If you look under the hood of the template you will notice that it’s very much based on the default Pligg template “Wistie”. I performed many of the changes through editing the CSS file. I designed this template because I know that a lot of users don’t want to start designing a template from Wistie because it’s a 3 column template. It didn’t take much work to change Wistie to a 2 column template. From there I just added some images and adjusted the width of a few template files to match the new 2 column format. Hopefully this template will be used to generate some free 2 column templates that others can contribute to the Pligg Templates forum.

The new template allows users to vote either up or down on stories, in some cases resulting in negative numbers appearing. A story still needs to reach a set positive number in order to become “published”, but once it is published it can go negative and remain on the homepage. The Standard will be included as a second template with the next release of Pligg, but we cannot guarantee long term support for it. You can learn more about the template by viewing the official The Standard template thread.

Download The Standard Template from the Pligg Forums

Demo The Standard Template at pligg.com/demo/

The most exciting feature for Pligg 1.0.0 is that we are now supporting 3 languages. During the installation process you will be able to select from English, German and Thai languages. By selecting one of these languages it will change the language of your entire Pligg site and admin panel. If you are interested in translating Pligg to another language please join the Pligg Translator Google Group.

The release date for 1.0 Final will probably be Tuesday, June 16, 2009. I hoped to release mid next week, but I suddenly have to travel all of next week and I won’t be able to work my normal 12 hours a day. Unless something major happens between now and the 16th you can expect the 1.0 release to be out soon. Until then you can grab the latest SVN versions for the latest bug fixes and features.

We will be ending the donation drive, and stop making the Magazeen template and Plingger module available for donors after 1.0 is out. If you want to get your hands on the Magazeen template or Plingger module you must have your donation of $20 or more in before 1.0 final is released. I suggest that you take advantage of the offer because Magazeen is really great template that I’ve put a lot of time into and it’s a great deal for just $20.

Update: Pligg 1.0.0 is out now and can be downloaded from the forums. Release notes and a dedicated blog post will come soon. As you might expect we’re busy at work now.

The page will also detect a few other problems such as PHP features that might not be turned on for your server, resulting in a broken Pligg. This will help you figure out if your server is compatible with Pligg, and even give you some instructions on fixing some problems. We aren’t asking for anything radical, just PHP 5 and MySQL 5 along with a few standard options like the GD Graphics Library and fopen. Even if you find your server setting off some red flags on the troubleshooter page your server will probably work. The red warnings only serve as a guideline for supported servers. You may find more errors on your server if it doesn’t come up all green.

RC5 Changelog:

• Many SEO updates and fixes
• Better foreign language support for UTF-8 Characters
• Future upgrades will automatically make edits to your language file so after 1.0 final you will never need to manually update it.
• Group admins can now be notified by email when a user requests to join a Private or Restricted group
• About page is now a “page”, editable from the Admin Pages section
• Related links now hides itself when no results are found
• Password reset now sends a more detailed email to users
• Google search method removed.
• ReCaptcha now better blends in to the Wistie template
• Multiple sidebar widgets were moved into modules

We are continuing to work on improving foreign language support and thanks to forum user Techkr who has contributed Thai translation files we are prepared to launch Pligg 1.0 with at least 1 language other than English. We hope that more translators will be contributing their languages to the Pligg translation project so that we can have several languages out soon after 1.0 is released.

Our latest SVN version (Revision 556) takes care of some URL Method 2 issues and cleaned up a few bad choices that we made in the past, or were just plain mistakes. Pagination is now working with the SEO URLs and there is very little left to fix at this point. A few more items to check off of the SEO URL todo list and we will be ready for primetime.

The last item that needs tested is the reason why I’m writing this blog entry. It would be very helpful if some users could volunteer to test the upgrade process going from Beta 9.9.5 to the latest SVN revision (see the link above). It’s very difficult catching every bug and hiccup that occurs during an upgrade so the more input I get from others the better. I know that the template and language files are going to be the biggest pain for people upgrading. Users need to pay attention to the readme.html file included with Pligg so that they won’t miss some critical instructions. Wish me luck tomorrow as I start my week of upgrade testing and try to make Pligg polished for our 1.0 release.

