ctBlog (Version 0.4)
Author: Jon Zgoda (jon atta ct-scan dotta com)
==============================================

Why?
=====
Yes, another blog software...just what the world needs ;)
So, okay, why in the world would I write another one...simply put, I dislike what I've seen.  Blog software is just too bloated, it tries to be more than it should be.  Things like multi-user blogs, why?  A blog is for ONE person, at least that's the intention, one poster, multiple readers.  If you want a message board, there are plenty of those out there too, go try one.

Another reason, to practice my Ruby on Rails more (and this is the first app I built with 2.0.2).  I'm a recovering PHP programmer, and there are plenty of systems that I built in PHP that I need to keep adding things to, so I needed a way to "take a break" from all that and focus on something fun.

I wanted to truly implement the concept of "Keep It Simple, Stupid!", I look at many blogs, and I just cringe by all the crap down the sides.


Future Improvements
====================
 - Static "About Me" page
 - Better Authentication System
 - Dynamic "themes": can set colors and background images
 - DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself) it up a bit
 - Expand on the Installation instructions
 - Configuration Settings manageable from the administration interface & stored in the database
 - Add the ability to preview and save articles without actually posting them
 - Allow articles to be "removed" without actually being deleted
 - Write upgrade scripts to move the database.yml file
 - Paginate administration pages for Articles, Subjects, Links, & Images
 - Use an SVN repository (not part of the software, but I should do this)
 - Use Capistrano (not part of the software, but will ease deployment)


The "Future Improvements" list could grow, but I believe that once all these items have been accomplished, I will be at version 1.0.


Requirements
=============
 - Rails 2.0.2
 - Starting in 0.4, RMagick (http://rmagick.rubyforge.org) will need to be installed.



Installation
=============
(I will expand on this later)
First, it's a Rails app, and I'm assuming that anyone looking for a Rails powered blog already knows how to install a Rails app on THEIR server environment.  
Currently my only criticism of Rails is that there is no clear (and simple) "best method" for serving pages. 
I personally use the: MySQL -> app -> Pack of Mongrels -> Apache 2 (mod_proxy)
It's quite a bit to setup, but works really great once it is.

All personalization can be done through:
config/config.yml => Site-wide variables
config/database.yml => Database variables (but you already know that)
public/stylesheets/ctblog.css => The Blog layout
public/stylesheets/admin.css => The Admin layout


Upgrade Notes
==============
 - Untar archive (tar -zxvf [filename])
 - Rename directory (mv ctblog ctblog-[version])
 - Copy old database file to new directory (cp ctblog-[oldversion]/config/database.yml ctblog-[version]/config/database.yml)
 - Manually merge old config file settings to new file (config/config.yml)
 - Update database (rake db:migrate RAILS_ENV=production)
 - Remove old link (rm web) and add new link (ln -s ctblog-[version] web)
 - Restart Mongrel Process(es)


Contact
========
For questions/comments regarding the system, please email me.


Development Environment
========================
MacOS X 10.5.1
Ruby 1.8.6
Rails 2.0.2
MySQL 5.1.22
TextMate 1.5.7