GSoC 2012 : Pidgin Plugin Website

[Eion Robb]

I'm personally glad to see a proposal for this :)

A few comments:
* awesome to see screenshots already (where did you get the 3d rendered
pidgin logo!) It'd be good if the theme matched the theme of the
pidgin.imwebsite for consistency
* plugins would need to be available for more than just 'windows and
Linux', eg splitting 'Linux' up into platform 32bit/64bit/PowerPC/ARM as
well as adding OSX and BSD (or whether it's cross platform in the case of
most Perl plugins)
* can you expand on point 10 "integration with the pidgin client"?  What
kind of integration are you thinking of?
* would you use a separate login system or link in with the logins on trac?

That's all I can think of right now :)

Cheers,
Eion


On Sunday, 25 March 2012, Nikhil Bafna <nikhil.bafna.r at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi.
>
> I am Nikhil Bafna, a fourth year Computer Science undergrad.
>
> I am interested in the idea to develop a website for pidgin plugins.
Currently, there is a lot of friction in browsing through the plugin list
and finding plugins that would enhance a user's pidgin experience. Though
an open source app, majority of the users are not coders and this has to be
kept in mind while designing the user interface.
>
> I suggest building something on the likes of the chrome web store for
google chrome extensions.
>
> Some of the possible features that I could think of building are -
>
> 1. Rating the plugins, so that the users know the good ones from the
not-so-good ones.
>
> 2. Much easier browsing experience, sorting by recency, popularity,
rating.
>
> 3. Information whether the plugin work on linux or windows or both. Given
that the majority users are non-coders, it is a frustrating experience to
be taken to the developers website to find out that the plugin might not
work for your platform.
>
> 4. Much improved search.
>
> 5. Separate page for each plugin, with detailed information about the
plugin, installation instructions, screenshots, and user comments.
>
> 6. Download the plugin from the site, rather than being re-directed to
the developer's site.
>
> 6. Separate user and developer accounts.
>
> 7. Developers can upload new plugins and modify information on their
existing plugins.
> 8. Newly uploaded plugins go through a community based moderation process.
>
> 9. Responsive design that scales down to mobile phones.
>
> 10. Integration with the pidgin client.
>
> 11. Of  course, all of this will require work on the backend as well,
which I propose to do in python + django.
>
>
>
> These are just initial ideas and i am sure more could be though upon on
further discussions.
>
> I made a rough initial page of what the plugin site might look like -
http://i.imgur.com/JfNKt.png
>
> As the size of the display scales down, the website automatically adjusts
for that display site, so that, a separate mobile version need not be made.
Here's what the page looks like on a smaller display -
http://i.imgur.com/GZHB2.png
> http://i.imgur.com/HPI3u.png
>
> This are just screenshots, and I will soon uploading the site online so
that the progress could be seen live.
>
>
> Regards,
> Nikhil Bafna
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://pidgin.im/pipermail/devel/attachments/20120325/4726bd62/attachment-0002.html>