward to upgrade your old Plinkit sites.
4. Yes, this upgrade should run ok on Windows. Many of us do development on windows platforms.
2. What to do about skins / color schemes?
1. Is there is good way for us to start sharing skins. Asked IL to share what they have done. They used ZMI to do these modifications. Action item for Ryan to add to collaborative site. Darci will put Ryan in touch with Joel.
2. Project Coordinators will recommend to the Steering Committee that we pay to have color schemes done for some of the free skins that are available.
3. Look at DIY Plone Skins tutorial for serious CSS changes (beyond color schemes), which is very good (do these changes through the file system rather than through ZMI)
3. What to do about recurring events?
1. Andy McKay gave Darci some code for this, and she wants us to test. Darci will post the tarball. **Warning – don’t do a year’s worth!!! Also, try this on PC rather than production. Please discuss via e-mail.
   
   If this code doesn’t work, we will probably suggest to steering committees to hire a programmer for this (maybe Andy McKay.)
4. Obstacles as identified above – none identified
5. Others?

1. Spellcheck options
   
   Plinkit ships with old KUPU, but 1.39 and above have spellcheckers. Ryan updated to 1.39 to get rid of MS-XML errors, and has had no problems (initially had just upgraded the saricissa.js file, causing a problem). Darci warned that if you install KUPU 1.39, do the whole thing, not just a file at a time.
2. Goal for next year is to get more folks to use the collaborative site and make more contributions.

ACTION ITEMS

Darci –

1. Plinkit Setup Tool and Plinkit 2.0/Plone 2.5
1. Status report and update
2. Timeline and URL for testing and acceptance
3. List of tasks necessary for states to implement
4. List of any issues we might run into with upgrading to Plone 2.5
2. Put Ryan and Joel in touch about skins
3. Post tarball for the “recurring date” fix

Holly –

1. These minutes posted to collaborative site after approval
2. Work with Darci, and rest of committee, for produce Dec 12 agenda

Ryan –

1. Add info about skins and color schemes to collaborative site
2. Request from Holly – can you also add infor about the 12 vs 24 hour modification and your board of trustee template?

All –

1. Plinkit Setup Tool and Plinkit 2.0/Plone 2.5
1. Read up on the Unified installer for Plone 2.5 on plone.org.
2. Get ready for info Darci will send out about testing, implementing, etc.
2. Look at DIY Plone Skins tutorial, which is very good (do these changes through the file system rather than through ZMI)
3. Test the “recurring date fix” code that Darci will post to collaborative website.

Next meeting date:

December 12. 2007, same time (9:00a PT / 10:00a MT / 11:00a CT)

Holly will chair, Darci will take notes and set up the teleconference. Holly and Darci will get an agenda out before the meeting, but all should feel free to suggest items at anytime.