2016 was a pretty big year. We started with a CMS built and used internally for our client websites and by the end of the year, we had hoodies with the Coaster CMS logo on, over 100 stars on github, an honourable mention on Laravel News and well over 1,000 installs of Coaster through composer and packagist not to mention the 100 + followers on twitter and positive reviews beginning to pop up on the web. It’s been pretty exciting and we’re really encouraged by the feedback we’re getting on Coaster and its features, but we’re not done yet! I wanted to write this post to give you an idea of new Coaster CMS features that we will be adding in 2017 and beyond, so, here goes…
New Coaster CMS features in 2017
Some, or all of these are already on the coasterframework github page but, I’ve explained them in a bit more detail below:
- More themes and more ways to install them:
We’re really pleased with the them that we’ve created for Coaster but we recognise that this isn’t enough and we are working on creating a theme “store” for Coaster where designers and developers can upload to and users can install simply through the admin system of their Coaster installs. - Estimote beacon support: (This is now available in v5.3.24)
One of Coaster’s unique features is its support for beacons. Coaster currently supports Kontak.io’s API for assigning your site pages to physical locations/objects using beacons but we want to add options to this feature, one of which will be support for configuring Estimote beacons. - Better theme editing:
The current theme editor is pretty basic, but we plan to add features such as “add block of type x” / “add section” enabling designers and developers to build themes from the admin itself. - New block types:
Currently, we have plans for 2 new block types in 2017; Simple rich text editor which will use fewer TinyMCE features so will limit users where necessary for design purposes, and “selectable repeaters” which will enable a repeater in “Site-wide Content” or on a page to have a single row selected and displayed elsewhere. This could be useful if you want to put some default responses (say FAQs) somewhere and call them onto specific pages, meaning that you can even more context to your content. - Block folders:
We are going to standardise the display function of blocks so that all block types can use a file for display, meaning greater control of design. For example, a string block could be displayed with some surrounding text or HTML (you could create h1/h2/h3 blocks for example).
There are other things that I’m sure will crop up through the year as we continue to develop Coaster in conjunction with the community that is growing around it. If you want to get involved, do get in touch either through the website, on github or on the forum.
We’re looking forward to another great year and can’t wait to get these new Coaster CMS features implemented so that building websites is no longer a chore! Happy New Year from Coaster CMS!