Wordpress: Mootools Commenting
My third proposal: This project will hope to produce a plugin to validate and send comments using ajax but powered by the mootools framework. The plugin would also feature the ability to let users modify their comment within 2 mins of posting it and would give admins quick ajax controls to modify, delete or report the comment as spam available on the front-end next to each comment.
This plugin would be useful for anyone who wants to enhance the commenting functionality of wordpress, but would be especially useful for people who are already using the mootools framework.
== Road Map ==
* Within the first month I would complete the basic ajax code for sending comment, with a simple framework for validating and verifying. Using the mootools framework I will also be able to achieve smooth slide-in and highlighting effects. This will be the first major milestone.
* In the second month I would give this a thorough cross-browser testing and also implement the other features outlined above.
* This leaves the last month as contingency in case I run into major problems earlier on, and plenty of time to fully test the final code, rewriting anything that can be made more efficient and checking that it all still degrades gracefully.
== Implementation ==
There are already separate existing plugins which provide some of these features but are nearly all written with other frameworks. I hope to use these as inspiration and build upon they’re combined success by creating a plugin that will handle all these features together. The code needs to be very well written so people can easily work with it, it should be well documented, it needs to be extremely robust and efficient and should self-diagnose common problems.
There is a very good plugin: ‘WP AJAX Edit Comments’, written on jquery that offers some of this functionality.
== How it will work ==
When the comment is submitted it will first be checked by client side javascript to ensure a valid email address and required fields are all filled in. Then it is sent to the server and put through the standard add comment procedure where it is re-checked. If this returns successfully to the original page this will display a confirmation and add the comment directly into the html code.
It will also display a timer from when the comment was first submitted counting down 2 mins with a link to re-editing the comment.
For admin users extra javascript code will be added when the page is created with links on each comment to modify, delete or report the comment as spam.
There will be an additional settings tab in the WordPress admin which will allow admins to setup the plugin as they like, adjusting options such as the time allowed for user comment editing.
== Mootools ==
I am very familiar with mootools and believe it is very well suited for this project. I will use the version 1.2 release using a minimal number of modules to keep the overhead to a minimum and speed & efficiency at a maximum.
Often frameworks are incompatible, and having more than one adds to the overhead, so this plugin will allow for developers who like to use mootools or want a specific mootools script such as JonDesign’s SmoothGallery within their post.
== About Me ==
I have long had an interest in WordPress and recently become more active in the WP community, mostly as developer of the plugin ‘pageMash’; which I have thoroughly enjoyed developing. I received a lot of great feedback including topic #161869, blog posts such as http://blueprintds.com/2008/03/12/organizing-pages-in-wordpress/, and have been listed in a top 10 WP CMS plugins.
I’m 18 years old and have been in web design and development for about 5 years now but have enjoyed programming ever since primary school. I do some web design work for local businesses; such as easyturn.co.uk and also contract out to a local web design company. I am experienced with coding standards and enjoy working with other developers. I attend College in the UK studying maths, physics and economics and have been accepted to study computer science at university next year. I am also a great lover of jazz 
GSoC — April 7th, 2008
@Reply April 25th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
This would be fantastic!
I think it would also be a very popular and well used plugin.
I agree that MooTools is best suited for this, a few of the plugins that do some of the features you have listed use “Scriptaculous”.
And we know from experience the difference MooTools makes over Scriptaculous from other projects such as:
Lightbox and Smallbox where a 250KB download was reduced to 12KB with more functions, and less bugs.
I am very excited about this plugin, and look forward to it being released.
Best of luck!
@Reply April 25th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
thanks for the comment pandaking. This was a proposal for GSoC 2008, but my code editor proposal was accepted in favour of this, so I’ll be spending most my summer producing that.
However I wrote this proposal because its something I wanted personally, and so I hope to get round to writing this plugin aswell sometime.
Cheers Joel.
also did you mean slimbox?