Blog module update

Posted by Mark | Filed under Sitecore

This week I released the stable version of the EviBlog module. You can download the module from the Sitecore Shared Source. The module works on all Sitecore solutions based on version 6.2.

The module now includes the following features:

  • Inline Editing support
  • Windows Live Writer integration
  • Pingback
  • RSS (using the Sitecore 6.2 Integrated RSS)
  • Tagging and tagcloud
  • Categories
  • Comments (you can disable per setting)
  • FieldEditors for blog and entry settings
  • Custom webcontrols for integrating your own theme

The Shared Source coordinator Jimmie Overby created two video’s (1, 2) which shows you the most common use of the module. Currently I am writing some documentation about how to use the webcontrols in your own theme. With these webcontrols it’s quite easy to integrate the module within an existing Sitecore installation.

Please do not hesitate to use the Shared Source forum when you have questions about the module.

Comments (14) | November 27th, 2009

14 Responses to “Blog module update”

  1. Twitted by markvanaalst Says:
    November 27, 2009 at 10:35 am

    [...] This post was Twitted by markvanaalst [...]

    Reply
  2. Lars Nielsen Says:
    November 27, 2009 at 12:35 pm

    Wow is all I can say!

    Reply
  3. DanBrown Says:
    November 27, 2009 at 4:12 pm

    Very nice! I really like the integration that has been done with Sitecore.

    Reply
  4. Seifert Says:
    November 29, 2009 at 10:34 pm

    That is an amazing module Mark! :o )

    Reply
  5. Raymond Says:
    January 22, 2010 at 11:16 am

    I’ve been testing the EviBlog module and it looks good to me. I noticed that when user submits his/her comments, the comments are immediately available on the blog, even though workflow is in place for the blog comments template. Is it possible to only publish the comments when the workflow is completed?

    Reply
  6. Paul Says:
    March 3, 2010 at 6:53 am

    Hi Mark,

    client in Australia wanting to use the blogs functionality but when i try to browse to a blog entry page i get “Object Ref not set” error.. Have you seen this before?

    [NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.]
    Sitecore.Modules.Eviblog.Managers.CategoryManager.GetCategories() +181
    Sitecore.Modules.Eviblog.UserControls.BlogCategories.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +33
    System.Web.Util.CalliHelper.EventArgFunctionCaller(IntPtr fp, Object o, Object t, EventArgs e) +14
    System.Web.Util.CalliEventHandlerDelegateProxy.Callback(Object sender, EventArgs e) +35
    System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +99
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +50
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +141
    System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain(Boolean includeStagesBeforeAsyncPoint, Boolean includeStagesAfterAsyncPoint) +627

    Reply
  7. ben637 Says:
    March 12, 2010 at 6:45 pm

    I have tried using the Eviblog recently and had problems getting it to work with LiveWritter. I am able to establish a connection but it says i have no active blogs. I have made sure i have ticked the livewritter option in the settings. I also noticed that in the video there appear to be items in the system/modules/eviblog/blogs folder. Mine is empty. I can only assume that there is supposed to be something in there. I also tried creating a proxy in there to see if that helped, but it didn’t.

    Anyone had this problem?

    Reply
    • Mark Says:
      March 13, 2010 at 12:00 am

      @Paul I haven’t seen this before. Did you modified anything or did the error occured after installation of the module?

      @ben637 In the system/modules/eviblog/blogs folder there needs to be an item based upon the settings (/sitecore/templates/Modules/EviBlog/Settings) template. The template has only one field which needs to contain the ID of the Blog item.

      Reply
  8. Sabrina Says:
    March 31, 2010 at 3:18 pm

    I’m interested in seeing some examples of this blog in action.

    If anyone has this up and running, could you post your URL?

    Thanks!

    Reply
  9. Ryan Says:
    May 25, 2010 at 8:52 pm

    Hi Mark! This module looks great, but I am getting the same null reference exception reported above. I receive it when I attempt to view the blog item that I created in the sitecore content tree. I created this item because after my installation (and full republish) there were no sample or test blogs created as indicated in the videos. This might be because my start path is different as I’m using an existing dev copy of sitecore rather than a fresh install. Any input is welcome as I would love to see this in action and utilize it if it fits all of our needs.

    Thanks!

    Reply
  10. @consultant Says:
    June 2, 2010 at 6:12 pm

    The eviblog module does not play nicely when it is installed in an existing sitecore instance. I tried installing the package into the starterkit and it did not work. Any ideas?

    Reply
  11. mike Says:
    July 12, 2010 at 6:59 pm

    You can “fix” the null reference exception error by creating a “Categories” folder under your blog node.

    Reply
  12. Chuck Says:
    July 19, 2010 at 6:03 pm

    I’m getting a null reference error too, but mine is coming from Blog.Initialize() rather than GetCategories(). Makes it hard to figure out what I’m missing. Are isnull conditional statements outlawed in Europe? :)

    Reply
  13. Chuck Says:
    July 19, 2010 at 6:53 pm

    Yay! The reason for the null ref error came from the rss checkbox being checked, but no rss item had been created.

    Reply

Leave a Reply