Proposal to update the ICU Demos

[Mihai Niță Ⓤ]

I've put together a document explaining the troubles with the current demos, and proposing to move the ICU C++ demos to Java and a hight level plan:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/152fYy39Ku8fbIOz1uTckzR6MvZKEHxnmrglnJ7UEcak/

Together with a spreadsheet with the existing demos to vote for what to keep and what to drop.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1WlcmzRO4Q5Yv3zJqZV1b6Et9XEL1q18ZLsdeTac1G9w/

Thank you very much,

Mihai

[George Rhoten]

It's worth mentioning that several of them are redundant, and those could be replaced by the existing/competing Unicode Utilities or online CLDR tools. I didn't know how to put that into your proposal, but I did add such links to my votes.  I suggest that any redundant tools/samples be turned into an HTTP redirect to the equivalent functionality instead of a full delete. Any existing stale links point to an equivalent tool.

What do you think of that modification to your proposal?

George

[Mihai Niță Ⓤ]

Thank you George!

I like the idea to link the Unicode Utilities.

Maybe those would benefit from some love :-), but not now. I don't know much about them.

The trouble is now I don't know how to grade anymore :-)

For example I think that "ICU Segments" and "Transforms" are pretty nice and useful.

But both have Unicode Utilities equivalents.

So should I grade them 0 (as in "drop them and use the Unicode Utilities ones"), or 5, as in "I find them very useful").

So what I'll do is grade as if Unicode Utilities does not exist, to show how useful I find a demo.

But I am 100% for unifying / pointing to Unicode Utilities.

===

I am also wondering: should we just merge the icu-demos/icu4jweb (the current ICU4J demos) into unicodetools/UnicodeJsps?

They are both Java and use the same technology, JSP.

So there would be no need for a separate deployment, with cross-links between two sets of demos.

===

I also added some more ideas

Mihai

[Mihai Niță Ⓤ]

And I've added a section to the doc about unifying with Unicode Utils

[George Rhoten]

This is a hard way to vote.  The spreadsheet key currently says that 0 means delete, and 5 means definitely keep. It's hard to correlate usefulness with action. There are some that I consider as useful as a 5, but I'd still advocate for deleting it, and turning it into a redirect to an equivalent tool on unicode.org (e.g. translit --> transform).

For the useful ICU4J demos, I'm fine with moving or redirecting to Unicode Utils. For some of the ICU4C tools (e.g. scompare & nbrowser), converting them to equivalent Unicode Utils tools would be acceptable. It's should be easy to use AI to convert those.

For the collation and Converter Explorer tools, those are the 2 that are not trivial, and have no Unicode Utils equivalents. I see a path for all ICU4J demos to disappear, and I see a path where most of the ICU4C demos disappear.

Should there be 2 sheets on your spread sheet? One is for usefulness, and the other is for suggested action?  For the suggested actions, maybe the following can be considered:

1. Delete with no equivalent
2. Redirect tool to unicode.org equivalent
3. Merge tool to existing unicode.org tool by adding functionality
4. Convert/Port to Unicode Utils
5. Keep as-is
6. Other...

George

[Mihai Niță Ⓤ]

When I created the spreadsheet I didn't consider Unicode Utils at all (I was very unfamiliar with them, I barely knew about them).

But I was thinking that the score shows the utility, and the utility decides the action.

if not useful:

    delete

else:

    if has Unicode Utils equivalent:

        use the Unicode Utils equivalent

    else if is Java:

        continue using it

    else if is C++:

        migrate it to Java

In the above "algorithm" we might split the case where a demo exists in Unicode Utils AND in the current demos, and see if one is better than the other.

But I see a redirect / link to Unicode Utils as a quick and dirty hack.

I would rather merge.

That would give us a unified look, one single menu to select between the demos,

one single repo to work on, one single build & deployment, one public URL, etc.

If you think this seems reasonable, then we should grade the usefulness in the sheet.

Mihai

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