Australian Quality Solutions Group - All News

3000 members in 3 months

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 02:00:00 +0000

Just over 3 months after introducing our paid subscriptions to enhance the amount of value we can give our members, we have hit the 3000 mark.

So a bonus to celebrate our 3000th member, we are offering all new and current members half price off our Gold, Platinum and Ultimate memberships.

To take advantage of this great offer use one of the following codes at checkout:
Half price Gold membership - ZMI0ZD
Half price Platinum membership - YTI4NJ
Half price Ultimate membership - YWFIZW

Progress Report [7 March 2010]

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 05:46:50 +0000

After a couple of weeks we've finally finished all the planned updates to our site. We believe that these updates will help enhance the experience of our members.

Here are some of the updates we have made to our site:

Replaced SEF URL management component, sh404sef with AceSEF.
Replaced access control management component, noixACL with JACLPlus.
Replaced problematic component Kunena with Agora.
Installed !JoomlaComment to allow users to be able to comment on news articles.
Updated DOCman to the latest version
Updated our website theme to improve performance and readability

Upcoming work:

Version 1.5.5 of Simple META Management Suite is nearing completion, just waiting on 2 further languages to be translated
A new jQuery version of Simple Pushup Plugin with the current browsers
A new version of Simple Popup Gallery possibly adding further lightboxes and features

If you have any further suggestions or comments please feel free to let us know

Metadata and tags

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 12:53:02 +0000

Many people have asked me what Metadata is and why it is so important. I decided that over the next couple of weeks I will go through and explain why metadata is so important and how to get it right.

So what is Metadata?

Metadata is structured data that describes the characteristics of a resource, in our case, a web page. It is conceptually similar to the cataloguing that takes place in libraries, museums and archives. Metadata helps a person to locate and understand data.

The term "meta" derives from the Greek word denoting a nature of a higher order or more fundamental kind, therefore metadata is literally “data above data” or “data beyond data”. In a more practical sense, metadata can be considered “data about data”. This therein means that it is the contents of a surrogate record that characterize an object

The Dublin Core (DC)—A Simple Content Description Model for Electronic Resources—is the most commonly recognised standard for providing metadata for electronic resources such as web content.

Fixing to get in

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:00:00 +0000

We know that even though our products are great value, not everyone can afford a membership, and some people just hate paying.

Luckilly our aim isn't to be millionaires, but to contribute and develop as much value as we can and share it with our members.

In this way, anyone that provides us with assistance in helping to develop this value for our members can earn themselves a credit reward which can be used towards the cost of a membership or other services on our website. These rewards are non-cashable and can only be applied to products and services on our website.

These credit rewards are also cumulative, and depending on the level of assistance provided, you could earn a Silver membership and then upgrades all the way up to an Ultimate membership without ever paying a cent simply by contributing back to the community.

Simple META Management Suite 1.5.5 RC4 [Draghkondar] released!

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 14:04:17 +0000

We are proud to release Simple META Management Suite v1.5.5 RC4 to our testing/development users today!

Hot on the heels of the previous version, Version 1.5.5 RC4 brings more new features that will help you take hold of your SEO and ensure that even more people can find you out in the big wide world.

Some of the new features we have added are:

Complete rewrite of the plugin code to inprove performance
Code Optimisation with the ability to ignore certain CSS/JS files
Removed outdated Pregmatch statements
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all internal links.
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all external links.
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to non-HTML documents.
Ability to add the Google Analytics e-Commerce tracking code to AEC subscriptions. ***EXPERIMENTAL***
Enable 'Basic Metadata' replacement on installation.
Lock URLS in your database to prevent accidental deletion.
Upgrade your previous installation without having to uninstall first.
Ability to select a 'Limited Interface' that reduces the database queries and completely eliminates 'MAX_JOIN_SIZE' error and has been reported to speed up page load times.

Your Opinion - Joomla Hosting

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 14:22:35 +0000

Over the last week we have been in the process of upgrading our website, forums and access control system. During this time we have also been assessing what benefits we can offer to our valued members.

For almost a year we have been operating from a dedicated server. Over this year we have tweaked and tuned the server to offer us the best performance and stability targeted specifically at hosting Joomla. We believe that this is a goal we have achieved quite well.

Although this is the first time we have considered offering this service to the public, we have been hosting numerous client's web sites for over 5 years now. These sites have ranged from small local business' with around 300 unique hits a day, through to large e-commerce sites handling over 700 unique transactions a day.

It is at this stage we would like to get your opinion on whether you would be interested in Joomla targeted hosting with us.
We are intending that the first phase of rollout will be released free to a small amount of varied beta testers who will evaluate the hosting and performance over a month or two and provide us with any feedback that may help us with the rollout program.

So as first order of business, we would appreciate it if you took time to answer the following poll:

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Simple META Management Suite 1.5.5 RC3 [Draghkondar] released!

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 15:00:09 +0000

We are proud to release Simple META Management Suite v1.5.5 RC3 to our testing/development users today!

