TiddlyHub preview (plugin repository for TiddlyWiki)

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Saq Imtiaz

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May 5, 2009, 9:28:37 AM5/5/09
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As many of you are aware, there have been numerous discussions and attempts at creating a "plugin repository" for TiddlyWiki in the past. However, for various reasons, these attempts have fallen short of delivering something usable by the community. Over the last few weeks - with the support of the UnaMesa Association - I've been working on a new project called TiddlyHub which addresses the same need: making it easier to find plugins. In particular my focus has been on delivering a solution that meets the immediate needs of the community and requires minimal maintenance to keep it up to date. An early preview is available here: http://dev.squize.org/plugins/

If all goes to plan, within a few weeks this will go live at http://plugins.tiddlywiki.org. Further features will be added incrementally as detailed below.

TiddlyHub is designed to make the indexing of TiddlyWiki plugins as automated as possible in order to reduce the burden of maintenance on community members. The de-facto standard for publishing TiddlyWiki plugins is for authors to publish their plugins as a public TiddlyWiki document. TiddlyHub builds on top of this existing norm by indexing[1] a list of TiddlyWiki plugin repositories[2] and checks them for updates on a regular basis.
Therefore, plugin authors normally do not need to manually intervene to keep listings for their plugins up to date, as TiddlyHub extracts relevant data directly from the respective plugins.[3]

Future planned features include:
  • Ability for users to suggest repositories for indexing
  • Ability for a plugin author to exclude specific plugins from being indexed
  • Comments and ratings on plugins
  • More advanced search and sorting mechanism (currently search only searches within plugin titles and the description slice)
  • An RSS feed of plugin updates
Any contributions to the project are very welcome.
Code: http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/
Issue tracker: http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/issues/
Project wiki: http://tiddlyhub.projects.unamesa.org/

I'd also like to acknowledge the invaluable assistance I've received from FND and Chris Dent on this project. FND notably spent some of his personal time creating the TiddlyPy module which is an essential component of TiddlyHub's indexing mechanism, whilst Chris has provided invaluable guidance whenever I've hit a dead end.

Best regards,
Saq

[1] Note that TiddlyHub is not a plugin repository, as it neither stores nor redistributes plugins. It is better thought of as a directory listing of plugins developed and hosted by various community contributors. In the context of the TiddlyHub project, the term "plugin repository" refers to a single TiddlyWiki document published by a community contributor which contains plugin tiddlers (e.g. http://www.tiddlytools.com).
[2] the (preliminary) list of repositories currently being indexed is available at http://dev.squize.org/plugins/repositories/
[3] guidelines for plugin authors to ensure that their plugins are indexed, will be properly documented before the initial version of TiddlyHub goes live

Mike

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May 5, 2009, 12:36:51 PM5/5/09
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This will be VERY nice !!

