Modx is a great cms and the documentation is unreal. You can always find the answer to what you need. The community is great to.

Hate to see immerse cms bite the dust though. That was real nice too.I had a hard time choosing so i was using both--thank God--- I can't imagine whay Alex and Maz just up and left everybody hanging. I would not have expected it in a million years.

To lose this great cms is one thing, but to have it done the way it was,with no notice before or since,and it has been like 2 weeks, is unlike anything I have ever seem on the internet---anywhere...

I have my copy, but the question is what to do with it.

I think I will port the default template over to modx. It is a very nice template---MODX is not going anywhere---and even if they did they may just take the few seconds to notify their supporters and members of their forum before disappearing off the face of the earth.

Alex and Maz--you are great at what you do as far as coding ability--your lack of simple courtesy is not so great!!!!!!!!
Totally agree. It really looks like a Bliksem Hosting action we've got here. Hate to see it happen, ImmerseCMS is great, truly deeply great. It's very well thought out and easy to manage, use and extend. We've built a CRM, a product datbase, news module, recursive menu generator, RSS feeds, photo gallery and truckloads of order forms with that CMS in a short period of time, and each question we had was answered (well, almost. The last question we've asked was never answered, and now I know why) on their forums.

Sucks, I hope Maz and Alex read this. Perhaps if we name them a few times, Google picks up their names and they might respond here. So Maz and Alex: be cool and respond! :P

Well at least the account is not suspended anymore :confused:

www.immersecms.org

The bad news is it is now completeltly gone :mad: Maybe it is being tranferred ;)

But still, not a single comment from either Alex or Maz :eek:

Have they been taken hostage.Are they being held incomunicado... To tell you the truth I am getting a little worried about them. This is not normal behavior...Not at all!!!!!!

Nope. Perhaps contact Olate, their former webhost?

Somebody already did that quite a while ago. No host will ever discuss their clients/exclients except with the client.

http://www.olate.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?p=9732#post9732
:uzi:

Sucks. Just sucks. Darnit! Not even because Immerse is now history, but just for their Bliksem Hosting actions... but lets not shout too early, there might be personal problems or funding problems or whatever.

Sucks. Just sucks. Darnit! Not even because Immerse is now history, but just for their Bliksem Hosting actions... but lets not shout too early, there might be personal problems or funding problems or whatever.

I been trying to find out what happened to immerse as well.
The site has been down for 2 weeks. Last forum posts I read Maz saying Alex might be having some problems with health maybe? Not sure? But it would be nice to know what is going on.

I saw someone saying Maz was not nice and sometimes it could be the case, but to do a lot with a little I can him a little bit, but they should ask more people for help. I guess they got burned in entomite somewhat?

I would pay for the immersecms to be continued to be developed, that is how good it was to me. Perhaps they should open it up and others can continue. I have been in the process of writing a blog and other plug ins for it.
I was getting ready to get two more websites up and running and then found their site was down, so I stopped for now and was looking at the alternative cms's because I want something that will be supported.

If Immersecms is down permanetly, which will be very sad, does anyone have a suggestion for which other cms is the best for muli-language sites? I have looked at a few, Joomla and drupel are not for me, just too bloated. I have been looking at expression engine, but dont love it and I am not sure it is worth the money, which I dont mind paying.

Immerse had everyone beat hands down for many things, simplest cms I ever used and it just worked better than anything else out of the box. Course it was lacking a lot, but it was beta still.

Northbikerjr

Hey gang - I can confirm about the post on olate, that was me. It was more of a desperation move hoping it might bring either Maz or Alex out of the woodwork and give an account of what happened. Never really expected the hosting company to respond any differently than what they did - and I understand where they're coming from.

I was also on their immersecms forum and had downloaded Beta 1 and then Beta 2. No doubt about it - awesome cms application with plenty of potential.

I have to assume now that something rather serious happened. If it was personal, then it should remain so - and they have our best wishes for better days. Hope to see them both back sometime soon.

I hope there is nothing seriously wrong with either one of them too,however, it still possible to let the world know the status of immerse without getting too personal.

I think there has been irreparable damage done here.

I really hope it comes back,but the thought of this will forever be on my mind--and wondering if it will happen again.

I would not be at all surprised to see it turn up as a commercial cms.

I would not blame them for that,and I might pay for Immerse if it was reasonable.. This lack of communication is another story.

There would have to be a seriously good [plausible] reason that neither one of them could not manage to post something somewhere..

If immerse was not free it would be business suicide to do this.

If you have nothing to lose but the respect of hundreds of people and you are willing to lose it, than all is well I suppose.

I still think there is a good reason for this. It was just too abrupt and rude--I just can't imagine wtf it is...

Alex/Maz???????Hope you are ok.. Why not drop a line.