Hot on the heels of the previous version, Version 1.5.5 RC3 brings more new features that will help you take hold of your SEO and ensure that even more people can find you out in the big wide world.

Some of the new features we have added are:

Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all internal links.
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all external links.
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to non-HTML documents.
Ability to add the Google Analytics e-Commerce tracking code to AEC subscriptions. ***EXPERIMENTAL***
Enable 'Basic Metadata' replacement on installation.
Lock URLS in your database to prevent accidental deletion.
Upgrade your previous installation without having to uninstall first.
Ability to select a 'Limited Interface' that reduces the database queries and completely eliminates 'MAX_JOIN_SIZE' error and has been reported to speed up page load times.

Forum upgrade

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 08:56:44 +0000

After many years with Kunena/FireBoard as our trustworthy forum, we have finally made the decision to move to a different component.

Agora Forum from the jVitals team has been chosen to replace Kunena.

This decision was made due to a number of reasons, one of the most pertinent reasons being that they just couldn't fix a jQuery conflict that was created when Joomla was upgraded to v 1.5.15.

So beginning tonight we will be upgrading the forum. For the duration of the upgrade, only Silver level and above memberships will have access to support. This support will be provided by email.

If you have any problems, please feel free to email us.

Simple META Management Suite 1.5.5 RC2 [Draghkondar] released!

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 06:08:57 +0000

We are proud to release Simple META Management Suite v1.5.5 RC2 to our testing/development users today!

Hot on the heels of the previous version, Version 1.5.5 RC2 brings more new features that will help you take hold of your SEO and ensure that even more people can find you out in the big wide world.

Some of the new features we have added are:

Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all internal links
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to all external links
Ability to add the Google Analytics pagetracker code to non-HTML documents
Ability to add the Google Analytics e-Commerce tracking code to AEC subscriptions {EXPERIMENTAL}
Enable 'Basic Metadata' replacement on installation
Upgrade your previous installation without having to uninstall first
Ability to select a 'Limited Interface' that reduces the database queries and combats 'MAX_JOIN_SIZE' error

Simple Scrolling Newsflash v1.5.4 released!

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 21:11:29 +0000

Simple Scrolling Newsflash has been our most popular module and over the years has grown so much since our first release!

Simple Scrolling Newsflash v1.5.4a

Version 1.5.4 involved a complete rewrite of the engine that powers the scrollling. By using the new jQuery based scroller, not only are we keeping up with today's new technologies but opening the door to more options for improvement.

The new release includes:

New features - 1
Performance fixes - 6
Bug fixes - 5
Language fixes - 7

Simple Scrolling Newsflash v1.5.4 is available for download on any paid subscription

Simple META Management Suite 1.5.4 [Dragonbane] released!

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 01:46:30 +0000

We are proud to release Simple META Management Suite v1.5.4 into the wild today!

Simple META Management Suite v1.5.4 [Dragonbane]

Version 1.5.4 brings a lot of new features that will help you take hold of your SEO and ensure that people can find you out in the big wide world.

Some of the new features we have added are:

Ability to add the Bing! verification meta tag
Ability to add the Yahoo! Site Explorer verification meta tag
Added a new 'Extension Manager' to allow for installation/management of extensions
Added Keyword Auto Generator complete with Stop Words database (over 940+ common stop words)
Redesigned 'Batch Update all URLs' function
Ability to have 'per-extension' settings
Ability to select a 'Limited Interface' that reduces the database queries

Australian Extensions Collection

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 19:41:14 +0000

Since Joomla became mainstream, the developers of Joomla played the game correctly and started the JED: Joomla Extensions Directory. This directory gave Joomla Developers quick access to Joomla extensions and support. However July 1st 2009, the JED became GPL only. This was a big step in the growth of the GPL - one that I support completely, however it did limit the growth of some commercial and non-GPL extensions; some of which are the best extensions out there.

To help remedy this, we have designed a familiar replacement - Australian Extensions Collection (AEC). Here Joomla developers can list their extensions for free, GPL or not.

sh404sef: Breaking free

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 08:13:48 +0000

On the 24 August 2009, Yannick put an announcement on his website that dismayed many dedicated Joomla developers - sh404sef was being discontinued due to lack of time for the project.

Due to a massive amount of emails urging him not to discontinue production, Yannick chose to move and work with a company called 'Anything Digital' in order to maintain the development of sh404sef. This however caused much uproar, with myself being a fore runner in the arguments. I personally spent many hours in sh404sef forums as an moderator helping users of sh404sef identify and solve many problems with the package. When Yannick announced his discontinuation I offered to host and maintain all the forums related to sh404sef - in their current state for absolutely no cost.

Welcome to the new website

joel@aqsg.com.au (Joel Bassett) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 14:00:00 +0000

After many months of trial, error and a tonne of coding, we've finally released the new Australian Quality Solutions Group website alongside fresh updates to all our programming products. And here you have it.

But as with most moves, this one was far from glorious. There were many compatibility problems with some of the major components and plugins that we used on the old site.

So here is just some of the things we have changed.