I am looking forward to a RSS feed for updates & new plugins :D

Thanks,
Mike

On May 5, 8:28 am, Saq Imtiaz <lew...@gmail.com> wrote:
> As many of you are aware, there have been numerous discussions and attempts
> at creating a "plugin repository" for TiddlyWiki in the past. However, for
> various reasons, these attempts have fallen short of delivering something
> usable by the community. Over the last few weeks - with the support of the
> UnaMesa Association - I've been working on a new project called TiddlyHub
> which addresses the same need: making it easier to find plugins. In
> particular my focus has been on delivering a solution that meets the
> immediate needs of the community and requires minimal maintenance to keep it
> up to date. An early preview is available here:http://dev.squize.org/plugins/
>
> If all goes to plan, within a few weeks this will go live athttp://plugins.tiddlywiki.org. Further features will be added incrementally
> as detailed below.
>
> TiddlyHub is designed to make the indexing of TiddlyWiki plugins as
> automated as possible in order to reduce the burden of maintenance on
> community members. The de-facto standard for publishing TiddlyWiki plugins
> is for authors to publish their plugins as a public TiddlyWiki document.
> TiddlyHub builds on top of this existing norm by indexing[1] a list of
> TiddlyWiki plugin repositories[2] and checks them for updates on a regular
> basis.
> Therefore, plugin authors normally do not need to manually intervene to keep
> listings for their plugins up to date, as TiddlyHub extracts relevant data
> directly from the respective plugins.[3]
>
> Future planned features include:
>
>    - Ability for users to suggest repositories for indexing
>    - Ability for a plugin author to exclude specific plugins from being
>    indexed
>    - Comments and ratings on plugins
>    - More advanced search and sorting mechanism (currently search only
>    searches within plugin titles and the description slice)
>    - An RSS feed of plugin updates
>
> Any contributions to the project are very welcome.
> Code:http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/
> Issue tracker:http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/issues/
> Project wiki:http://tiddlyhub.projects.unamesa.org/
>
> I'd also like to acknowledge the invaluable assistance I've received from
> FND and Chris Dent on this project. FND notably spent some of his personal
> time creating the TiddlyPy module which is an essential component of
> TiddlyHub's indexing mechanism, whilst Chris has provided invaluable
> guidance whenever I've hit a dead end.
>
> Best regards,
> Saq
>
> [1] Note that TiddlyHub is not a plugin repository, as it neither stores nor
> redistributes plugins. It is better thought of as a directory listing of
> plugins developed and hosted by various community contributors. In the
> context of the TiddlyHub project, the term "plugin repository" refers to a
> single TiddlyWiki document published by a community contributor which
> contains plugin tiddlers (e.g.http://www.tiddlytools.com).
> [2] the (preliminary) list of repositories currently being indexed is
> available athttp://dev.squize.org/plugins/repositories/

Måns

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May 5, 2009, 3:29:24 PM5/5/09
to TiddlyWiki
This is an extraordinarily GREAT initiative!!
I believe that it will get MUCH easier for newcommers to see the
potential of TiddlyWiki, when they can find/search for plugintitles,
links and short descriptions in one place!!

Regarding css/styles & themes:
It would be wonderfull with something similar for styletweaks and
themes contributions from the community!!
I think the TiddlyThemes is very good - but it is very inspiring also
to follow "live" and cutting edge development that occurs in the
community, many places at once -

Documentation of and recognition to the "cssdesigners" as well:
I think there ought to be be some kind of documentation (like the
slices in plugins), which follows a combination of stylesheets,
stylesheetcolors and pagetemplates.
It might be a incentive to potential contributors - and give the
community a "facelift" - rewarding the great cssartists with fame and
recognition, which I think they deserve!

Just a thought...

Thanks for your initiative - and yet another great and intelligent
high quality tool for TW-users!

YS Måns Mårtensson




On May 5, 3:28 pm, Saq Imtiaz <lew...@gmail.com> wrote:
> As many of you are aware, there have been numerous discussions and attempts
> at creating a "plugin repository" for TiddlyWiki in the past. However, for
> various reasons, these attempts have fallen short of delivering something
> usable by the community. Over the last few weeks - with the support of the
> UnaMesa Association - I've been working on a new project called TiddlyHub
> which addresses the same need: making it easier to find plugins. In
> particular my focus has been on delivering a solution that meets the
> immediate needs of the community and requires minimal maintenance to keep it
> up to date. An early preview is available here:http://dev.squize.org/plugins/
>
> If all goes to plan, within a few weeks this will go live athttp://plugins.tiddlywiki.org. Further features will be added incrementally
> as detailed below.
>
> TiddlyHub is designed to make the indexing of TiddlyWiki plugins as
> automated as possible in order to reduce the burden of maintenance on
> community members. The de-facto standard for publishing TiddlyWiki plugins
> is for authors to publish their plugins as a public TiddlyWiki document.
> TiddlyHub builds on top of this existing norm by indexing[1] a list of
> TiddlyWiki plugin repositories[2] and checks them for updates on a regular
> basis.
> Therefore, plugin authors normally do not need to manually intervene to keep
> listings for their plugins up to date, as TiddlyHub extracts relevant data
> directly from the respective plugins.[3]
>
> Future planned features include:
>
>    - Ability for users to suggest repositories for indexing
>    - Ability for a plugin author to exclude specific plugins from being
>    indexed
>    - Comments and ratings on plugins
>    - More advanced search and sorting mechanism (currently search only
>    searches within plugin titles and the description slice)
>    - An RSS feed of plugin updates
>
> Any contributions to the project are very welcome.
> Code:http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/
> Issue tracker:http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/issues/
> Project wiki:http://tiddlyhub.projects.unamesa.org/
>
> I'd also like to acknowledge the invaluable assistance I've received from
> FND and Chris Dent on this project. FND notably spent some of his personal
> time creating the TiddlyPy module which is an essential component of
> TiddlyHub's indexing mechanism, whilst Chris has provided invaluable
> guidance whenever I've hit a dead end.
>
> Best regards,
> Saq
>
> [1] Note that TiddlyHub is not a plugin repository, as it neither stores nor
> redistributes plugins. It is better thought of as a directory listing of
> plugins developed and hosted by various community contributors. In the
> context of the TiddlyHub project, the term "plugin repository" refers to a
> single TiddlyWiki document published by a community contributor which
> contains plugin tiddlers (e.g.http://www.tiddlytools.com).
> [2] the (preliminary) list of repositories currently being indexed is
> available athttp://dev.squize.org/plugins/repositories/