What do you suppose the guidelines are for continued use of the immersecms code? I assume that any one who has the code can continue to freely use it?

But what about the following approach - cms.schnio.eu?

I can see what this website is trying to do in filling the gap, but it looks like there is text copied from the previous immersecms.org site.

I wish any of those links worked especially to the developers and users guide...I can't believe I did not mirror that whole site. :mad:

I still hold out some dwindling hope that Alex and Maz did not do what it seems they did--and they will return with Beta3 :stickout:

We, as developing team, decided we still stick with this CMS and expand it ourselves. Its framework is already very mature and our coders have skills enough to fix bugs. Too bad there's no more support, and I hope nothing's wrong with either Maz or Alex, but we continue to use the CMS anyway :)

The topic at http://www.invisioncube.com/board/index.php?showtopic=10822 should answer any questions about ImmerseCMS.

David - I would really appreciate if you could post the pertinent details here on this forum. The link to invisioncube's forum only works for registered members. Many thanks!

Don

The post is:

As some have noticed, the Immerse CMS website has vanished. No great hardship there you might think.

On the Immerse domain was the following:

The complete code set for the new InvisionCube, which had been written to run under Immerse. It was being coded on a sub-domain there.

My design for the new InvisionCube. This was, in my view, the best design that I've ever done, and took several weeks to get just right.

All of the updated skins, which were being held on an IPB forum, on that same server.

So, for reasons that completely baffle me, I've lost everything that I've been working on for the past few months. Everything. To say that I am angry would be a gross understatement. I have no idea why Alex vanished (again!) and I have no idea if he's ever returning to Immerse CMS. He had full control over the Immerse CMS domain.

I feel both completely embarrassed and completely stupid. Stupid because Alex has done this to me before, and I was too trusting to believe he might do it again, and so didn't take any precautions against it. Embarrassed because, the last time I added an announcement, we had only one more module to complete, the percentage on the billing, and that would have been it.

Further embarrassed because, one of the last messages he wrote in his forum was that his router had blown. I grew increasingly suspicious of this as weeks passed. I do know that it doesn't take weeks to replace a bloody router, and yet I still didn't take remedial action. How much of an idiot am I?

Then there is all the work that I have put into Immerse CMS. The site itself, the design for the Manager interface, and more besides. All time that is now completely wasted. He has really taken the (BLEEP) out of me big time, and, as you might suspect, I'm bloody angry about it. He has plenty to show for all the time I've put in. I have absolutely nothing to show for the time he's put in, or for the time I've put in. If anyone knows where he is, I really want my (BLEEP)ing design back!

He knew full well that he had all of my work on there, so he can't go claiming ignorance. It's just downright selfish and callous behaviour. Nothing short of that.

As for InvisionCube now, I don't know. To try and redo everything again now would just further the embarrassment, and I'm not even sure it's technically possible anyway.

I'm sorry that I can't be more positive, but at this point in time, I have absolutely nothing to play with so don't know what to do. as it is, I'm paying hosting fees for nothing, and there's no way, whatever I do, that I'm going to be able to start selling skins again now for months. What a complete and utter (BLEEP)! Why do I fall for the same things over and over again!

For those interested in Immerse CMS, I don't know what to tell you either. I am as staggered as you no doubt are. I repeat, I have no idea why he closed shop. He certainly didn't speak to me about it, though I could have, in retrospect, spotted the signs. I have no idea if he's ever opening shop again. I suspect he won't because, even if there is no other reason, he should be too (BLEEP)ing embarrassed to do so.

I don't have any say or control over the Immerse CMS license and so as much as I would love to say "go continue to develop it as a product", I can't do that. Though, if I recall, the license allows you to do that for personal use. We had some really enthusiastic users who were doing an amazing job of spreading the word about the product, and I feel ashamed that we have ended this way for them. If I had just one splinter of control, it wouldn't have happened, that I promise you. It's shameful.

I saw someone saying Maz was not nice and sometimes it could be the caselol. How nice. Anyway...

I'm sorry that you guys had to suffer in silence for so long. Had I have been aware of this thread, I would have filled in the gaps sooner. My web-logs just picked it up this evening.

As has hopefully been made clear by now, I am essentially as much in the dark as you are, about why Immerse just vanished off the face of the earth. I had absolutely no warning of it. If I had, I would have been a little happier about it than I am now.

I do feel for those who have been using Immerse CMS. I know of at least one company which has been using it in earnest to build their client websites. What do they do now? I too placed a very important client on it, and am in the same position.

What do we all do? I'm not sure. I am 90% tempted to take the code and run with it, as I feel that my input to the project to date more than entitles me to do so. If Alex wants to try to sue me for that, then so be it. I see that crime as no greater than what he has effectively done -- stolen all my work.

I would personally be very saddened to see it discontinued as it had a huge potential. While I can't officially condone someone taking the development on, I don't think that would be as big a crime as letting it just vanish into the ether.

Whatever happens, the existing license does permit people to develop it for personal use, and make any changes they require for their own needs.

If history repeats itself, Alex will turn up in about a year, with a completely rebranded CMS, with a new name, and new domain. Then, I suspect, as he gets bored, it will vanish again. He has done this exact same thing before. It's no way to build confidence, and I am thoroughly embarrassed to be associated with it now. But hey, if we had the power of foresight...

Thanks everyone for the info and links. In particular I want to say thank you to Maz for taking the time to explain what transpired. I feel very badly for what has happened to you and your investment.

I have to say that I am totally flabbergasted with the outcome. It just all seems unbelievable - more like a bad nightmare than actual events!

As you remember from my participation on the immerse forum, I had a strong interest in the continued development of immersecms. While I can't offer the expertise that may be needed, if there is any thing I can do to help, let me know.

One thing I had started was trying to retrieve documentation from archives. Although not in the original format, so far I have retrieved the Immerse Tag Reference and the Text Transformer Reference. If enough of us get together, we might be able to put Humpty Dumpty back on the wall again! Maz, would that be enough to take you that last 10%?

Don

Wow, just .... wow. First off: hats of to Maz for coming here and explaining things. This sucks mate, really. It's hard to believe why Alex would just run off and shut of his server, taking everything with him into darkness. I'm not sure if you were refering to us, but we as company were and still are indeed building a big website in Immerse, and we're totally loving it so seeing it just vanish into nothing is well, painful.

All the best to Maz, I really hope you can find the power and will to continue doing what you do best.

lol. How nice. Anyway...

I'm sorry that you guys had to suffer in silence for so long. Had I have been aware of this thread, I would have filled in the gaps sooner. My web-logs just picked it up this evening.

As has hopefully been made clear by now, I am essentially as much in the dark as you are, about why Immerse just vanished off the face of the earth. I had absolutely no warning of it. If I had, I would have been a little happier about it than I am now.

I do feel for those who have been using Immerse CMS. I know of at least one company which has been using it in earnest to build their client websites. What do they do now? I too placed a very important client on it, and am in the same position.

What do we all do? I'm not sure. I am 90% tempted to take the code and run with it, as I feel that my input to the project to date more than entitles me to do so. If Alex wants to try to sue me for that, then so be it. I see that crime as no greater than what he has effectively done -- stolen all my work.

I would personally be very saddened to see it discontinued as it had a huge potential. While I can't officially condone someone taking the development on, I don't think that would be as big a crime as letting it just vanish into the ether.

Whatever happens, the existing license does permit people to develop it for personal use, and make any changes they require for their own needs.

If history repeats itself, Alex will turn up in about a year, with a completely rebranded CMS, with a new name, and new domain. Then, I suspect, as he gets bored, it will vanish again. He has done this exact same thing before. It's no way to build confidence, and I am thoroughly embarrassed to be associated with it now. But hey, if we had the power of foresight...

Maz I just wanted to say what I had before which was: I thought you and Alex did an incredible job. In my earlier post i said this, but I missed a word, I dont blame you for patrolling the forums and geting a little pissy with others sometimes, someone has to fend off some of the questions so developers can work. I know this as I work with developers everyday and am a developer as well. I knew you guys had a good thing going and it would only go up. I had read others saying you are patrolling the forums like Hitler, deleting posts going against immerse,etc, which I though was rather funny.

On to Immerse, it is sad that Alex did that to you, actually to everyone else as well, Us using Immerse. I guess it shows his lack of professionalism. I dont know how much of the layout and design was his versus yours, but overall I am very sadened to see the stopping of development on Immerse. I been looking at many of the CMS's out and still not satisfied with them as I am with Immerse, but I have to move on and forward and I cannot work on a CMS that isnt supported at least somewhat. Although I hate the big projects like joomla and such which are lacking and requiring you to piece everything together.

Now my only question is on the way the license works, could someone take the frame and build it into a new CMS? If that is the case perhaps you could get enough support of others and do that. It seems that you if anyone could have a legal right to it, you would. I am not sure if you want to, but it is an idea and that way everything is not lost. If you work hard you probably could regain the trust of the people working on it, etc.

It is just a thought, something to think about. I wish I had time now to build on another project, but I have my own development on top of developing all day so I am tapped out, but I have no problem with helping out if you decided to continue. Answering forum questions and posting help as I was doing with Immerse, you should decide soon though as most people are going to find alternatives. I already have downloaded several cms and while not happy, I will probably choose one that is similar to Immerse and has a good future.

