Hello everyone!
No. You are not dreaming. This posting is actually real (and in my usual 'not that good' english).
It's been awhile since I worked on www.opkg.org. More than one whole year, to be exact. Over the past year there has been a lot going on. Many things have changed - to the good and to the bad.
Since the Openmoko-Project was officially 'killed', www.opkg.org became less important to me. I thought to myself 'Why creating a website for a project, that is dead anyway?'. Well, my prediction was, that after the announcement of Openmoko, concerning the end of the freerunner, the users will throw away their bricks and buy an iPhone (damn, I hate that thing). I thought www.opkg.org would be deserted a month later.
Well, I was wrong.
Astonishingly, you're still developing apps and other cool stuff for the neo. Even after all that time, Openmoko isn't 'officially supported' anymore, there are still 200 to 400 users that visit www.opkg.org each day. By now there are over 250 packages and more than 800 users registered in our database (not to mention the 2000 comments you've all written).
So. Why am I posting? It's simple: Even if I want www.opkg.org to die, it won't. I made no changes at all to the site for one year, and you're still visiting it! So I think that www.opkg.org is still useful for many of you.
This is why I'd like to improve the whole system. I'm not sure if there will be a new design/package system or whatsoever. But I would like to add at least some features, and this is where I ask for your help!
Please e-mail me everything you don't like about www.opkg.org or features you would like to see to
reanimation@opkg.org
Like all of you I just have 24 hours a day to work. So please, don't consider this as the 'rebirth' of www.opkg.org. I can't promise anything! I don't know how much time I can spend on developing. I can't even tell when you will see the first changes! I don't like promising things I can't deliver. This is why I don't. This time.
So, I'm looking forward to receive your input in my mailbox!
(... and don't forget to motivate me!)
Thanks.
Notification system up and running
I finally found some time to develop a new, but highly demanded feature for www.opkg.org: a notification system.
How does it work?
On all package overview sites, you'll now find a 'notify me on update' button. Click it once and you'll get an email as soon as someone updates the package.
Furthermore, you'll find a 'Notify me about new comments' check box on the bottom of each page. If you post a comment and check this box, you'll get an email when someone posts a comment to the package.
How do I manage my subscriptions?
The management of your subscriptions is pretty simple:
Just click the 'Manage subscriptions' link in your control panel (the one on the home page, just visible if you are logged in). There you'll find an overview of all your subscriptions and the possibility to delete them, if you have enough of SPAM mails from www.opkg.org.
I hope the system works as it should. I've tested it - there shouldn't be any bugs left. If so, please drop me a line.
Thanks to all of you for motivating me over and over again to go on with development on www.opkg.org.
Happy eastern,
Tobias
How does it work?
On all package overview sites, you'll now find a 'notify me on update' button. Click it once and you'll get an email as soon as someone updates the package.
Furthermore, you'll find a 'Notify me about new comments' check box on the bottom of each page. If you post a comment and check this box, you'll get an email when someone posts a comment to the package.
How do I manage my subscriptions?
The management of your subscriptions is pretty simple:
Just click the 'Manage subscriptions' link in your control panel (the one on the home page, just visible if you are logged in). There you'll find an overview of all your subscriptions and the possibility to delete them, if you have enough of SPAM mails from www.opkg.org.
I hope the system works as it should. I've tested it - there shouldn't be any bugs left. If so, please drop me a line.
Thanks to all of you for motivating me over and over again to go on with development on www.opkg.org.
Happy eastern,
Tobias
www.opkg.org - Relaunch!
After hours of coding I can present you the new www.opkg.org website. The whole site was recoded. There is a new system and a shiny new design.
These are the main new features:
New Design
The old design wasn't very pretty. The new one is more professional and hopefully user friendlier than the old one.
The best results you'll get on a resolution of 1280x1024 pixels. I'm sure there are some displaying bugs in other browsers than firefox or in other resolutions. If you find one, please drop me a line and I'll fix it ASAP.
There are also some small goodies. For example all new packages since your last visit are highlighted in the overview.
One note: Please remember that I don't speak English as first language. So I'm sure there are a lot of grammatically mistakes in the text. Please let me know that, so I can correct them.
Improved member area
If you are logged in, the member area are now appears on the homepage. You'll find a list of all your packages with useful links like «Edit» or «Restore older version». By the way, you now can delete your packages yourself.
The API remains the same
The API wasn't changed at all. So if you began to write an application using it, you don't have to change anything. It simply was ported to the new system - but the results it gives you are the same than the old one.
What you should change
The URLs for the RSS-Feeds have changed. So please update the URL in your RSS-Reader. Furthermore I'm sure that not all updates since last Friday are correctly imported to the database. So please check the packages you updated since last Friday.
What's next?
There are some features I'd like to include in the future. First of all there's a repository I'd like to create. And maybe I'll include a feature where you can give the visitor information about the compatibility of your package. So you can say, yes, it works on OM2008.12 but not on FSO, for example.
Maybe I'll have to change the category names too because there is some conversation on the mailing list about it. We'll see...
Of course I'd like to implement your ideas as well. So please write me if you have a revolutionary idea.
Please let me know what you think of the new site.
I wish you a merry Christmas,
Tobias
These are the main new features:
New Design
The old design wasn't very pretty. The new one is more professional and hopefully user friendlier than the old one.
The best results you'll get on a resolution of 1280x1024 pixels. I'm sure there are some displaying bugs in other browsers than firefox or in other resolutions. If you find one, please drop me a line and I'll fix it ASAP.
There are also some small goodies. For example all new packages since your last visit are highlighted in the overview.
