Quality Assurance for Gavick Templates

Hello,

I'm using Joomla for at least 8 years, used many types of framesworks etc. I worked alot with Gantry but for some reason I just like the design of Gavick templates and their simplicity. But there is a big BUT: the quality. Don't get me wrong, the visual quality is very high but the functional quality not. When a new template is released the specific forum gets overcrowded fast and many topics are targeting the same issue.

I just like to call on Gavick to make more quality assurance. The good side effect is: you won't have to answer so many support requests.

I hope you see my post as a constructive feedback.

Kind regards,
getimo

Well, to be honest - not that much topics are actually bug related. Most of them are made by users who doesn't understand something (like documentation), would need some small design changes (small customisations), or having compatibility issue (server side, other plugins). Anything that goes beyond is less than 5% of all posts. We are trying to test out our templates as much as it is possible before release.
Anyway - thanks for suggestion - we love users that actually care for our products to become better.

If I may also....
Sometimes 10 people ask about this same because they don't use "Search" bar - why? Ask them.
And sometimes it's because of poor knowledge of English language .... they prefer to ask without checking.

That is also true

Thanks for answering!

Well, that's true, yes. But let me give you some examples (with the Quark Restaurant theme in mind):

1. You'll find there this CSS code:

Code: Select all

#gkHeaderMod img {
  height: auto;
  left: 50%;
  max-width: none !important;
  position: absolute;
  top: 50%;
......
}


If a customer puts an image into the header he will ask many qustions I suppose The selector should be more specific to avoid weird behaviour and support questions.

2. Hardcoded language strings. I think you'll agree that there are many questions regarding these topics. I htink about the storefront template where many strings are hardcoded deep into the javascript code.

3. I asked this question (https://www.gavick.com/forums/quark/fix ... tyle-45363) and got an answer. Well, I didn't realize that this was not a bug but a "feature". BUT: the explanation in the backend should be more clear.

4. When using the quickstart I often find old "footsteps" (content items, menu items etc.) of previous templates.

5. In the quark template folder I find these folders and files:

- /templates/gk_quark/css/override.test.css
- /templates/gk_overrides/test

6. In the quark template I uploaded the dark logo and the light logo. In the frontend I only see the dark version. Seems to me as a bug.

Again, please don't get me wrong I just want to "care for your products to become better."

Kind Regards,
getimo

Thanks for pointing them all together in one place.
I'll provide them to our devteam for future investigation.

Oh, and according to 4 - could you please be more specific?

Also 6 seems strange to me, is there a thread with that bug described?

According to 4) I can't remember in which templates but there were quickstart installations where I could find unpublished content/menu items which shouldn't be there (these were specific items for previous template releases). That's what I mean with quality assurance.

Kind Regards,
getimo

According to 6) I didn't create a topic yet, I just listed it because I noticed that issue just 5 minutes ago.

Kind Regards,
getimo

@ bravensrok initial post: +1 - also, I'm especially addressing the quark template:
1) it will be helpful to release more documentations, since there are lot of fresh concepts - we have to answer our clients questions and it will be much appreciated if there is more knowledge collaboration
2) yes, hardcoded functions - I just run into nice fa-share in k2 or even the counters - we like to teach our clients to manage their websites and only stepping in when necessary - with things hardcoded, this gets more complicated.
3) functional quality, quality + quality - I know it is not easy, but it should not be discouraged.
thanks
AZ

Hi all,
I join in this discussion because I find strange that a quickstart, just released, may have malfunctions so widespread.
For example, the error 1146 (to which you suggested to reinstall the Virtuemart ...).
A new, just-published package, takes a systematic error and the resolution is to reinstall a part of it??
Why don't you update the package?
At the moment I'm blocked, waiting for support in the related topic, because of that error, and also I know that your work around solution isn't effective because reinstalling virtuemart the package stops working permanently.

In conclusion, I think that the Gavick's products are aesthetically very beautiful but the functionality of the releases has not the same level.

Thanks
Maurizio

Sorry, I guess our developer team works to fix them.
But please think 2-twice if VM3 is really a good solution for you, last time some developers have found few important security hole in this software. I know it's popular component ....but.

Thank you Oscar.
I will seriously consider your suggestion for my future choices.
Would be nice, for that, if the developer team include in the quickstart other solution instead of VM.
But it depends on them...
Thanks for now
br
Maurizio

@mauriziomomix the 1146 error is not directly connected with our quickstart. Joomla is not a great tool to hack and to attach other things inside. While creating quickstart we need to add our template, sample data, modules and vm. While template, data and our modules are easily to hack and add to a quickstart, vm isn't.
During installation process some databases are created for VM, but we can't hack installation process to be able to install the vm tables correctly when other then en_gb language is selected and user will not do additional steps at the end.
We have this document:
https://www.gavick.com/documentation/jo ... quickstart
which describes exactly step by step how to correctly install quickstart with vm with language different than en_gb. So basically all 1146 happens to users who doesn't read documentation
Of course it can be fixed later, after installation (which I described in few threads) but this process is a little bit more complicated than restarting installation and following clear procedure.

Hi Cyberek,
actually I haven't read the documentation about installing quickstart, just because usually is a standard and almost easy sequence of steps. May be this time is quite different and I will soon retry following your suggestion.
Just one thing: yesterday I did completely new "installation" with english language alone (the full content of the quickstark package and nothing else) but the 1146 error message was right in the middle of the main page anyway...
Might be I've done some other mistake, wo knows...
I will let you know soon my result.
br
Maurizio

English British, not English United States - this might be the issue.

Thank you Cyberek
Everything is ok now about this error.
As you wrote, it was depending on the use of the languages

br
Maurizio

@bravensrok, @cyberek - can you guys explain what's the purpose of the gk_overrides FOLDER and it's content (test) (RE: bravensrok #5) - is this some new function to override?
thanks
AZ

There is even an article for that
https://www.gavick.com/blog/quark-classic-menu