If enough of us get together, we might be able to put Humpty Dumpty back on the wall again! Maz, would that be enough to take you that last 10%?As tempting as that is right now, and believe me it is, I was never the natural coder in the team. My skills were and are in design primarily. Alex was the reverse, which is what made us such a good team.

I can code in PHP of course but it would take me some time to get familiar with the code. As it stands, I've pretty much decided that I'm going to give it three months for Alex to surface with Immerse again. This will give me time to get done what I need to do with my own website. After that, it's open season as far as I'm concerned, and I will take the project, releasing it as GPL if I really have to. It's just stupid to let the project die.

Now my only question is on the way the license works, could someone take the frame and build it into a new CMS? If that is the case perhaps you could get enough support of others and do that. It seems that you if anyone could have a legal right to it, you would.I think we posted more or less at the same time.

Believe me I have the balls to take the code and run with it. I really do feel that I'm entitled to, and frankly, if Alex later felt he wanted to sue, then I'd happily take that on too.

I just need to give it some time, and to see if I can generate enough interest from experienced developers in revitalising the project.

We will help you out, our PHP coder knows the CMS by heart already ;)

Threads split to better keep track of topics.

I would be interested to see how Immerse develops.

... you can say that again! Hate to see it go. Thanks for splitting!

If someone decides to carry on Immerse, post it here and let everyone know. I will keep an eye on this thread. I still would like to see the development continued.

We can't let this beauty just die. If no one does it, we'll do it.

We can't let this beauty just die. If no one does it, we'll do it.Can I just suggest that we all give it 8 weeks from today for Alex to surface with a decent explanation. (Can't wait to see what that might be this time!)

After that, I say it's open-season on Immerse CMS. Though, whatever happens, I'd love to be kept up to date on any changes. I put a lot into that project!

I've subscribed to this thread so just post any update notifications here.

I would love to check this cms out because it sounds interesting

Can I just suggest that we all give it 8 weeks from today for Alex to surface with a decent explanation. (Can't wait to see what that might be this time!)

After that, I say it's open-season on Immerse CMS. Though, whatever happens, I'd love to be kept up to date on any changes. I put a lot into that project!

I've subscribed to this thread so just post any update notifications here.

That is very reasonable. 8 weeks is plenty of time to 'fix a broken router' ey? ;)

I understand about you want to be kept up-to-date, for sure. It must've been an awful lot of work to create what ImmerseCMS is already, front and back end!

I kept visiting the Immerse site periodically over the past few weeks - I was wondering where it went, and kept Googling about it, but did not find anything until just now. I was SurferJon on the Immerse site.

I have been making my new site on Immerse for the longest time, so I seriously hope it is brought back to life. I put so much time into building my website on the system...

Run with it, Maz! :p

We just have to wait and see. I can understand where everybody is coming from but we don´t really know what happened. Maybe Alex is really ill or something... he used to be very active in the Sitepoint Forums and his last entry was on August 28, so he didn´t just left Immerse. He was working in language query optimization and in optimization of the statistics module...

In the meantime, does anybody has a copy of the documentation (tags, db api, etc.) that they can share?

I would also like a copy of the patches... I believe there were between 10-12 patches.

@amygdela: are you willing to share or sell the modules that you guys have developed so far?

Hopefully Alex will come back...
hopefully he is healthy and well...

@amygdela: are you willing to share or sell the modules that you guys have developed so far?

Some modules are too custom to be useful for the crowd, but there are some publicy available modules on... the immerse site :(

I'll discuss this with the coder and see if we can make ready-to-install packages of them. FYI we've launched our first big Immerse-powered website today, on greenwish.nl.

amygdela - awesome website! and thank you for posting the site url so we can have a look. Other than the sites by Maz, I believe this may be the first major site published using immersecms?
Did you still want the debug on? In index.php set DEBUG to false on line 27, unless this is on purpose for the first while.

charliezen - I went into archives and got a start on collecting documentation but it isn't neat and tidy yet. Maybe we all need a temporary spot to hang out and share user information until the 8 weeks are over like Maz suggested. Any ideas?

@amygdela - nice site indeed... even to the detail of the green grass at the bottom. Very well thought and designed.

@donfish - I went to cms.schnio.eu and it was supposed to be a mirror of ImmerseCMS, but he copied some things and all the links went to the Immerse site so the only thing he/she has available is a copy of Immerse with his mod (rss I think) included.

I will contact her/him tomorrow to see if we can upload the bits and pieces that we have in the site until we have all the info together and wait for the 8 week period.

Reading the Immerse License it mentions that we can do anything we want to the software as long as we do not change the name (or fork it or something) but as it is going to be the same name and software....

we´ll see...

