Proposal for Ubiquity - Bespin integration

[Jono]

(Cross-posted to the Ubiquity core discussion list)

Hey everybody,
I am starting to work on setting up the new Herd (the server-side
components for Ubiquity, e.g. command search engine etc.) And I
started thinking: the Herd code already stores copies of the source
code of Ubiquity commands that it indexes. Why not make it into a
simple hosting platform for command source code, with versioning and
(drum roll...) online code-editing provided by Bespin! A few benefits
are:

1. If there's a Ubiquity command that *almost* does what you want, but
not quite, you can hack it right there on the page, and then subscribe
to the resulting version.
2. Or you can subscribe to a "safe" version right from the Herd page;
the safe version would fold in the best community code edits and
additions after code reviewing and testing. It would be considered
trusted, so it wouldn't put up the red warning page when you go to
subscribe.
3. Localization of commands could happen right there, too -- you see a
command you like that's not in your language, you click a link and get
a Bespin editor opened up with a .po file containing all the strings
from the command that need localization, you type in your new
versions, you save it, now everyone can subscribe to your localization
right on the Herd.
4. There'd be a search page on the Herd which searches both commands
for which the code is hosted on the Herd, and also commands which are
hosted on other people's websites.
5. Optionally, we can host the Ubiquity built-in commands on the Herd
too, so that we can make quick improvements there and people can get
those improvements without needing to install a new Ubiquity version.

Bespin guys: Do you think this would be a useful test case for
deployment of Bespin? The nice thing about Ubiquity commands is that
they are small, self-contained chunks of source code, so maybe they
make a good study environment for learning about how collaborative
Bespin editing of a codebase can work, and then what we learn can be
applied later to Bespin deployments on larger-scale open-source code
repositories.

What do you think?

--Jono

["mitcho (Michael 芳貴 Erlewine)"]

Hi Jono et al,

I think this is a fabulous idea! I would also love to see Bespin in
the Ubiquity hack page, with the "share" link submitting it to the
herd 2.0.

Re: localizations, however, I haven't played around with po files on
Bespin at all but given how structured po files are, it might make
more sense to make a simpler form-based editor for the po files.

mitcho

--
mitcho (Michael 芳貴 Erlewine)
mit...@mitcho.com
http://mitcho.com/
linguist, coder, teacher

[Lech]

This seems like an awesome idea, but I do have a very tiny list of
concerns. Personally, I would love to see this for all of the obvious
reasons, but what about coders that want to simply edit their code
locally before sharing any of it, or who don't want to put it on the
herd at all? In addition to that, do we plan to offer an alternative
editor if the users network is down or just unreliable enough when
they still want to code a command? Can Bespin offer any kind of
offline support to address this?

I can see some instances where users might not want to contribute or
manage yet another login for services like this, so making it as easy
and transparent as possible for them would really be key to. Beyond
that I think it's an awesome idea and could replace the editors in the
about: pages if that's what the goal is.

-L

[Jono DiCarlo]

Hi Lech,
I wasn't proposing getting rid of the local command editor, actually.
For all the reasons you said -- editing when offline, code that you
don't want to ever want to share (or don't want to share *yet*) -- we
still need the local command editor. But maybe it should have some
easy UI for copying your command to the Herd when you do want to share
it.
--Jono

On Aug 20, 5:21 pm, Lech <unatten...@gmail.com> wrote:
> This seems like an awesome idea, but I do have a very tiny list of
> concerns. Personally, I would love to see this for all of the obvious
> reasons, but what about coders that want to simply edit their code
> locally before sharing any of it, or who don't want to put it on the
> herd at all? In addition to that, do we plan to offer an alternative
> editor if the users network is down or just unreliable enough when
> they still want to code a command? Can Bespin offer any kind of
> offline support to address this?
>
> I can see some instances where users might not want to contribute or
> manage yet another login for services like this, so making it as easy
> and transparent as possible for them would really be key to. Beyond
> that I think it's an awesome idea and could replace the editors in the
> about: pages if that's what the goal is.
>
> -L
>

[Lech]

No, I wasn't thinking of getting rid of the editor currently in place
at the present. But I was thinking if is in any way beneficial then
why not?

Knowing that Bespin is mostly an online type of service like google
docs for code... I'm kind of curious to know whether or not there
would be any add-on functionality to go along with it. Meaning: are
there any kind of plans for off-line editing capabilities or something
else a user might benefit from when disconnected but still be able to
edit their documents with it? If there is a plan for that, then could
other add-ons (Ubiquity) get access to that data in some way if it's
correctly associated then when back online push those changes back to
their account?

The current editor is alright for basic and quick editing, but I think
any serious coder will likely pull their code out to an external
editor which is fine. But if Bespin could somehow make them change
their mind, with a method for sharing or even not sharing their
command it would still make for a nice addition.

-L