Hi Andrea,
thanks for your feedback!
On 17 Feb 2009, at 13:28, Andrea Schiavini wrote:
This sounds good, but what if I want just to check my databases
status? The
main use of Futon - as a developer - is to see docs, see why
something has
gone wrong, and so on. The "cool home page" can be good and useful for
first-time users, but boring for the developer: he has to click on a
link to
get to the databases. So, IMHO, there should be an option to
"disable" the
new home page.
Yes, I don't want to penalize the primary use-case. This is why the
start
page should be carefully designed. See below for another option.
News Feed. The Futon home page should display an RSS/Atom feed
containing
latest news items for CouchDB, like announcements of new versions, or
security
issues and the like. Whether this should be an opt-in or opt-out
thing,
needs to be
decided, I can see reasons for both, but I think users should be
able to
disable
it, again runtime config to the rescue.
Are you sure it should go into Futon? Or better: what should Futon
be, in
your opinion? I'd rather prefer it to remain a sort of "control
panel" for
my databases. I prefer to fire up a newsreader or gmail to see
announcements.
Not saying this should be a feed reader :) And it would be only for a
really
limited number of announcements. New versions and security stuff and
other things that most users better see sooner than later. The idea is
that
you don't have to even know that there's such a feed to add to your feed
reader, removing steps and all. If you don't want that, just turn it
off and
read this list, where all the announcements will show up as well. Maybe
it'd just be a single item in the sidebar "Important Security
Update" (in bold
red letters") or just "New Version Available for Download" (in regular
styling),
nothing fancy.
List of installed apps. With CouchApps shaping up, Futon could show
a list
of installed applications alongside created databases. The way to
detect
CouchApps is not yet defined, though there are sensible proposals.
Yes, this is good. I'd make this sort of a "tab" though: welcome page,
databases, installed apps. With an option on the welcome page like
"Default
page:" and a dropdown with welcome page, installed apps, databases.
Maybe
also news, if you really want to.
The tabbed interface is a nice idea: A cookie or config option could
remember
the last or preferred tab to load when you access Futon. This would
alleviate
the first problem above.
More pluggable architecture. Hey, it might even be easy to add new
pages to
Futon already, but I'm sure we can im prove that. The idea is that
users
can
write add-ons to Futon that are not of interest for all users but
only
those who
use CouchDB for a specific purpose (see next item). Futon then
wouldn't
have to
include all features for everybody but we'd have a repository of
Futon
plugins
that people can install. The repository of plugins should be a
CouchDB
database
that users can just replicate the plugins they like from.
Mmm I think this would mess up the slick interface of Futon too
much. I dont
want it to be a sort of Facebook, it's Futon, I use it to manage my
databases and it does its work well.
Back to the tabbed interface, you could install new plugins that show
up as
additional tabs. I don't think that messes up the default case. If you
like Futon
as-is, don't install a plugin :)
Cluster management plugin. CouchDB will be deployed in clusters of
CouchDB
nodes. It'd be really cool if we had a Futon plugin that allows you
to do
all sorts of neat things with that cluster. Like monitoring how it
is behaving
or restructuring the cluster at runtime.
Agreed! Another tab maybe.
Right, but what about other people who don't need the cluster-tab? I
think
this is an ideal candidate for an opt-in plugin.
Good post Jan. I like some of your ideas; however, I'd prefer Futon to
remain a control panel instead of becoming something like
"MyCouchDB" or
"iCouch"...
Again, default Futon would not be a lot different than it is now. But
users would
be able to add more plugins they find useful.
Would you be interested in helping out with this endeavour? :)
Cheers
Jan
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