Cuong Dang

DotNetNuke Skinning, The Untold Story

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 15:47:36 GMT

Skinning is not a skill; it’s a profession that requires knowledge and experience in understanding the DotNetNuke platform (especially with the skinning engine), web standards, as well as aesthetic design.

DotNetNuke Skinning Tutorial Book

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Tue, 13 May 2008 12:48:34 GMT

Back in November 2007, I was invited to be a technical reviewer for a book called DotNetNuke Skinning Tutorial by Packt Publishing Company. Having seen limited resources about DotNetNuke skinning, I agreed to be involved in the project instantly. It was an exciting experience since I have never had any experience in working with formal documentations besides DotNetNuke training documentations I wrote here with the team.

DotNetNuke Training Reflection

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 18:44:31 GMT

After weeks of preparation, our first training offering in St. Louis is complete and I can finally relax a little bit. At Engage, we have offered on-site training for quite sometime; however, it is such a different and exciting experience for all of us for holding training classes in St. Louis.

DotNetNuke CSS Precedence

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 03:49:22 GMT

Many times I have been asked the same question by various clients regarding the DotNetNuke CSS load order. Many of them were having difficulties when customizing their modules and skins to have uniform styles. Simply understanding the DotNetNuke CSS hierarchy is essential when performing these tasks.

Engage: ADAPTIVE

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 23:34:10 GMT

For those of you who had seen it appeared on Engage Modules site last year and was removed, it's now time to revisit the "Skins" page and find out about our current and upcoming commercial (also free will be introduced in the near future) DotNetNuke skins. Last week , we introduced our very first DotNetNuke commercial skin to public called Engage: ADAPTIVE.

Silverlight, user interface and developers

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 18:42:48 GMT

If you recall the basic marketing principles in college when you’re taking “Marketing 101”, two of the elements that contribute to the success of your products are making it easy to use/operate and writing the best user manual.

Redbird Heist? Or Good Guerilla Marketing?

cdang@engagesoftware.net — Wed, 22 Feb 2006 21:10:00 GMT

Who is to say that one of the giants in sport business does not need more brand attention? A local advertising agency, Schupp Co in St. Louis has helped Cardinals with a great caper kicking off the 2006 Season – Redbird heist.

A person calling himself the Bird Napper stole two Birds on the Bat from a local billboard in downtown St. Louis and carried the large Cardinals cutouts Redbird across St. Louis downtown. He finally showed up at St. Louis Post-Dispatch at 4:30 on Wednesday. The local TV media and St. Louis Post Dispatch all picked up the story. Here is a quote from the stltoday.com:

Then, a break in the case. Bird Napper had the birds, and he would prove it on Tucker Boulevard downtown in front of the Post-Dispatch at 4:30, he e-mailed.

Right on the dot, two people ran down the street carrying large Cardinal cutouts. They waved, hopped into a sport utility vehicle - with view of the license plate obstructed - and took off.

By the afternoon, Dan Farrell, the Cardinals senior vice president of sales and marketing, conceded - a bit. He said that the missing Cardinals "were not acts of theft or vandalism, as far as we know."

Schupp finally confessed.

"Our goal was to create an advertising campaign outside the norm for our client," he said. "We did not approach the media with this story and frankly wanted to avoid the media until the campaign had unfolded."

That, by the way, won't happen until Wednesday. Or so he said.

Today, (Wednesday, February 22nd, 2006) more news out of the Cardinals camp about stolen birds. This time the birds that were stolen were from the uniforms of several players.

Guerilla Marketing is all about doing things differently and trying to generate a buzz. This campaign did it. Kudos to Schupp and the Cardinals for trying something different.