nodefamily, status update

Submitted by fago on Mon, 07/10/2006 - 02:58
i've started development of the node relations module, i called it nodefamily module. As the module might be useful not only for profile nodes, I've written it generally, so that it may be used without nodeprofiles at all. It allows you to define relations between content types. It uses this relation to automatically mark all nodes of these types of the same user as related. For this it uses its own simple API for node-node relations. Further it lets you define a number of maximum nodes of a content type per user - quite useful for nodeprofiles.. ;) I've also already created a simple nodeprofile module, which allows you to mark content types as user profiles. The nodeprofile module uses the nodefamily module to set the number of maximum nodes of nodeprofile content types per user to one. Further, if the usernode module is present, it adds a relation between the usernode content type and the nodeprofile types. So it should be possible to build nodeprofiles, which may consist of several content types - hold together by the node relations. The usernode could be used to provide an overview of all profiles, or for displaying all profiles... I don't concentrate on creating a superior way this all should work, I would like to create a flexible solution, which can be customized easily.

Status

The current available code is not ready for use, but for testing.. :) Feedback is welcome! So whats left, whats next? Next I'll look into the views integration, which is currently missing totally. The views integration I 've in mind is that it's not only possible to display a link to a related node in a view, like it is with CCK node relations, instead it should be possible to list concrete data (e.g. CCK fields) of the related node. When this all is working, I would like to build convenient interfaces for endusers, so that e.g. they are able to add several nodes of one type without loosing overview. Profiles which consist of more than one content type can be easily done with the nodefamily module, however it's important that they can be filled out easily by endusers. I think it would be userfriendly to provide a kind of a workflow for filling out the nodes of a profile in a through steps, so I plan to look into it.