I'm in the process of testing this installation, adding some test users, and asking people to critique the site. Something I've noticed, and has been confirmed by others, is that the navigation is not intuitive. The top navbar is set off from the design, and doesn't have all of the links that you'd want. An example of what I'd expect would be:
Home | Edit Profile | Search Users | Search Communities
Something like that.
Keywords: elgg, navigation, web design
Comments
Hi Bottlecap,
First I would like to say that I love your concept as well as the design.
It is rare to find elgg sits actually up and running.
I am in the process of trying to set up elgg, for a week now on shared hosting, it is a nightmare. Nothing that should work does work. At least not with elgg. I have two other domains that I runn off of Mambo, but really wanted something more and elgg looks like it could be it. Especially after seeing your site.
The top nav bar is as you saiad something else. I am not sure I would want it up there at all. I wouold rather use it in a block just below the logo and search line.
I am not sure how complex it is to get to the point you are at after installation but so far I can't seem to find out.
I am having the snandard .htaccess file problems so emptied the .htacces file and created a php.ini
Overcame the register_globals issues and am now working on rewrite_issues. LOL I dread to think what problems may come after that.
There does not seem to be many recent posts on the Elgg site by support and I caonsidered dropping the install all together, but seeing your site tells me that it really is possible and this could be hte magic program.
Please keep me posted on changes and any suggestions you could give to get to this point would be greatly appreciated.
Jim Windwalker
http://myactivistnetwork.org
http://defendthewolves.org
http://wolfgardens.org
Thanks for the comment Jim. I am using hostmysite to host this installation. It took 8 to 10 emails to different customer support people, all saying different things, before we stumbled on the right combination of settings. I tried installing Elgg on 1&1 hosting, and found it absolutely impossible.
I too found Elgg support forums lacking. I've tested a wide variety of open source content management systems and community software, and found Elgg the most difficult to work with. It's kind of neat once it's running, but I doubt I will spend any more time on it until the developers do.
Hi BN,
I have tried a lot of other programs too.
I have several mambo and joomla sites but I ma looking for something a bit more expandable.
I like the idea of elgg, but is appears to be a lost cause.
I still can't get my site up.
My hosting service should be usable but the coding of elgg is too restrictive.
For example. I am at a point wehre I can actually log in, but the program does not create the needed folders for a registered user. mod_rewrite works fine, but something is not creating the needed folders and I have no idea how to make it do so.
Profiles and other plugins simply give an error page. So beyond the login page nothing works.
If you run across any other programs that actually work, please drop me a line.
We are a non profit Org heavily involved in civil and human rights. This kind of program would have a world of advantages for our members.
Currently we are using a mambo portal and I would really like to move to a social networking software that is more directed at community rather than development.
Joomla and mambo can bothe be difficult for users and I hope we see something along the lines of elgg that actually works.
If you keep working with this fan club helper site please let me know. I am a musician as well and would love to send some greast folks obver here.
Jim