First, let me explain how the stats work by giving you some example URLs that you can use to fetch download counts. The main url http://www.pligg.com/download_count.php gives you the total number of downloads that we are able to track. Now if you add some parameters to this URL you can get the stats for the average downloads per hour, week, day or year. Here’s an example of the day average url: http://www.pligg.com/download_count.php?stat=day.

The numbers being generated here are updated a couple times an hour, so you won’t see the download count increasing with each page refresh. I bet your asking yourself how this number is being generated, well it’s a mix of hard-coded numbers and numbers that are continually being fetched from the vBulletin forum MySQL database. We used to use a downloads section of the site for hosting Pligg over a year ago, but since we switched that part of the site off the old versions of Pligg are no longer available. Since users can’t download them we know that the number for those versions isn’t going to change so we added up those numbers. Then we wrote a script that connects to the MySQL database and finds the download count for all of the working downloads from the Current Version forum. Then we add all of those numbers up into one figure representing Pligg.com downloads. I then hard coded some download figures provided by sourceforge.net and softpedia.com for some of our older versions and added them to the total figure. The end result of all of these numbers is our total download count.

To generate an average daily count I wanted to discard a lot of the older download data since it wasn’t tracked very well and decided to only calculate the number of downloads from Pligg RC1 or newer. I took the total number of release candidate versions and then divided them by the number of days between the current date and the release date for RC1. The end result gives you an average daily download number (rounded to the nearest whole number) which the average hourly, monthly and yearly stats are based on.

<?php
$downloadcount = file_get_contents('http://www.pligg.com/download_count.php');
echo $downloadcount;
?>

Above is a quick example of how you could use PHP to grab the download number inside of a PHP script to display the number. We are using this method to display the Download Stats currently found at the top right of the Pligg Blog. If you are interested in the complete source code for this download counter script designed for vBulletin sites, please view the full article URL for the PHP source.

<?php

// This download counter grabs the number of downloads tracked by
// the Pligg Forums, Sourceforge and other sites to be added in later
// It must manually be updated whenever a new download is added to
// the forums.

// First we need to connect to the vBulletin forum MySQL database
$conn = mysql_connect("localhost", "USERNAME", "PASSWORD");
if (!$conn) {
    echo "Unable to connect to DB: " . mysql_error();
    exit;
}
if (!mysql_select_db("DATABASENAME")) {
    echo "Unable to select database name: " . mysql_error();
    exit;
}

// Now lets get the download numbers for each version of Pligg.
// Use postid for posts that only have 1 download, attachmentid for posts with more than 1 attachment.

// Beta 4
$B4 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  postid = 4";
$B4result = mysql_query($B4);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B4result)) {
    $B4count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B4result);

// Beta 5
$B5 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  postid = 13";
$B5result = mysql_query($B5);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B5result)) {
    $B5count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B5result);

// Beta 6.01
$B601 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  postid = 1058";
$B601result = mysql_query($B601);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B601result)) {
    $B601count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B601result);

// Beta 7
$B7 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  postid = 1888";
$B7result = mysql_query($B7);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B7result)) {
    $B7count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B7result);

// Beta 9.8.1
$B981 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  postid = 40434";
$B981result = mysql_query($B981);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B981result)) {
    $B981count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B981result);

// Beta 9.9.5
$B995 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  attachmentid = 1759";
$B995result = mysql_query($B995);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($B995result)) {
    $B995count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($B995result);

// 1.0 RC1
$rc1 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  attachmentid = 1759";
$rc1result = mysql_query($rc1);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($rc1result)) {
    $rc1count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($rc1result);

// 1.0 RC2
$rc2 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  attachmentid = 1798";
$rc2result = mysql_query($rc2);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($rc2result)) {
    $rc2count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($rc2result);

