It is my understanding (after an hour or so of research) that the AdvImage and AdvLink dialogs from V3 have been replaced by native umbraco dialogs. Content authors no longer have the ability manipulate often used image and link attributes. I find it frustrating, if not silly to have to 'hack' the TinyMCE under-belly to partially regain features that were present in V3. Worse, the custom hacks have to be tracked and then re-applied each time umbraco is upgraded or patched.
For those that wish to offer CSS workarounds: It is unreasonable to attempt to put the needed options (let alone all of the possible options) into CSS drop down options. Things like image alignment, link target attributes, image attributes (padding, border, etc) that change on a per item basis, should have been incorporated into the new interface.
Please make the old dialogs PART of the distribtion or add the appropriate attribute modifier fields to the current dialogs. This should be more than trivial from a development standpoint.
Also there was a discussion about this http://forum.umbraco.org/yaf_postst8163_TinyMCE--insert-image-dialog.aspx. The solution is a bit hacky, and would be lost on upgrade. I would write a short xcopy based script file to 'install' the changes into Umbraco to try and avoid future upgrade issues.
I have had a look at http://forum.umbraco.org/yaf_postst8163_TinyMCE--insert-image-dialog.aspx and it is a bit to hacky to rely on. I got it to work for the IMAGE dialog, but not for the LINK dialog. I must be missing something in converting the code. Also, as mentioned in the thread on the (yet once again) abandoned umbraco forum (what would open source be without the needless and constant fragmentation of good information) The IMAGE dialog has no media picker, so BOTH the new and the old must be used in conjunction.
If any team members are following along... PLEASE add the needed attribute fields to the NEW dialogs, or enable the OLD dialogs as part of the standard UI. I fail to see the utility in removing these features.
I guess... but like most things it will just get lost in the shuffle. On the way to make a request now.
My understanding of the TinyMCE environmnet is very minimal. If somebody could post instructions for the advlink, similar to those for the advimage hack I would be greatful. I gave it a try, but am just able to get the code tweaked to work properly.
The old dialogues will not return in the default distribution, no need to add a Work Item.
The redesign of the dialouges are based on research on what:
1) Was the most needed features of insert image 2) Was the best options for a clean and strict implementation
If we try to satisfy everyone in the default distribution we'll just have clutter. We think we get a better product by giving the majority a simple and intuitive interface and then add hooks to ensure that people can implement their own editor if their implementation needs that. Adding full options in link and image dialogues are possible, just like adding the option of choosing font face, font color and other options which might be of use for your clients.
It's not that we don't care if your clients have special needs, we just care more about all the other clients which don't. That's why we've designed Umbraco to be clean and simple, yet offering full extensibility and customization.
Thank you for the quick and kind response. I honestly was not aware that the "rel=" attribute of a hyperlink was considered depricated. From my limted travels, it would appear that most of the display engines use the "rel" attribute as a trigger (lytebox for example), as well as other link aware scripts. I have found no clean way to add "rel=something" to hyperlinks in V4. Adding them via the HTML editing function is cumbersome and they are erased if the link is again edited in the RichText editer.
At this point, at is clear that the functionality will not be duplicated in the new release. Can you (or anybody) point me in the right direction for a workaround? I have pulled my hair out all afternoon trying to figure something out.
I know reasons for not to include old image dialogs into standard distributions, but I think you don’t remember about backward compatibility. I have 2 big clients, which this move stops from migrating from v3!
They already use this in v3, and is hard to explain him, why this was removed in v4. It's good practice first marks thinks obsolete and then remove it. If it’s included, marked as obsolete and disabled by default upgrade was much easier.
BTW: Without ability to set align to image, clients add table, image into it and then set align to this table, which isn’t nice clean XHTML...
@Petr We do have backwards compatibility. Remember that this update doesn't break any *existing* content AND that it's possible to add your own dialogues.
You can still align images by clicking an image and selecting alignment in the toolbar (left/right) or right click the image and choose alignment. Am not saying that we'll never introduce alignment in the dialogue again, simply stating that the 20-40 config options in the old dialogue should be seen as an example of the capabilities of tinymce in the default distribution rather than a great UI. We prefer the latter :o)
I think most of us would agree that many of options were clear candidates for removal. I think where we disagree is on the removal of image alignment, space and border tags in the image dialog and the "rel=" and other commonly used attribute tags in the hyperlink dialog. That is, out of the 20-30 removed fields 3-4 of them are commonly used.
I have been able to hack in the old advImage dialog as per Petr's original thread in the old forum, though it is not ideal as it does not have the media picker. I am stuck on the advLink functionality, or a simple way to conistantly add "rel=" to hyperlinks.
Maybe this would be a good package project for somebody to undertake :)
I think alignment on image and rel on link would be fine to add again. Space and border attribute are bad as it'll bring inline styling on elements, which is something we think should be avoided and added to general image css instead. Feel free to submit a work item on codeplex suggesting alignment+rel and if enough is interested it'll come back for 4.1!
Thanks for a constructive conversation - I love when we can approach eachother on things like these!
This is just an example that replaces the target of a link but your problem would be simmular. Unless it is not posible to determine what links would need a rel attribute.
UI functionality moving backwards?
Please take this in the kindess manner:
It is my understanding (after an hour or so of research) that the AdvImage and AdvLink dialogs from V3 have been replaced by native umbraco dialogs. Content authors no longer have the ability manipulate often used image and link attributes. I find it frustrating, if not silly to have to 'hack' the TinyMCE under-belly to partially regain features that were present in V3. Worse, the custom hacks have to be tracked and then re-applied each time umbraco is upgraded or patched.
