I received this from one of the engineers:
Can you tell if any of the new product features are compatible, such as the community central? Thanks JD.

- Reid

There is an error in 2.0.0.5rc1 whereby it disregards the setting for "Show profile link in post bit"

the plugin for postbit_display_complete that displays this information should use the value of the variable $show['zointsprofile'] in its if statement and the other plugin for postbit_display_complete should execute in order number 4 (before the aforementioned one)

the former should be:

I'll post it in our bugs forum right away!

Thanks bc3tech. :)

- Reid

Still no photo album??!

As we figured the primary future of our downloads will be from 3.7x forums, most of which will use the built-in photo album system, we thought it would be pointless to spend time developing an album solution thus why the 3.7x version has album integration into the Community Central and with a profile block.

Where as something like the blog is something that we felt a lot of forums might like who wish to have a free blogging solution.

- Reid

[Vent]At the risk of sounding like a complete jackass, I have to ask what the point of this release is. Why would anyone want to blog with such a cumbersome, and archaic text editor? The lack of an integrated photo album is another thing that prevents this from being a product forum members would want to use. Granted, my forum is currently a small one with a little over 300 members, but in spite of numerous attempts to get them to create personal pages using Zoints, not a single member page has been created on my site in the last year. Why should they? There's no easy to use text editor, and they can't create photo albums. These are 2 features that you have somehow managed to implement on the zoints website, but they are conspicuously missing from the released product. Bottom line is, that without these 2 features, I cannot imagine Anyone enjoying using this system, or why they would want to.

I could be wrong in my assessment, so if there is any forum owner out there that is having any degree of success at getting members to participate, I'd sure like to hear about it, because I'm very close to uninstalling htis product. And please hold the obvious comebacks that I'm getting this product for free, because that wasn't my choice and I'd be glad to pay for something that had all the necessary features.[/Vent]

Pointless? A photo album page that has the same look and feel as the rest of a members pages is pointless?

JD,

I've tried to be nothing but helpful in answering your questions. It's truthful that many of our features came directly from suggestions and common thought among feedback, such as wanting ways to encourage members to have a reason to use profiles. Did we want to add more? Yeah. On the possible to-do list for the engineers was in fact the external WYSIWYG editor. Did we have endless time to complete all of this? No. You might think, actually I know you think, that we didn't prioritize correctly. For you and your forum that may be the case and I apologize if we can't meet your specific requirements but for other forums we might be delivering just what they need. We can never make everyone happy, but it's not for a lack of trying.

We WANT to add one. I think no matter what I say, you're not going to consider it and that's fine as you are entitled to your opinion, but I will make another push for looking into it. I am just a staff member, that doesn't mean it will happen but I can try my best.

As for this "but they are conspicuously missing from the released product," not to sound rude but that is just digging for something. We have added cool things to Local that haven't even made it's way to our network. A lot of people would say that was a pretty stupid move for us, but we wanted to give you guys something cool, whether you want to believe it or not.

Would it have been pointless if we could develop a superior photo album option? Of course not. Did we have the time to do such a thing considering how long we have been going at this? No. And to draw from the paragraph above, an album solution was needed on Zoints.com, we felt that as we weren't planning to release when 3.70 came out, some would already have established photo albums by our release and would be more content with keeping those rather than starting over.

I am really sorry you aren't more satisfied. As a non-engineer there is not much more I can do than to push for the editor issue to be looked into, which I will do.

Have a great weekend JD.

- Reid

The ultimate point I am trying to make is that the developers of zoints local are shooting themselves in the foot by not making the features I mentioned an urgent priority. I realize how much development time must have spent on this product. The plain and simple fact is, that if someone wants to create personal pages that include photo albums, they will go is myspace.com. Whether you like it or not, that is who zoints local is competing with. The myspace concept is completely integrated, and very intuitive. It is what the vast majority of forum members that would even consider creating a detailed profile are used to, and they will turn away from anything that is not as easy to use. As a forum owner, I am not able to present my members with a good reason to create profiles and blog on my site, because there are too many better places for them to do it easier. I have been hoping for the last year that the zoints product would change that.

Whether you believe it or not, I probably want zoints local to be a successful product as much as anyone on the zoints team. That is why I have been so persistent about implementing features that translate into ease of use by forum members. Not to sound too crass, but a lot of forum members or potential members couldn't find their butt if it had a bell on it... they can't even figure out how to complete the forum registration process 25% of the time, so they surely will have a hard time using, an antiquated text editor.

As far as a photo album, it's NOT about who has the better implementation. It's about the end users perception of seamless integration of album pages into their profile. Profile pages are, in fact, a mini-website, and as such should be a congruous collection of pages, including the photo album. If a visitor to any given zoints profile pages must navigate away from the profile to view a photo album, they have in effect, left that mini-website. That's not good because the congruity of profile pages is then broken. I have Photopost installed on my site and it's a better photo album solution that anything built into vBulletin will ever be. Even though it's the best photo forum available, it's useless as far as an integration into profile pages goes... it's a seperate product.

Bottom Line: Integration of features and ease of use is the key to making zoint local a highly successful product. I want zoints local to be a successful product, don't you? This thread had about 10 unique posters in th month of May.... that's a pretty low turnout. This thread should be going nuts with questions if forum members were using the zoints profile system.

First off JD, I appreciate your passion for the product. Secondly and before I possibly bore others with a wall of text, we are looking into it (the editor.) Like I mentioned, this has come up recently again and I think it's something we all want solved. I don't know when or how or even if, but I believe there will be a good effort made toward this.

And I understand your point about photo pages and I agree as a Zoints Local Photo Album would be great. In the future? Who knows. But I think you misunderstood my point a bit. Photo pages to us were "pointless" (probably not the best word) when compared to revamping the blog and developing blocks for it. A lot of of time alone was spent on thinking how an entry would be spaced out or where should the tags go, etc. We felt that as not all forums would have the blog, in fact many do not, that it would be the more heavily desired feature as it is another form of content. So in essence, it was a very utilitarian type of thought, which of the two would bring the greatest joy to the most. With any feature development in the future, I am sure a photo album solution will be heavily discussed (it was discussed in the last round) as we knocked off a lot of potential additions with the 2.0 changes.

- Reid