Some of you may have noticed that the graphics team website has gotten a major face lift.  I figured a site redesign and reorganization might inject a bit of fuel into the graphic design fires of the community.  Here’s a bit of what happened in the site redesign:

BBPress Forum Removed

No one had posted to the graphics forum in 4 months.  I figured it was time to retire it.  For now, I’ve linked the top forum link to a graphics board on the main site of Unity Linux.  I’m most likely going to install Simplepress soon here.  For an example of how simplepress works with a site like ours, see devnet’s Exchange blog forum.  More updates to come on that for us here.

A full backup was performed before this system was removed and I’ll save that in case any Unity Admin has a desire for it.

Coppermine Gallery Removed

All images from the old Coppermine gallery now reside in our Gallery Showcase.  No images were deleted.  A full backup was performed before this system was removed and I’ll save that in case any Unity Admin has a desire for it.

Gallery Showcase

The new Gallery Showcase page was put in.  This replaces our Coppermine gallery and provides one less area that hackers can attack us on.  Public uploads ARE enabled.  You have to register to upload and images will only appear upon approval.  So if you have something to share with us, please do!

Why now?

Why not now?  The graphics team is VERY talented and provides Unity Linux with a fantastic amount of icons, themes, and wallpapers.  They should have a main site that caters to and showcases all the great things they do.  I believe this new design does just that.  Hopefully, you all agree!  Please do let us know what you think of the new digs and thanks for using Unity Linux!

Forum Updates, SMF, and MyBB

You may have noticed that the support forum has had a bit of a makeover along with the front page here.  What we’ve done is move from MyBB to Simple Machines Forum (SMF).  The main problem we faced with MyBB was maintaining customizations to the core.  This proved difficult and spam attacks were beginning to trickle through.  SMF put an end to this and has allowed our developers the chance to play in familiar territory.  Some of the differences will be immediately noticeable (like subscriptions and loading screens) but hopefully, the community will find SMF familiar and usable.

Front Page Updates and Joomla

The front page received a face lift today in an attempt to move toward a simpler navigation and appearance.  Currently, we use Wordpress as a CMS.  However, we’ve begun working with Joomla in the background in an attempt to unify authentication across the forum, bugtracker, and wiki…and while work there is steady, it is not finished yet.  What this will mean is that community members will have one username and password to take advantage of the wiki, the forum, and the bugtracker.

So What Does This Give You?

The system we’re working with Joomla is called JFusion.  This system will unify authentication across projects and inititives.  This means that if you decided to base your distribution on Unity, you could integrate and offer your users the same login they use at the main Unity Linux websites.  This will unify across domains, across sub-domains, and across remaster/branches of software.  Imagine being able to go to the e17 Unity Linux website and logging in with the same password you’d use in our support forums here.  Simplicity!  And that’s exactly what we’re going for with Unity Linux…keep it simple, keep it updated, and keep it free!

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns, please let us know in the comments section and thanks for reading!