For those that wish to offer CSS workarounds:
It is unreasonable to attempt to put the needed options (let alone all of the possible options) into CSS drop down options. Things like image alignment, link target attributes, image attributes (padding, border, etc) that change on a per item basis, should have been incorporated into the new interface.
Please make the old dialogs PART of the distribtion or add the appropriate attribute modifier fields to the current dialogs. This should be more than trivial from a development standpoint.
"AdvImage and AdvLink" can probably be re-enabled relatively easily.
Have a read at previous forum posts on enabling tiny mce plugins. I wrote a short explaination of enabling the template plugin http://our.umbraco.org/wiki/how-tos/enabling-the-%27template%27-plugin-for-tinymce it can't be too dissimilar to what your trying to do.
Also there was a discussion about this http://forum.umbraco.org/yaf_postst8163_TinyMCE--insert-image-dialog.aspx. The solution is a bit hacky, and would be lost on upgrade. I would write a short xcopy based script file to 'install' the changes into Umbraco to try and avoid future upgrade issues.
Chris
Thank you for the reply Chris.
I have had a look at http://forum.umbraco.org/yaf_postst8163_TinyMCE--insert-image-dialog.aspx and it is a bit to hacky to rely on. I got it to work for the IMAGE dialog, but not for the LINK dialog. I must be missing something in converting the code. Also, as mentioned in the thread on the (yet once again) abandoned umbraco forum (what would open source be without the needless and constant fragmentation of good information) The IMAGE dialog has no media picker, so BOTH the new and the old must be used in conjunction.
If any team members are following along... PLEASE add the needed attribute fields to the NEW dialogs, or enable the OLD dialogs as part of the standard UI. I fail to see the utility in removing these features.
Best thing to do William would be to raise the issue via codeplex (umbraco.codeplex.com) and get folks to vote up the change request.
I guess... but like most things it will just get lost in the shuffle. On the way to make a request now.
My understanding of the TinyMCE environmnet is very minimal. If somebody could post instructions for the advlink, similar to those for the advimage hack I would be greatful. I gave it a try, but am just able to get the code tweaked to work properly.
The old dialogues will not return in the default distribution, no need to add a Work Item.
The redesign of the dialouges are based on research on what:
1) Was the most needed features of insert image
2) Was the best options for a clean and strict implementation
If we try to satisfy everyone in the default distribution we'll just have clutter. We think we get a better product by giving the majority a simple and intuitive interface and then add hooks to ensure that people can implement their own editor if their implementation needs that. Adding full options in link and image dialogues are possible, just like adding the option of choosing font face, font color and other options which might be of use for your clients.
It's not that we don't care if your clients have special needs, we just care more about all the other clients which don't. That's why we've designed Umbraco to be clean and simple, yet offering full extensibility and customization.
Niels,
Thank you for the quick and kind response. I honestly was not aware that the "rel=" attribute of a hyperlink was considered depricated. From my limted travels, it would appear that most of the display engines use the "rel" attribute as a trigger (lytebox for example), as well as other link aware scripts. I have found no clean way to add "rel=something" to hyperlinks in V4. Adding them via the HTML editing function is cumbersome and they are erased if the link is again edited in the RichText editer.
At this point, at is clear that the functionality will not be duplicated in the new release. Can you (or anybody) point me in the right direction for a workaround? I have pulled my hair out all afternoon trying to figure something out.
Hi Niels,
I'm author of original forum link.
I know reasons for not to include old image dialogs into standard distributions, but I think you don’t remember about backward compatibility. I have 2 big clients, which this move stops from migrating from v3!
They already use this in v3, and is hard to explain him, why this was removed in v4. It's good practice first marks thinks obsolete and then remove it. If it’s included, marked as obsolete and disabled by default upgrade was much easier.
BTW: Without ability to set align to image, clients add table, image into it and then set align to this table, which isn’t nice clean XHTML...
@Petr We do have backwards compatibility. Remember that this update doesn't break any *existing* content AND that it's possible to add your own dialogues.
You can still align images by clicking an image and selecting alignment in the toolbar (left/right) or right click the image and choose alignment. Am not saying that we'll never introduce alignment in the dialogue again, simply stating that the 20-40 config options in the old dialogue should be seen as an example of the capabilities of tinymce in the default distribution rather than a great UI. We prefer the latter :o)
I think most of us would agree that many of options were clear candidates for removal. I think where we disagree is on the removal of image alignment, space and border tags in the image dialog and the "rel=" and other commonly used attribute tags in the hyperlink dialog. That is, out of the 20-30 removed fields 3-4 of them are commonly used.
I have been able to hack in the old advImage dialog as per Petr's original thread in the old forum, though it is not ideal as it does not have the media picker. I am stuck on the advLink functionality, or a simple way to conistantly add "rel=" to hyperlinks.
Maybe this would be a good package project for somebody to undertake :)
I think alignment on image and rel on link would be fine to add again. Space and border attribute are bad as it'll bring inline styling on elements, which is something we think should be avoided and added to general image css instead. Feel free to submit a work item on codeplex suggesting alignment+rel and if enough is interested it'll come back for 4.1!
Thanks for a constructive conversation - I love when we can approach eachother on things like these!
Totaly agree with you Niels.
Another option to add the rel would be using something like jquery.
$(document).ready(function () {$("a[href$='.pdf']").each( function(){
var href = $(this).attr('href');
if( href.substring(0,7) == 'http://' ){
$(this).addClass('external');
$(this).click( function(){
window.open(href);
return false;
});
}
});
$("a[href^='http:']").each( function(){
var href = $(this).attr('href');
if( href.substring(0,7) == 'http://' ){
$(this).addClass('external');
$(this).click( function(){
window.open(href);
return false;
});
}
});
});
This is just an example that replaces the target of a link but your problem would be simmular.
Unless it is not posible to determine what links would need a rel attribute.
Ron
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