For now I have 2 sites running on Immerse, my own and one other, but I am not sure I will stay on Immerse with no support. I been looking for a replacement now.

I just took a look at CMS made simple/Movable Type 4(will go opensource later this year)/expressionengine last night and while they are all ok, I still like the Immerse user interface of Immerse, Immerse is so easy to maintain a website, just needs more development.

I think the Greenwish site proves that with Immerse you can make clean, great looking sites, which run very fast.

Before Immerse went down, I was putting together an immerse guide here: http://beginnersoft.com/Immerseguide/ but it is not even close to being complete. I dont think I have the official Immerse help guide. But you can get most of the textual help by googling: Guide site:Immersecms.org and then clicking the cached versions.

Over the weekend, I think I can post a link here to my website with the Immerse files, I am pretty sure I have all the patches and I have the beta2, but I am not sure on the actual beta2 file.

amygdela - awesome website! and thank you for posting the site url so we can have a look. Other than the sites by Maz, I believe this may be the first major site published using immersecms?

I'm not sure, but I haven't seen much ICMS powered websites yet, so it could be.

Did you still want the debug on? In index.php set DEBUG to false on line 27, unless this is on purpose for the first while.
sh1t, forgot that thank you very much!!!

@amygdela - nice site indeed... even to the detail of the green grass at the bottom. Very well thought and designed.
That's cool, thank you as well :)

I think the Greenwish site proves that with Immerse you can make clean, great looking sites, which run very fast.

Thanks :) Indeed, the site is quite fast indeed. I love ICMS's optimization and caching, makes your site runs like a cat through water.

Thanks for all comments!

@donfish - I went to cms.schnio.eu and it was supposed to be a mirror of ImmerseCMS, but he copied some things and all the links went to the Immerse site so the only thing he/she has available is a copy of Immerse with his mod (rss I think) included.
RSS is already present in BETA2 ImmerseCMS, so he has done nothing but well... ripping contents :)

One idea that might work is for an immersecms help group to get organized with gmail accounts and form a Google Group. It won't cost anyone and there won't be any one person/website/company amongst us appearing to take advantage of the vacuum. The group would be open to interested parties that identify themselves here. They can continue to help each other until the 8 weeks are over and then we proceed from there. Anyone interested?

I wish I had a copy of the docs to provide, but I don't even have a copy of the distributed Immerse, let alone the docs. That shows how stupid I was!

Re: Google group. I'm not a fan of the idea, but that's because I am a user-centric nut, not a developer-centric nut. If I said to my Dad, there's a Google group all about product x, he wouldn't have a clue what I was talking about. If I said, visit thedomain.com, even he would know what that meant.

The user MUST come first for me, and that was indeed the spirit of Immerse, at least I thought it was.

Re the above referenced website, you really need to run that through a validator. target and align in an XHTML 1 Strict document? I don't think so! :)

Result: 12 errors / 0 warnings

line 153 column 54 - Error: there is no attribute "target"
line 218 column 9 - Error: end tag for element "p" which is not open
line 227 column 40 - Error: there is no attribute "width"
line 230 column 136 - Error: required attribute "alt" not specified
line 231 column 29 - Error: there is no attribute "align"
line 235 column 136 - Error: required attribute "alt" not specified
line 240 column 136 - Error: required attribute "alt" not specified
line 297 column 11 - Error: end tag for element "dt" which is not open
line 298 column 35 - Error: document type does not allow element "td" here
line 298 column 126 - Error: end tag for element "dd" which is not open
line 299 column 10 - Error: end tag for "td" omitted, but OMITTAG NO was specified
line 298 column 7 - Info: start tag was here
line 299 column 10 - Error: end tag for "td" omitted, but OMITTAG NO was specified
line 290 column 7 - Info: start tag was here

Yeah I know, but its not like the website doesn't work when it doesn't validate. We were on a very, very tight schedule for this website and therefore I sometimes choose the ugly way out.

If theres enough interest, and enough coders/designers come about and alex doesn't return, I'd be more than glad to "help" sponsor the project :)

I wish I had a copy of the docs to provide, but I don't even have a copy of the distributed Immerse, let alone the docs. That shows how stupid I was!

Go easy on yourself Maz - it seemed to all of us that you had an ideal partnership, so who woulda thunk it.:confused:

Do you hold any copyright over the documentation that appeared in the ImmerseCMS website?

I would be happy to pass along the documentation that I have recovered to date - as available through archives. My goal here was to recover info that I could personally use in the absence of the ImmerseCMS website. But if this content can be distributed in an equitable manner - happy to oblige.

My preference would be to send the documentation to you and help you get your feet back on the ground ASAP. But your request for 8 weeks makes sense and I respect that. So that is why I suggested the Google Group idea.

