LiveCodeOnline [Was: Re: Rev Online]

[Richard Gaskin]

Alex Tweedly wrote:

> On 20/06/2012 01:23, Richard Gaskin wrote:
>> In LiveCode, see Development->Plugins->GoRevNet, and once there see
>> the Stacks section.
>>
>> RevNet was the first community-based stack sharing service, later
>> somewhat displaced by the advent of RevOnline two years later.
>>
>> It all still works, and I would be happy to work with anyone here to
>> expand it to be even more useful.
>
> Richard,
>
> you are absolutely correct - RevNet is exactly the kind of thing I was
> thinking of, I'd simply forgotten about it because it got "pushed aside"
> by revonline. Most of the stacks available through RevNet have been, or
> still are, here on my system.
>
> I think it could benefit from some additional features (mostly seeon on
> revonline, such as finer granularity of categories, or keyword tags, or
> search by author, or ....) (and I'll email you off-list about spending
> some of my copious spare time on those).

Thanks - I've just added a new section for RevNet to the LiveCode 
Journal forums:
<http://livecodejournal.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=28>

I hope you don't mind, but I've taken the liberty of copying your post 
there to kick off that discussion.

The LiveCode Journal forums are new and still not linked into the main 
site yet - I need to do that, but first I need to revamp the main menu 
buttons using x-plat tools (I made those with Fireworks but now I spend 
more time with Linux and since LC now has nice graphic effects I prefer 
to make such things in LC), and then link them in, and all of that will 
have to wait until I finish some client projects (been an unusually busy 
season here).

So for now just use <http://livecodejournal.com/forum/>, or the link 
above, and I'll link it in proper as soon as I get some time to do that.

Alternatively, if anyone here wants to help webmaster the LiveCode 
Journal site, let's talk.  There's a section in those forums for 
LiveCode Journal itself.


> But RevNet also needs three other things:
>
>   - publicity. It needs to become common to see a posting on the
> use-list (or in the forums) that says "I've just posted a little stack
> to RevNet to do ..."
>
>   - it needs to become slightly less imposing. It was always clear that
> revonline was for everyone to use - and many people would post things on
> there. RevNet looks a little bit too much like "only experts put stuff
> there". It's probably a combination of the style, and maybe the language
> (e.g. calling them resources rather than sample stacks) and probably
> just gathering more usage.
>
>   - more stacks.
>
> So - unless a better alternative appears in the next day or two - I'd
> urge everyone who has posted stacks to revonline to also add them to
> RevNet. I'll be doing that with the stacks I used to have on revonline
> (though I'll probably take the opportunity to tidy them up a bit first
> -some of them are a bit old :-).

All good suggestions, but to be honest once RevOnline was born I started 
thinking about RevNet in different ways, moving beyond the stack-sharing 
that RevOnline is focused on into other types of resources useful to 
developers.

As long as RevOnline exists, it simply needs to be fixed. It's the most 
popular solution for sharing stacks, and I would only put a lot of time 
into RevNet's "Stacks" section if RevOnline were to become EOL'd.  While 
there may be some merit to double-posting to RevNet in addition to 
RevOnline, in truth that's only because RevOnline needs to be fixed; 
once fixed, that section of RevNet becomes a redundancy.

So the key here is to try to get a realistic estimate from RunRev about 
when RevOnline will be fixed, or whether it will be EOL'd.  I've written 
Support this morning to find out.

That said, there are other ways RevNet can be useful to the community. 
They key element is time:  so far it's been just me with occasional help 
from a few others (like Chipp and Jerry who've helped in the past).

There is some foundational work which could/should arguably be done to 
simplify how it downloads stacks - I've learned a lot since I first 
launched RevNet on Christmas day in 2002.

But again, the key is time.  Right now I'm committed to client projects, 
which must take priority over volunteer efforts like RevNet.

So while I have some ambitious plans and a fair amount of prep work done 
for new RevNet features in the future, for now moving it forward will 
have to rely on contributions from others in the community, at least 
until the end of summer when my schedule begins to lighten up.

Anyone interested is welcome to join the discussion in the LiveCode 
Journal forum:
<http://livecodejournal.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=28>


--
  Richard Gaskin
  Fourth World
  LiveCode training and consulting: http://www.fourthworld.com
  Webzine for LiveCode developers: http://www.LiveCodeJournal.com
  Follow me on Twitter:  http://twitter.com/FourthWorldSys