Though it seems like a minor tweak, swapping the What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) editor from the old system in favor of a better one was a long and perilous adventure.

It's all in the editor

The WYSIWYG editor of the current system is a decent little program called TinyMCE. We did not write it; instead, we grabbed it from the great farm of available open source software.

Sadly, we picked something rotten. It looked shiny and it smelled pleasant, but it was not edible. Unless you were starving. At the time we chose it we were famished.

The great limitations of it are known to all of our users: from the Bush Administration-type quality control that would re-write your content to the minuscule editing window on pages that used templates, TinyMCE clearly had its upbringing at the teat of Mussolini. Like Mussolini, we were lying when we said it made the trains run on time. We even had to go so far as to create "features" to work around the problems caused by TinyMCE. That "disable WYSIWYG editor" was so that our users would not have to suffer through it. TinyMCE brought a lot of heartache, and that was just the daily impact we would see on our support staff.

TinyMCE had to go. Under the new Salsa regime it was first against the wall. But first we needed a replacement. The new editor needed to:

• Generate really clean HTML.
  
• Be lightweight. (TinyMCE was a hog dipped in butter.)
  
• Clean out the crud that Microsoft Word generates.
  
• Be cross-browser compliant.

The email blaster is by far our most-used tool. Since its inception it has, like many of the DIA tools, evolved organically. There are six separate steps to send an email blast and most of the steps seem to be just thrown in random order.

Master Blaster

In the Salsa edition of the blaster we decided to follow a more logical approach and one that is more akin to composing and sending an email from your desktop email application. The number of steps has been reduced from six to three: Write, Target, Send.

In the first step, writing your email, we've combined the ability to choose a template, set the from fields and then compose the email. The new template chooser allows you to see a preview of your template than just having to rely on a name.

Third in the series. Previously:

Queries
Reports

I want it MY way!

Yeah, yeah. We've heard you. All of you. You want your own, customized, slice of DIA heaven. You loathe having to share you preferences with others in your office.

Sharing is not caring in your book. Instead you have a rugged sense of individualism. We know. You are a special and unique snowflake.

Well, we listened. Not only did we listen (and listen and listen and listen) but we did something about it. Salsa is about you. All about you. You and your needs. We can wait for our needs until our Guacamole release is ready.

This is the week.

It's sure to be less fun than the release party this Thursday night (you're coming, no?), but the blog pays its own form of remixable tribute all this week with a countdown of the top enhancements you'll find when you log in to Salsa.

Sure, the party has an open bar. But does it have an RSS feed?

The birth of the condiment:

For Salsa, at one point called Fuse, and at another called Joan Rivers and Six Million Dollar Man (granted, only I called it that) we set forth some very basic, high-level goals.

• make the system easier to use
  
• make the system more stable
  
• make the system more flexible

With
much anticipation I logged onto the N-TEN webinar "Is Paying for Email
Delivery Inevitable?" Since I missed the battle royale version of this
discussion in Seattle I was sure not to miss web based replay. The web
makes everything better. My favorite part is the first 10 minutes - the
10 minutes of disembodied voices asking if they can see the chat and
the cacophony of engaging mute.



After the 10 minutes of our technological superiority over the apes
the games began. The first speaker, incorrectly introduced as the CTO
of the largest sender of non-profit email, was actually the CTO of a
competitor. We keep the real CTO of the largest sender of non-profit
email chained away in a closet. Really. So CTO the lesser warned of
armageddon and Goodmail was the savior. OK, next please. Next up was
Richard from Goodmail. Turns out Richard and I have something in
common: he worked on E-World (Apple's version of AOL circa 1995) and I
have an E-World t-shirt.



Richard, clearly a very bright man, laid out the case for Goodmail.
Everything sounded hunky dory - then I had a moment of clarity and
typed my question to the N-TEN moderators.



"People, especially, non-profits send email because of the minimal
cost. Adding any cost to this, even a nominal fee, will reduce its
usage by those that are unable to pay. Is this widening of the digital
divide a good thing?"



