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How can you tell that I really do like the latest K2 from Joomlaworks.! However, there are a few items that would make it a whole lot better, in my humble estimation. Perhaps if I nag Fotis enough, they may get implemented into a future update.

1. Front end editing controls

The way it stands now, when one either edits or creates a new item from the front end, the user is presented with a non-standard set of controls for saving or cancelling.

A couple clients of mine whose site was built with the first version of K2, and which had similar controls, were, to say the least, extremely surprised when they accidentally clicked on the ‘Reset’ (replaced in the current v2 version with an equally cryptic ‘Clear all form fields’) button … oops, there goes a very long edit. Therefore, my suggestion is that the same controls that are used in the backend create/edit item be used for the frontend as well.

Sort of a 'Part B' to this, would be to have a resizable edit popup window. As it is now, on a 1024px wide monitor, there is only a very thin sliver on the side where one is able to click in order to exit the edit popup.

2. reCAPTCHA on the K2 Login Module

I’m no PHP programmer by any stretch of the imagination but I cannot see how, as it is already available for the K2 Comments, that having this welcome spam-fighting addition would be very difficult to hook up.

3. XMLRPC integration for K2 Categories

If I was a plugin guru, and I am most certainly not, this would be one of my first priorities. It would be ever so nice to have the K2 Categories exposed to the MetaWeblog XMLRPC plugin as this would provide the ability to create and edit K2 items from such applications as Windows Live Writer (which, by the way, is being used to create this post – just copy & paste … for now) or the ScribeFire plugin for the Firefox browser. An additional benefit would be the ability to receive, unattended, posts from remote content creation services such as My Article Network.

As the title states, the site has now been converted to K2 from Joomlaworks. There now are no Joomla! Sections, Categories or Articles; all content is a K2 item. Additionally, there are three instances of the K2 ‘tools’ module, namely Latest Comments, Calendar and Tags. The K2 'Import Joomla! articles' was used to convert the previous Joomla! content. I have only begun to explore all the possibilities that this fantastic extension has to offer. Stay tuned.

The images in the Manual and Digital Artwork areas are displayed using the Simple Image Gallery plugin, also from Joomlaworks.

Artisteer 2.2 was used to create the new template, which was then modified 'by hand' to allow for the transparent header background as well as the link on the graphic. A step-by-step guide as to how this was accomplished will be available soon at www.2ninerniner2.com.

This is "Noah". Created in CorelDraw by tracing a scanned sketch I had made.  Follow along for the process ...

I love to doodle. Especially when I am on the phone. So it was one night when talking with my mother. For some reason, I seem to always start with the flight deck windows and go from there. If you look closely at the upper right side of the image, you can see the edge of the paper. Hmm ... this just isn't going to fit! Oh well, just carry on with a cartoon-ish version. 'Noah' is born!

That sketch was laying around on my desk when I was thinking about doing some more experimentation with CorelDRAW's 'Mesh Fill' tool. Hey, this will work just fine for that! Scanned it, brought it into CorelDRAW X3, put it on a separate layer and then used the pen tool to create the outlines using the underlying scanned image as a guide. Then started messing around with the mesh fills on the wings, horizontal stab and engine nacelles.

Added the rest of the detail and some colour, but was still lacking something. A smile! :) The colours are specific but I won't get into that at the moment. Suffice to say, those that know, 'know' :) The identifying logo has been removed from the vertical stab as well :)

The more I looked at it, the more I thought about how this could perfectly fit in with the 'Do Tell' theme. All that would be required is to change the colours ... and add some lips! :) Regarding the 'Do Tell' 'thang', again ... those that know, 'know' :) To reiterate from elsewhere, that's a long story! :)

Here are two more created with the same method as Noah.

• doodle up a rough sketch
• scan and import the sketch into CorelDraw
• set the scanned sketch as the base layer and then use the pen tool to trace over it
• complete the details with the other CorelDraw tools, notably the Mesh Fill tool

The rough doodle.

The finished product.

The rough sketch.

The finished product.