Re: Google group. I'm not a fan of the idea, but that's because I am a user-centric nut, not a developer-centric nut. If I said to my Dad, there's a Google group all about product x, he wouldn't have a clue what I was talking about. If I said, visit thedomain.com, even he would know what that meant.
The user MUST come first for me, and that was indeed the spirit of Immerse, at least I thought it was.

My concept of the Google Group would be a temporary repository that a number of people could contribute to. In 8 weeks time there could be a substantial amount of material recovered from archives and cached pages - enough to rebuild the site, which at that time would deposited in a domain even your Dad could find (any ideas yet for a new domain name? I have a couple of ideas but would rather PM them to you).

BTY - I also have an untouched stock version of ImmeresCMS Beta 2 (no patches) installed on a subdomain (currently off-line) that you are free to "play" with - I would grant you admin rights. It has the potential to be a repository of recovered documentation and then the database could be exported to use at your domain of choice. Ultimately - if you are going to regain control of this project - you will need your own domain and a hosting package that you control.

Donfish, what we could do is setup a wiki with the documentation in it ;)

Also, I got stylecp.com/net/org that could be used for the project, at no charge :)

Heh - the wiki could work too. But, seems to me I recall a rather scathing review of wiki by Maz in a blog article. Let's see what he says!

Is styleCP.com your domain?

The wiki can be set so only certain people can edit, if I recall :)

Yes, I own the set of 3 domains. They were bought for a project that didn't work out, so I have them sitting around now :) (They need a good home for a good project)

I like where this is going!
We could do all three... a main site stylecp.com for all to find, with a wiki on it to start importing the docs that we have and a google group to "mimic" the forums at immerse and start helping each other.

I have a copy of Immerse in zip format without patches and some of the developer docs in text format... I am missing the patches and the tags docs...

All this will help the project and us... if Alex returns, well, this stuff will work as a "mirror", if he doesn't we will have advanced a lot... instead of starting to do all these eight weeks from now!!!

Let's go for it...

Seems as if interest was lost in this? I've got the domain setup, installing a wiki if you guys are really interested :)

Nah, it was the weekend, they will be here soon...
Go ahead and install the wiki and a place to upload files... I will start with the main Immerse zip file and two or three guides...

if you build it they will come... :-)

Yup, the weekend had a lot to do with it. The bigger issue for me is knowing where Maz wants to go with this. Without some level of approval from him, I am simply not comfortable with anything that involves distribution of files. A trip to the Netherlands would be nice but I would sooner travel under the pretense of holiday rather than court date if Alex pursues the legal part!

Speaking of legalities, does anyone have experience with these situations? I know when I downloaded the software there were legal terms on the immersecms website. But in my download package I can't find the text and of course without the website there is no official legal document to follow now. I know Dean posted something on his blog, I assume obtained from cached files, but ignoring that source: what law applies when there is no official document available?

I've the immerse cms beta 2 files and al the patches. So if you guys have a site for it, i could be upload it ;)

Yup, the weekend had a lot to do with it. The bigger issue for me is knowing where Maz wants to go with this. Without some level of approval from him, I am simply not comfortable with anything that involves distribution of files. A trip to the Netherlands would be nice but I would sooner travel under the pretense of holiday rather than court date if Alex pursues the legal part!

Speaking of legalities, does anyone have experience with these situations? I know when I downloaded the software there were legal terms on the immersecms website. But in my download package I can't find the text and of course without the website there is no official legal document to follow now. I know Dean posted something on his blog, I assume obtained from cached files, but ignoring that source: what law applies when there is no official document available?

Understandable about the approval :) I've got the wiki setup, we can at least start recompiling the documentation, if anything it'll help Maz in the long run :)

About the legalities, it depends on what exact license the package was distributed under.

www.stylecp.com/wiki/ if you guys would like to start working on it, PM me and I'll give ya perms that you need or w/e :) Also, could someone upload a copy of the cms so I can install it in the root directory?

I don't see anything wrong in the "legal" end of things... we are not doing anything illegal. The license indicates that we can use the software and even modify the source as we wish. The only restrictions are to change the name of the software, reverse engineer it or fork it... and we are not doing anything of that sort.

We could have enabled a wiki and forums when ImmerseCMS was running smoothly and even then it would have been OK to do it...

@Mr. Obvious: please go ahead and give me permits to the wiki, I cannot PM you because I do not have enough replies yet!!

I have gone ahead and reated a Google group named ImmerseCMS so we can start uploading original files and patches and try to recreate the forum topics, so we can help eachother... does anybody remembers some of the forum Topics/subjects/Titles?

@sssander: could you upload the patches into the ImmerseCMS google group? We already have a copy of the software zip... thanks!

Looks like this will be a good way to get started with gathering ImmerseCMS people together. As we get the wiki figured out that can also be built - thanks for starting that Mr.Obvious. In the mean time, the Google Group that charliez created can be found here:

http://groups.google.com/group/immersecms?hl=en

To join you simply need to first register for a free gmail account and then follow the simple steps for joining the group.

Yup, the weekend had a lot to do with it. The bigger issue for me is knowing where Maz wants to go with this. Without some level of approval from him, I am simply not comfortable with anything that involves distribution of files.Sorry, guys. As you may know already, we were rebuilding my website (e-commerce enabled) in Immerse. Now that has vanished, it has left me with a huge rush of work that I have to do. I would strongly suggest mailing me (young.maz@googlemail.com) if you need my input on anything. I never ignore emails, whereas I don't always get to websites that readily.

A trip to the Netherlands would be nice but I would sooner travel under the pretense of holiday rather than court date if Alex pursues the legal part!Whereas my motives would be entirely different, I assure you. :)

Speaking of legalities, does anyone have experience with these situations? I know when I downloaded the software there were legal terms on the immersecms website. But in my download package I can't find the text and of course without the website there is no official legal document to follow now.I wondered about this you know. I lay in bed the other night wondering if Alex had the sense to put the license in the distribution zip. If not, then, as you say, what are you supposed to use as a reference for what is legal and what isn't, in terms of the, what was a custom license.

Heh - the wiki could work too. But, seems to me I recall a rather scathing review of wiki by Maz in a blog article. Let's see what he says!You are correct. I detest the entire "Wiki" thing with a passion that should ideally be reserved for standing in a dog's mess. I hate the loose editing style, I detest the silly and pointless tags (whatever happened to good old HTML which almost everyone knows?), and I hate how downright scruffy they look. I've yet to see a nice looking Wiki. But hey, that's me. If you're happy that there is no way on God's earth that I would ever contribute to a Wiki, then go for it. Why not.

As for what now... I "know" as much as anyone else does. Though, I am in a position to speculate a little more I guess. Here's what I think.

I do not think we will see Alex on this project again. If for no other reason than sheer embarrassment at leaving so many people in such a state, and, I would hope, most of all, "stealing" all of my work (for that is what I see it as). I also know that he uses Google notifications to receive new comments and things about Immerse, and so he will have read my scathing and heart-felt views on him.

I suspect what will happen is what happened before. He'll buy a new domain, rewrite the Immerse CMS code a little, change the interface, and give it an entirely different name. Though don't expect that to happen for about a year.

Someone stated he might be ill. Yes, he might be, but as others have stated before, he could have said so before vanishing. I knew things were amiss before he vanished, and I asked him so many times if things were okay, as things just seemed to crawl to a halt, and my site was taking an age to complete, even though there was so relatively little to do on it. So he had ample opportunity to say something. He didn't.

I think, for clarity, I would say if he hasn't surfaced with objections by Jan 01, then just do as you will with it. (Though I would hate to see someone go commercial with it. That would seem very unfair indeed.)

I will gladly give my support and as much permission as is valid from me to do so. (Though I suspect that doesn't legally account for much, as I was the interface design and website guy, not the code guy.) But in any legal challenge (though, I think the chances of that happening would be less than being bitten by a snowball in a Texan summer), I would happily stand my ground and argue my case for supporting a new continuance, based on my provable input to the Immerse CMS project.

Do I want to be involved in any future incarnation? That depends really. I am quite a miserable old twat by any definition, in terms of how I think software should function, and who it should cater to. Typically, I don't get on well with GPL projects, as they have too many people fighting over the pettiest of things, and the projects usually suffer as a result.

I also find that many (most) GPL projects tend to just do unfriendly things like throw the files on sourceforge or somewhere like that, bang a Wiki up, and then expect the "customer" to just learn whatever is needed to use them. I absolutely detest that mentality, so much. It cheapens any project to me, and worse still, makes it available only to a select few "tech-heads".

Both Alex and I stated, from the start, that Immerse CMS would just work. It wouldn't need a technical degree, the site wouldn't be dogged with buzz-words for the technical to lap up, and it would be in a format that most people on the Internet would be familiar with - a website. Isn't that what Immerse CMS does, after all? It should also be noted that I am not a natural coder. Alex taught me most of what I know over the years. I built my own website with PHP, and implemented full e-commerce, and more besides, but I'm not a natural - I struggle! :) A designer, sure. I can design until I'm blue in the face and quicker than the eye can see, but not so with code....

So, in essence, sure I'd love to be involved, but I'm busy enough and old enough to be selective in what I get into. I don't like the petty squabbles, prefer smaller dedicated groups of people who ALL have the same vision, detest cheap effort-less project websites, and can't code for toffee. :) Whatever else, you shouldn't feel that I need to be involved in whatever splinter of Immerse CMS you create, if you choose to do so. I don't feel that way at all.

I would rather work with those I see have the right vision for the project, than just jump on the first wagon. If that means nobody has the right vision and I end up leaving Immerse CMS entirely, so be it. As I said, I'm old enough and busy enough to be getting on with other things.

P.S. There would be tears from me, if someone took the project on, but didn't care about the W3C validation for the manager interface that Alex and I worked tirelessly on. It's bloody rare to see something so sophisticated have 100% W3C compliance. Losing that would be the biggest shame of all.

Hi Maz - thanks for checking in, offering additional insight on where you stand with ImmerseCMS and for answering my questions. As you suggest I'll take the email route next time.

For now, there a few Immerse folks meeting at the Google Group. Please feel welcome to join the group or at least check in periodically on what is happening.

The main objective is to salvage as much documentation as possible from archived and cached files. Unfortunately it is tough sledding as the code needs cleaning up to remove old site links and image references that no longer work. Hindsight now but I sure wish I had copied some pages before the site disappeared!

Take care Maz.

Don

The main objective is to salvage as much documentation as possible from archived and cached files.Really wish I was able to offer more than there is. I even offered to pay a month of hosting at the time directly to the host. Unfortunately, the data had been deleted from the server by then, and even with a backup, the database data wouldn't have been there, which is really what was needed.

I sure wish I had copied some pages before the site disappeared!heh. YOU wish? :)

P.S. There would be tears from me, if someone took the project on, but didn't care about the W3C validation for the manager interface that Alex and I worked tirelessly on. It's bloody rare to see something so sophisticated have 100% W3C compliance. Losing that would be the biggest shame of all.

+100 for Maz on this one. I studied your coding on the ICMS interface and all I can say is: wow. Losing that would indeed be just like losing ICMS.

Sounds like you guys have never heard of Archive dot org. ;)

EDIT: Darn, I can't post links yet.

Go to Archive dot org, type in the old Immerse site's URL, and it will display all the pages it has archived. I think it got everything.

Have fun!

archive.org doesn't save it all, but it's a good reference for textual contents and some images.


--

I still think we should all let Maz decide what's happening next. I assume he haven't heard anything from Alex yet?

Sounds like you guys have never heard of Archive dot org. ;)

EDIT: Darn, I can't post links yet.

Go to Archive dot org, type in the old Immerse site's URL, and it will display all the pages it has archived. I think it got everything.

Have fun!

Already taken care of that one, was just commenting on how much easier it would have been with the original content and images. We have a discussion group going and the bulk of the documentation, as collected from the archives, is posted there. SurferJon and amygdela - I encourage you both to join the group and get involved - thanks.

http://groups.google.com/group/immersecms (http://groups.google.com/group/immersecms)

Been following this with interest as I'm looking for a good cms. I have been looking into CMSMS but am now intrigued with ImmerseCMS. I just joined the google group and am feeling my way around there, but in the meantime, I would appreciate any comments comparing CMSMS vs ImmerseCMS you all might have. Particularly:
ease of use between the two
ease of customization

Also, any links to sites using ImmerseCMS would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

lol. How nice. Anyway...

I'm sorry that you guys had to suffer in silence for so long. Had I have been aware of this thread, I would have filled in the gaps sooner. My web-logs just picked it up this evening.

As has hopefully been made clear by now, I am essentially as much in the dark as you are, about why Immerse just vanished off the face of the earth. I had absolutely no warning of it. If I had, I would have been a little happier about it than I am now.

I do feel for those who have been using Immerse CMS. I know of at least one company which has been using it in earnest to build their client websites. What do they do now? I too placed a very important client on it, and am in the same position.

What do we all do? I'm not sure. I am 90% tempted to take the code and run with it, as I feel that my input to the project to date more than entitles me to do so. If Alex wants to try to sue me for that, then so be it. I see that crime as no greater than what he has effectively done -- stolen all my work.

I would personally be very saddened to see it discontinued as it had a huge potential. While I can't officially condone someone taking the development on, I don't think that would be as big a crime as letting it just vanish into the ether.

Whatever happens, the existing license does permit people to develop it for personal use, and make any changes they require for their own needs.

If history repeats itself, Alex will turn up in about a year, with a completely rebranded CMS, with a new name, and new domain. Then, I suspect, as he gets bored, it will vanish again. He has done this exact same thing before. It's no way to build confidence, and I am thoroughly embarrassed to be associated with it now. But hey, if we had the power of foresight...


Hi maz.. Im sorry to hear this.. however out of kindness i will be able to host your projects again if you want. You and Alex have both helped me with my site and im more than happy to give a helping hand.. feel free to mail me at tone79@tele2.no.