Hi again:

I'm developing an Announcements/News-ish module that has an improved functionality, both in the Edition, the Settings and the Visualization.

First I tried with the News Module, but since I need the news to be introduced manually through the portal itself I moved onto the Announcements module.

Now my main task is to modify the Announcements Module since it's still far from what I need. I need to add some fields to the Announcements, as well as change the Visualization (need 2 different visualizations, one with rolling and another with scroll) and the Settings. I also need to categorize it and add the posibility to mark the Announcements as "Archived" and filter through it.

Ye, I know it's a lot of work, but hey, someone has to do it, and this time is me :S

Ok, after the into, let's go to the main dish. I have downloaded the Announcements Module Source in order to start from there, but when I try to open it with VS2005 it tells me it has to upgrade it, and even after doing so, it's a total mess. Then I found out Announcements is still 1.1, so I have moved to VS2003.

Now's where the problem comes. After opening the project in VS2003 it shows a lot of errors, most of them caused by a failure in the References. The Reference to DotNetNuke dll is either broken or missing, and if I try to manually add the Reference to the DLL in my Portal Folder, it shows the following error:

"A reference to '..../DotNetNuke.dll' could not be added. This is not a valid assembly or COM component. Only assemblies with extension 'dll' and COM components can be referenced. Please make sure that the file is accessible, and that it is a valid assembly or COM component."

I have STW about it and the only clue I got is that the DotNetNuke.dll is a 2.0 assembly while the Announcement is 1.1. The thing is that, the Reference was already in the project (although it showed an error), so there should be a way to do it.

I really hope you can help me with this, or at least point me a direction to follow. If you need more explanation about this, I will be glad to give you more info.

I would also like to have your opinion about the possibility of developiing what I intend to.

Thanks in advance

Wow, that was a fast reply, thanks.

I'm going to try with the VS2005 path, but when I first tried it caused a lot of problems, missing files and such. Since it seems you're around here at this time, I hope you don't mind that I ask for your help again soon.

As you will know for sure, things can change while developing a project, and that's what has happened to me. As the post subject says, I'm going through a new way.

I'll make you a sum up of what I want and what I intend to do so maybe you can guide me a bit through and confirm if I'm going the good way or how to avoid some common mistakes.

In my WebSite, localized to 2 languages (this far) I need to have "News" in 2 different Tabs:

- I need one News Module Instance in the Home Tab with "rolling effect" that only should allow visualization, and where the news shouldn't be editable.
- I need another "News" Module Instance with two Panels in a News Tab, one on the left with the summary of the news with scroll, and one of the right with the details of the selected new from the left.

At the very first moment I thought about extending the Announcements Module to make both things with an option to choose the way of viewing it, and giving different View/Edit Permissions to each instance of the module. As a handicap, I need those modules in both languages (maybe more in the future), and the instance of the "News" module in the Home Tab and the one in the News Tab taking the news from the same source to avoid having to introduce news twice per language.

After reaching this point I remembered what another user of these forums suggested me when I was struggling with the News Module, and after some considerations, I have changed my way to go to solve this.

I'm going to extend the Announcements Module to have the aspect I want it to have (2 panels, one left with summary in scroll, one right with the detail of the selected news) where the WebSite Admin/Manager will have to introduce the news. Then I'm going to extend also the News Module in order to adapt it to what I want (the "rolling effect"), and I'll make it feed from the RSS that the Extended Announcement Module generates.

From my point of view, although now I have to extend 2 modules instead of one, the task I have to complete has been simplified, since:

- I don't have to care about how to manage that 2 different module isntances feed from the same data
- Each language will have it's own Extended Announcement Module to make the RSS feed and it's own Extended News Module to feed from that RSS
- I don't have to manage the problem of making it possible to select 2 ways of viewing the news, since they will be two different modules adapted to my needs

I would really appreciate your opinion (well, yours and also whoever may want to guide/help me in this task), since I'm quite new to DNN and I'm not sure if I'm taking the right way, or if I have complicated my task instead of making it more simple.

Since I have already modified the aspect of some other modules in my WebSite (basically changing the .ascx and the .css) the only "problem" I'm facing now is how to make the Extended Announcement Module to generate a RSS to feed the Extended News Module. From what I've read this feature is already included in the module through the Syndication, but I haven't done this before and I may need a little guiding on this.

Sorry for the Big Wall of Text, I hope to be able to solve this myself or be able to find the help to solve the problems I face.

I'll keep you informed of my progress.

Thanks in advance