Mini-beta development plan

[Michael Allan]

Dear all,

I have some mockups ready.  These illustrate some proposed designs for
the toolbar (1a), bridge footing controls (1b) and single sign-on
(1d), all of which are aimed directly at usability.  (See the orignal
post quoted at bottom.)

In addition, they introduce two new theatre tracks.  These are not
strictly for usability purposes and will therefore be coded last.
They are intended to attract new users and also to provide back-links
to discussion media, both of which are new functions unprovided by the
existing code.  (Crossforum Theatre is supposed to provide these
functions in its feeds and maps, but those are a little further in the
future.)

The first mockup is of Votorola's home page:
http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/_/TheatreToolbar/home-1.xht

Stuff happens when the mouse moves.  This is the attractor:
http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/_/TheatreToolbar/home-2.xht

A user who clicks around will begin learn what it's about:
http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/_/TheatreToolbar/home-3.xht

If only because he/she will soon bump into others who are talking:
http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/_/TheatreToolbar/home-4.xht


The second mockup is of the difference bridge.  It looks similar to
the previous mockup, which of course is the main idea:
http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/_/TheatreToolbar/diff-1.xht


That's all I have, so far.  I still need to draw a position draft and
votespace.  But I just wanted to share these drawings, because it's
been taking longer than I planned.  What do you think so far?

Personally, I get a good feeling from tracks as a design pattern.
They have almost no effect on page layout so we can deploy them over
almost anything.  (If we do a browser plugin, for example, then we can
deploy directly over top of web forums, or over any web based medium
or application.)  And if a track doesn't happen to work out, then it's
no big deal; we just throw it away and code a new one.  Easy come,
easy go.

-- 
Michael Allan

Toronto, +1 416-699-9528
http://zelea.com/


Michael Allan wrote:
> Dear all,
> 
> The attempt to initiate alpha trials + vote mirroring (Open Voting
> Network) in Occupy Wall Street is dying in the NYCGA.  If it weren't
> for Stephen Coffman's generous help, it would be completely lifeless
> already.  As it stands, I doubt it can survive past January 19, which
> is the deadline to arrange on-ground meetings in New York as required
> under the new NYCGA rules.
> 
> So I want to propose another plan.  This one is centered on Votorola
> in the short term:
> 
>   1. Code a mini-beta.
> 
>      The development target is ease of use for small-group
>      consensus-making practices of up to 20 participants.  Here are
>      the main tasks:
> 
>      a) Place the Crossforum Theatre toolbar as a kind of common
>         dashboard atop all primary service/tools and pages:
> 
>           * Difference bridge: (as it already is)
>             http://zelea.com:8080/v/w/D?a=5208&b=5206
>           * Votespace:
>             http://zelea.com:8080/v/w/Votespace?p=G!p!govn&u=Mike-ZeleaCom
>           * Pollwiki: http://zelea.com/w/User:Mike-ZeleaCom/G/p/govn
>             
>         The toolbar will carry the common controls, especially those
>         for navigation among the various service/tool pages.  There'll
>         be no actual Crossforum Theatre app anywhere, of course,
>         because it's not finished, and also because it's not needed
>         for small groups.  We'll pull it in later, as needed.
> 
>      b) Improve the navigation controls for the bridge footings.
>         http://zelea.com/w/User:Test-bg-ZeleaCom/G/p/sandbox
>         (see the doo-hickies floating near top left)
> 
>         A bunch of minor changes are needed, and one important one:
>         add co-voters.  Differencing among co-voters is very common.
> 
>      c) Automate the creation of initial position drafts.
> 
>         This is what happens when the user clicks on "My position" or
>         whatever and there's no actual position.  We'll query the user
>         for creation parameters and confirmation of intent.  We'll
>         include an option to cast an initial vote (so there's no need
>         to mess with a pin-up in that case).  Then we'll place the
>         user on the newly created draft page, with initial content,
>         etc, ready to go.
> 
>      d) Single sign-on.
> 
>         Implement a single login to cover all servers (pollwiki,
>         vote-servers, etc.) of the local network cluster.
> 
>         This is left either for last, or for another developer to take
>         up in parallel.
> 
>   2. Conduct alpha trials using the mini-beta release.
> 
>      Note these will be alpha trials, not beta.  A core group of
>      superusers will push the practice beyond the small-group
>      boundaries of the mini-beta, and thus push the development of
>      Crossforum Theatre. http://zelea.com/project/votorola/a/xf/
> 
>      So Crossforum Theatre remains the platform on which the full beta
>      will unfold.  We won't get there in a single leap, that's all.
> 
> Please let me know if this conflicts with anyone else's plans. I can't
> start for roughly a week, so I'm still open to alternatives.
> 
> -- 
> Michael Allan
> 
> Toronto, +1 416-699-9528
> http://zelea.com/