// 1.0 RC3
$rc3 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  attachmentid = 1859";
$rc3result = mysql_query($rc3);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($rc3result)) {
    $rc3count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($rc3result);

// 1.0 RC4
$rc4 = "SELECT counter
        FROM   attachment
        WHERE  attachmentid = 1876";
$rc4result = mysql_query($rc4);
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($rc4result)) {
    $rc4count = $row["counter"];
}
mysql_free_result($rc4result);

/*
echo 'Pligg Forum Downloads <br />';
echo 'Beta 4:' .$B4count. '<br />';
echo 'Beta 5:' .$B5count. '<br />';
echo 'Beta 6.0.1:' .$B601count. '<br />';
echo 'Beta 7:' .$B7count. '<br />';
echo 'Beta 9.9.5:' .$B995count. '<br />';
echo '1.0 RC1:' .$rc1count. '<br />';
echo '1.0 RC2:' .$rc2count. '<br />';
echo '1.0 RC3:' .$rc3count. '<br />';
echo '1.0 RC4:' .$rc4count. '<br />';
*/

// Add up all of the Pligg Forum Downloads
// The number values are from the retired downloads section that we used to use, which are no longer active
$subtotal = $B4count + $B5count + 993 + $B601count + $B7count + 1003 + 1414 + 3382 + 4109 + 10494 + 21342 + $B995count + $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
// echo 'Subtotal: ' .$subtotal. '<br />';

// Add the SourceForge totals as of 04/14/2009
$sftotal = 7744 + 14184 + 9393 + 8341 + 15295 + 14305 + 8043 + 2516 + 1901 ;
// echo 'Sourceforge: ' .$sftotal. '<br />';

// misc represents softpedia.com
$misc = 1115 + 50 ;
// echo 'Other: ' .$misc. '<br />';

// Add up all of the subtotals
$totaldl = $subtotal + $sftotal + $misc;

// Now it checks if the url specifies a source for the download number
// URL values are ?source=sourceforge , ?source=forums and ?source=misc
if(!isset($_GET['stat']))	{
	// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
	$formatted_total = number_format($totaldl);
	// Output the final total number
	echo $formatted_total;
} else {
	$stat = $_GET['stat'];
	if ( $stat == "sourceforge" ) {
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_sourceforge = number_format($sftotal);
		echo $formatted_sourceforge;
	}
	if ( $stat == "home" ) {
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_subtotal = number_format($subtotal);
		echo $formatted_subtotal;
	}
	if ( $stat == "misc" ) {
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_misc = number_format($misc);
		echo $formatted_misc;
	}
	if ( $stat == "hour" ) {
		// Finds the average number of downloads per hour from Pligg 1.0 RC start date
		$pliggstart = strtotime( "2009/01/30" );
		$today = strtotime( date("Y/m/d") );
		$timediff = abs(($today - $pliggstart) / 3600 / 24);
		// Release candidate versions
		$version1 = $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
		$averagehour = $version1 / $timediff / 24;
		// echo round($averagehour, 2);
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_averagehour = number_format($averagehour);
		echo $formatted_averagehour;
	}
	if ( $stat == "day" ) {
		$pliggstart = strtotime( "2009/01/30" );
		$today = strtotime( date("Y/m/d") );
		$timediff = abs(($today - $pliggstart) / 3600 / 24);
		// Release candidate versions
		$version1 = $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
		$averageday = $version1 / $timediff;
		// echo round($averageday, 2);
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_averageday = number_format($averageday);
		echo $formatted_averageday;
	}
	if ( $stat == "week" ) {
		$pliggstart = strtotime( "2009/01/30" );
		$today = strtotime( date("Y/m/d") );
		$timediff = abs(($today - $pliggstart) / 3600 / 24);
		// Release candidate versions
		$version1 = $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
		$averageweek = $version1 / $timediff * 7;
		// echo round($averageweek, 2);
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_averageweek = number_format($averageweek);
		echo $formatted_averageweek;
	}
	if ( $stat == "month" ) {
		$pliggstart = strtotime( "2009/01/30" );
		$today = strtotime( date("Y/m/d") );
		$timediff = abs(($today - $pliggstart) / 3600 / 24);
		// Release candidate versions
		$version1 = $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
		$averagemonth = $version1 / $timediff * 30;
		// echo round($averagemonth, 2);
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_averagemonth = number_format($averagemonth);
		echo $formatted_averagemonth;
	}
	if ( $stat == "year" ) {
		$pliggstart = strtotime( "2009/01/30" );
		$today = strtotime( date("Y/m/d") );
		$timediff = abs(($today - $pliggstart) / 3600 / 24);
		// Release candidate versions
		$version1 = $rc1count + $rc2count + $rc3count + $rc4count ;
		$averageyear = $version1 / $timediff * 365;
		// echo round($averageyear, 2);
		// Add commas to the number every 3 digits in from the right
		$formatted_averageyear = number_format($averageyear);
		echo $formatted_averageyear;
	}
}