One moderator got back to me and said not to worry as Danny from
EFF would address this. Odd, I thought. I hadn't asked Danny anything.
Instead I sent my questions while Richard spoke. Thinking the moderator
confused, I sent in my next question.



"If one of the reasons for Goodmail is to generate trust with the
consumer, won't not having this certified goodness affect the trust of
my brand? What if I already have a well established and trusted brand -
without the blue ribbon of approval aren't I effectively destroying my
brand?"



The moderator again, reassured me and told me that Danny would also
address this. This Danny guy is swell. I want a Danny. Sorry, you'll
have to address your questions for me to Danny. Undeterred by the guard
at the gate, I typed my next, conspiracy-laced question.



"How long before the fee to send email is trickled on the average
consumer? After all Bill Gates has publicly stated that people - you
and me - should pay to send email."



The CO for a third time, told me to take my meds and that my celly
Danny, oh Danny boy, would answer all of my questions. How I longed for
Danny. Until I heard what he had to say. And, well he was exciting as
fluoride treatment. I sat there, mouth agape and his words were like a
mixture of Styrofoam and cold goo. Something about how Goodmail is a
solution to a real problem but Danny has concerns that it might stifle
innovation in the spam blocking software industry. Well, he's got my
vote. Heck he can have two.



Richard, if you're out there, can you sign my t-shirt and answer the above questions? Also, can you answer this one:

With
much anticipation I logged onto the N-TEN webinar "Is Paying for Email
Delivery Inevitable?" Since I missed the battle royale version of this
discussion in Seattle I was sure not to miss the web based replay. The web
makes everything better. My favorite part of the webinar is the first 10 minutes - the
10 minutes of disembodied voices asking if they can see the chat and
the cacophony of engaging mute.



After the 10 minutes of our technological superiority over the apes
the games began. The first speaker, incorrectly introduced as the CTO
of the largest sender of non-profit email, was actually the CTO of a
competitor. We keep the real CTO of the largest sender of non-profit
email chained away in a closet. Really. So CTO the lesser warned of
armageddon and Goodmail was the savior. OK, next please. Next up was
Richard from Goodmail. Turns out Richard and I have something in
common: he worked on E-World (Apple's version of AOL circa 1995) and I
have an E-World t-shirt.



Richard, clearly a very bright man, laid out the case for Goodmail.
Everything sounded hunky dory - then I had a moment of clarity and
typed my question to the N-TEN moderators.



"People, especially, non-profits send email because of the minimal
cost. Adding any cost to this, even a nominal fee, will reduce its
usage by those that are unable to pay. Is this widening of the digital
divide a good thing?"



One moderator got back to me and said not to worry as Danny from
EFF would address this. Odd, I thought. I hadn't asked Danny anything.
Instead I sent my questions while Richard spoke. Thinking the moderator
confused, I sent in my next question.



"If one of the reasons for Goodmail is to generate trust with the
consumer, won't not having this certified goodness affect the trust of
my brand? What if I already have a well established and trusted brand -
without the blue ribbon of approval aren't I effectively destroying my
brand?"



The moderator again, reassured me and told me that Danny would also
address this. This Danny guy is swell. I want a Danny. Sorry, you'll
have to address your questions for me to Danny. Undeterred by the guard
at the gate, I typed my next, conspiracy-laced question.



"How long before the fee to send email is trickled on the average
consumer? After all Bill Gates has publicly stated that people - you
and me - should pay to send email."



The CO for a third time, told me to take my meds and that my celly
Danny, oh Danny boy, would answer all of my questions. How I longed for
Danny. Until I heard what he had to say. And, well he was exciting as
fluoride treatment. I sat there, mouth agape and his words were like a
mixture of Styrofoam and cold goo. Something about how Goodmail is a
solution to a real problem but Danny has concerns that it might stifle
innovation in the spam blocking software industry. Well, he's got my
vote. Heck he can have two.



Richard, if you're out there, can you sign my t-shirt and answer the above questions? Also, can you answer this one: