We all liked the concept of the copy Design feature – that's in the Page Settings area, and gives you the ability to apply a skin to the sub pages of a site and I found it quite handy on many sites. It's like the Copy Permissions feature that allows you to push roles through the sub pages under the current one, without having to manually go in and set them. So these are handy features to have and while they may not be used often, when you're trying to finish a site are going to really appreciate these two significant updates.
But I am getting tempted to seriously consider updating with this new little number 4.7 – with the import and export features at page level, what a great thing you've got here building pages on the fly. Sure we've got the Add/Copy page function, where we can select the modules from a page, then, use the very cool copy / new / reference function to populate that page. And sure we've got the import/export feature that is set at module level (of course this depends on whether the modules is exportable too) but wow, this import / export feature is great. I admit – I'm sold on it.
We've all see the option when create a page, where you can choose a page template that by default adds a text html module to the page, but the ability to import or export a single page wasn't there. I know there are videos and instructions on helping you create them, but in a business sense, it was still limiting time wise.
You can import and export, with and without content. I haven't tested it on all modules, so not 100% sure on how it works with modules that don't have an import/export feature themselves, but will test over the next few days. I really like this feature – It will be very handy for me at least and I'm sure that by the time I share with a few clients, building sites will be more streamlined.
Importing the page gives you some options on the fly – like replacing or creating from new, through to choices on how you want view the page – to edit further, perhaps skin or permissions, or to view the page, allowing you to start editing the modules, so on the surface, this has been a very nifty and handy enhancement to DNN.
It's been a while since I've really spent time on looking at DNN before it's released. I used to alot of testing, but it is very time consuming, especially when doing test upgrades to see if the process works as expected. I felt for a long time, DNN simply doesn't quite cut to the chase when it comes with solid releases due to lack of real testing. However, I like to look at as many DNN builds as time permits possible to compare with the previous and give evaluation on whether it is worth upgrading to the latest version. It's an ongoing journey as less and less testing these days leaves us with a 'trick or treat' situation on some builds, so it's worth watching the pioneers forge ahead and sort out the problems before taking the plunge to upgrade without some sort of development strategy behind you.
Sometimes, unless there is a real need, eg security or some hellishly annoying bug or some amazing feature I can't live without, the decision to upgrade is now becoming one that needs serious consideration. While not being a developer, I get my hands dirty in most other ways with DNN and I thank goodness there are such outstanding developers around with a great handle on DNN these days who are taking dnn to another level.
But back to basics, there is always the need to test, evaluate and consider in any release, the real need to keep updated to the latest version. So it's quite exciting to see a couple of things from an administration point of view, that are handy and I feel are very welcome and will be appreciated by those who are deploying sites. This version of DNN with the page import and export features gets the thumbs up from me. An excellent enhancement and one that will be well received I'm sure.
Nina Meiers