Cambrian - Admin Modules

In the keynote at OpenForce, Shaun mentioned that the next version of DotNetNuke (codenamed "Cambrian") would contain an improved Admin experience.

As part of the preparation for this I have been working on removing the differences between "Admin" modules and pages and "Standard" modules and pages.

There are two major components of this re-Architecture.

1. Remove the artificial difference(s) between Admin and Standard pages.  There are four major components of this:
   1. Admin pages will no longer be required to be a child of the top-level "Admin" menu
   2. Admin page access will be controlled by the standard Page permission model, thus allowing Admin users the ability to delegate administrative tasks to other "Power" users, for example a "User Account Manager" role.
   3. Remove the artificial notion of an Admin Skin and a Portal Skin.
   4. Remove the artificial restrictions on Admin Pages so they can contain a mix of Normal and Admin modules.
2. Remove the artificial difference(s) between Admin and Standard modules, so that all modules - admin and standard - will behave the same way.

While, these changes, do not themselves create an improved Admin experience, they do introduce more flexibility in the framework.  For example, with these changes:

• Module Developers will be able to build their own versions of Admin modules, and have a fully supported way to install them and add them to pages.
• Portal Administartors will be able to place admin modules on any page, possibily with other modules, to improve the usability for their site.