?>

For those who are unfamiliar with the history behind Pligg here’s a brief summary of the past 3 years. We founded ourselves in December 2005 as a fork of the open source script provided by Meneame.net. Originally I had translated Meneame from Spanish to English and hosted a download, but quickly after that things started to take off because everyone back then wanted a Digg clone and Pligg was the first supported script to provide that. The next 3 years had plenty of bumps on the road, everyone contributing was doing it part time and a lot of personal issues including family and school distracted the developers from moving the project forward in a timely manner.

As an open source project it was difficult to find much cause to continue to develop besides the satisfaction of building a great script that everyone wanted. Over time we were beginning to lose sight of what inspired us to start the project and it was at that time that we considered selling the site to a company who would be able to continue our work properly. While we knew at the time that Pligg could potentially become a profitable business, we hadn’t yet discovered the right formula for making Pligg a success both financially or as a CMS. That started to change though only a few months after we considered selling our assets when we came up with the idea of selling premium templates and modules through a digital shop. That in combination with site-wide advertising has been able to provide me with enough income to develop Pligg as my day (and often night) job for 9 months now. During that time things have changed a lot, and all for the better.

What are we, now that I’ve committed to a full-time work schedule? I think Pligg has finally crossed that blurry line that divides PHP scripts from true content management systems. Now that we have jumped into the deep end of the pool where all of the other CMSs play it’s time for us to dunk some heads under the water and show why Pligg is a serious competitor.

Soon we will be releasing our 1.0 Final version of Pligg, but don’t let the name fool you we will continue to be providing some smaller fixes for the foreseeable future. The 1.0 release marks the first release that we are confident that most of the bugs have been fixed and most importantly we won’t be making any more major changes to how templates or modules work. This is important because we want to future-proof templates and modules so that upgrading won’t be such a pain down the road. We’ve designed templates so that modules should be adding in new features automatically so that if anyone wants to add a feature to Pligg they shouldn’t need to modify any template files. I can hear the sighs of relief from the template designers already.

Looking back over everything myself and the other developers have accomplished and even the mistakes that we’ve learned from over the years I’m very proud to be the founder. I would like to take this chance to thank everyone who has participated in developing Pligg, including any users who have either moved on to other projects or chose to participate in life instead of developing an open source script. I must also thank those who have made a financial contribution to Pligg. Over the years we have received a few very generous donations from members who expected nothing in return and the money gained from that has given us the ability to develop features that non-paying users benefit from.

Pligg has become my life, I wake up every day to emails and forum posts and end each night with more of the same. What’s sad is that I really enjoy this lifestyle and being able to create something that other people are inspired by. It’s been a great opportunity and I have learned a great deal about web design, development and project management. If you are interested in becoming part of our content management development team, we always have spots open for talented PHP developers or template designers.