Måns

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May 5, 2009, 4:04:27 PM5/5/09
to TiddlyWiki
Amother potential TiddlyThemes project -

Name proposal: 'TiddlyHip..'
- Ability to scroll through thumbnails and "short descriptions" (new
standard of sliced documentation for themes)
- Ability for users to suggest repositories for indexing
- Ability for a theme author to exclude specific themes from being
indexed
- Comments and ratings on themes
- An RSS feed of theme updates
...
A TwitterTabs or Twitter Archiver-like application - which allows for
tweets as contribution to the "virtual" repository--

YS Måns Mårtensson

wolfgang

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May 5, 2009, 5:18:16 PM5/5/09
to TiddlyWiki
Hi Mans,

> Regarding css/styles & themes:
> It would be wonderfull with something similar for styletweaks and
> themes contributions from the community!!
> I think the TiddlyThemes is very good - but it is very inspiring also
> to follow "live" and cutting edge development that occurs in the
> community, many places at once -
>

Though still far from what you envision, nevertheless, this was a step
to a styles repository:

http://change.tiddlyspot.com/download

Last updated in July '08.

regards..

Saq Imtiaz

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May 6, 2009, 1:35:48 AM5/6/09
to TiddlyWiki


On May 5, 9:29 pm, Måns <humam...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Regarding css/styles & themes:
> It would be wonderfull with something similar for styletweaks and
> themes contributions from the community!!

This is something that I've considered and I've ensured that the
TiddlyHub code base is extensible and could in the future be used for
indexing other types of TiddlyWiki addons as well, such as themes.
While this is not a priority just now with the focus being on getting
the plugin portion up and running, the issue will be revisited at a
later date.

Saq

PS: There's an open ticket for this actually, and any contributions
would be very welcome! http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/issue/9/extend-tiddlyhub-to-track-tiddlywiki-themes

ybabel

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May 6, 2009, 9:39:08 AM5/6/09
to TiddlyWiki
Hi,

great idea !
how do we register to repository ?
for example http://ideia.tiddlyspot.com contains my plugin, but also
some third-party plugins... Is it possible to mark the specific
plugins ?

Yoann
> would be very welcome!http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/issue/9/extend-tiddlyhub-to-...

Martin Budden

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May 6, 2009, 11:38:06 AM5/6/09
to Tiddl...@googlegroups.com
Saq,

I've spent some time looking through this and have got the gist of how
the aggregator works. I'm not so clear how the django database is
structured, though. Can you add a paragraph to the readme describing
this?

Thanks,

Martin

2009/5/6 ybabel <yba...@ideia.fr>:

Saq Imtiaz

unread,
May 7, 2009, 8:06:08 AM5/7/09
to TiddlyWiki
Hi Yoann,

Once the first version of TiddlyHub goes live at
plugins.tiddlywiki.org I'll set up a mechanism for register a
repository for indexing. For the time being feel free to make
suggestions in this thread and I'll add them when TiddlyHub goes live.

Note the following requirements for a plugin to be indexed from a
repository:
- it must have a systemConfig tag
- it must have a Name slice and a Source slice
- the URL in the Source slice must indicate that the plugin originates
from your repository. (This automatically excludes third party
plugins.)

Cheers,
Saq

On May 6, 3:39 pm, ybabel <yba...@ideia.fr> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> great idea !
> how do we register to repository ?
> for examplehttp://ideia.tiddlyspot.comcontains my plugin, but also

Saq Imtiaz

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May 7, 2009, 8:11:02 AM5/7/09
to TiddlyWiki
Martin,

The database models for plugins and repositories is described in the
following models.py file: http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/src/tip/tiddlyhub/plugins/models.py

See the following for details on how Django uses the models in this
file to create database tables and provide an API for interaction:
http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/topics/db/models/#topics-db-models

For the relationship between a Plugin and a Repository please refer to
the repository field on Plugin which describes an optional many to one
relationship between Plugins and a Repository:
http://bitbucket.org/saqimtiaz/tiddlyhub/src/tip/tiddlyhub/plugins/models.py#cl-33

Saq

On May 6, 5:38 pm, Martin Budden <mjbud...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Saq,
>
> I've spent some time looking through this and have got the gist of how
> the aggregator works. I'm not so clear how the django database is
> structured, though. Can you add a paragraph to the readme describing
> this?
>
> Thanks,
>
> Martin
>
> 2009/5/6 ybabel <yba...@ideia.fr>:
>
>
>
> > Hi,
>
> > great idea !
> > how do we register to repository ?
> > for examplehttp://ideia.tiddlyspot.comcontains my plugin, but also

wolfgang

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May 13, 2009, 10:04:06 AM5/13/09
to TiddlyWiki
Hi Saq,

> As many of you are aware, there have been numerous discussions and attempts
> at creating a "plugin repository" for TiddlyWiki in the past. However, for
> various reasons, these attempts have fallen short of delivering something
> usable by the community. Over the last few weeks - with the support of the
> UnaMesa Association - I've been working on a new project called TiddlyHub
> which addresses the same need: making it easier to find plugins. In
> particular my focus has been on delivering a solution that meets the
> immediate needs of the community and requires minimal maintenance to keep it
> up to date. An early preview is available here:http://dev.squize.org/plugins/


Gee, forgot to say thank you for the work you put into this. Nicely
done.

.
What makes me a bid sad is that TW itself, looking so promising with
Fred's prototype (dysfunctional now, but still visible today:
http://plugins.tiddlywiki.org/) - didn't made it to the production
stage. Such a search machine would also have been the best
advertisement for TW itself.

What were the reason for dropping the TiddlyWeb route for this
purpose?

Inherent limitations of TiddlyWiki? - Or TiddlyWeb, which I
nevertheless see advertised for multi-user-collaboration TWs.

I'm asking this because sometimes a non-coder gets the impression
nothing is impossible with a TW and a good developer.
And if I failed in making something I envisioned, only so because I
know nothing about programming.

But if Fred with the support of BT wasn't able to - what could have
been then the reasons for a failure? - Lack of time??

the very best wishes..

FND

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May 14, 2009, 4:38:57 AM5/14/09
to Tiddl...@googlegroups.com
> What were the reason for dropping the TiddlyWeb route for this
> purpose?

The Django framework Saq uses here makes a lot of things very simple
that we would otherwise need to write code for.
However, Django also provides a RESTful API - which means that an
intrepid developer could write a TiddlyWiki-based client providing an
alternative front-end for the data provided by TiddlyHub.
One could also write a TiddlyWeb store for this purpose.

> if Fred with the support of BT wasn't able to - what could have
> been then the reasons

There were a number of factors to this.
In hindsight, I have to admit I'd allowed myself to get pulled in
different directions. The most important one was was getting more
involved with TiddlyWeb development, which at the time was still in
alpha stage - which also meant that, back then, it didn't yet do
everything the Plugin Library needed it to.

Either way, I think we're at a good point now, and this iteration of
TiddlyHub certainly benefited a lot from the expertise (both
conceptually and in terms of code) gained from the earlier efforts.


-- F.

wolfgang

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May 14, 2009, 4:17:52 PM5/14/09
to TiddlyWiki
> One could also write a TiddlyWeb store for this purpose.
>

Thanks for going into the details.

>
> There were a number of factors to this.
> In hindsight, I have to admit I'd allowed myself to get pulled in
> different directions. The most important one was was getting more
> involved with TiddlyWeb development, ...

So we also could feel glad, because TiddlyWeb maybe wouldn't have went
as far ..
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