One note: Please remember that I don't speak English as first language. So I'm sure there are a lot of grammatically mistakes in the text. Please let me know that, so I can correct them.
Improved member area
If you are logged in, the member area are now appears on the homepage. You'll find a list of all your packages with useful links like «Edit» or «Restore older version». By the way, you now can delete your packages yourself.
The API remains the same
The API wasn't changed at all. So if you began to write an application using it, you don't have to change anything. It simply was ported to the new system - but the results it gives you are the same than the old one.
What you should change
The URLs for the RSS-Feeds have changed. So please update the URL in your RSS-Reader. Furthermore I'm sure that not all updates since last Friday are correctly imported to the database. So please check the packages you updated since last Friday.
What's next?
There are some features I'd like to include in the future. First of all there's a repository I'd like to create. And maybe I'll include a feature where you can give the visitor information about the compatibility of your package. So you can say, yes, it works on OM2008.12 but not on FSO, for example.
Maybe I'll have to change the category names too because there is some conversation on the mailing list about it. We'll see...
Of course I'd like to implement your ideas as well. So please write me if you have a revolutionary idea.
Please let me know what you think of the new site.
I wish you a merry Christmas,
Tobias
Source code field added!
Today, I added a 'link to source code' field to the http://www.opkg.org/member/">add- and edit-pages. You can now add a link to the source code of every package in the database. You can link to http-directories, svn-directories or even straight to a tar.gz file. Every link is accepted.
Second site update!
So, finally I found some time to work on the site again! Here are the changes since the last update:
API (application programming interface)
I set up a little API so everyone can access the www.opkg.org database. The reason I did this was mainly because I am planning to create a repository soon. The API may help me there.
Furthermore I can imagine, that sooner or later someone wants to access the database and fetch out the data for her/his own project. (I would really appreciate that...)
You can find the API at this location: http://www.opkg.org/api.php
I think the syntax is described very well. If you have problems using it, feel free to drop me a line!
Repository
How I wrote in the upper paragraph, I will create a repository for www.opkg.org. I can't tell when it is released by now. But I hope that it will happen this year.
Minor Updates
Over the past few weeks I made some minor updates to the site (they were minor, because I don't remember all of them...). However, the most of the updates were introduced by some very nice people who wrote me their suggestions through the contact-form. I'd like to say thank you to all of them again.
A feature that soon will come is the ability to add a link to the source-code download-location for every package. And I am pretty sure, that I will have some more good ideas to work into the site.
Well, that's it for now. Feel free to send me all your ideas and suggestions through the contact-form. Thank you.
Regards,
Tobias
API (application programming interface)
I set up a little API so everyone can access the www.opkg.org database. The reason I did this was mainly because I am planning to create a repository soon. The API may help me there.
Furthermore I can imagine, that sooner or later someone wants to access the database and fetch out the data for her/his own project. (I would really appreciate that...)
You can find the API at this location: http://www.opkg.org/api.php
I think the syntax is described very well. If you have problems using it, feel free to drop me a line!
Repository
How I wrote in the upper paragraph, I will create a repository for www.opkg.org. I can't tell when it is released by now. But I hope that it will happen this year.
Minor Updates
Over the past few weeks I made some minor updates to the site (they were minor, because I don't remember all of them...). However, the most of the updates were introduced by some very nice people who wrote me their suggestions through the contact-form. I'd like to say thank you to all of them again.
A feature that soon will come is the ability to add a link to the source-code download-location for every package. And I am pretty sure, that I will have some more good ideas to work into the site.
Well, that's it for now. Feel free to send me all your ideas and suggestions through the contact-form. Thank you.
Regards,
Tobias
First big site update
There have been a lot changes since I launched the site last weekend. Let's go through them:
Improved Package View
I improved the package's detail view. Now you get information about the developer, the homepage and further installation instructions.
Additionaly you can use BBCode in the long descreption.
Furthermore, it's possible to add dependencies, that are not automatically resolved by opkg, to each package.
RSS-Feeds
There are two new RSS-Feeds:
- http://www.opkg.org/news_feed.php">News Feed
- http://www.opkg.org/feed.php">Latest Packages Feed
You can simply add them to your favourite RSS-Reader.
Improved Javascript-Compatibility
I recoded the "most popular"-box on the start page. It should work better than the old one. If you have Javascript disabled, the box doesn't stay blank anymore. It will display the package with the best rating.
News-Site
To keep you up to date, I added this little news blog with a comment function. Feel free to leave your opinion as a comment (http://www.opkg.org/posting_1.html#comments).
Bug fixes
I fixed a lot of bugs in the system (thanks to Thomas Bertani again) and one mayor bug in the layout, which let the menu fall down to the footer. This shouldn't happen anymore.
Well, that's it for now. I have some great features in mind. Depending on how much time I can invest, they will be available soon. I'm also happy if you give me your feedback trough the contact form (http://www.opkg.org/contact.html).
Regards,
Tobias
Improved Package View
I improved the package's detail view. Now you get information about the developer, the homepage and further installation instructions.
Additionaly you can use BBCode in the long descreption.
To highlight installation instructions, you can use the new [ install ]-Tag (without spaces).
Furthermore, it's possible to add dependencies, that are not automatically resolved by opkg, to each package.
RSS-Feeds
There are two new RSS-Feeds:
- http://www.opkg.org/news_feed.php">News Feed
- http://www.opkg.org/feed.php">Latest Packages Feed
You can simply add them to your favourite RSS-Reader.
Improved Javascript-Compatibility
I recoded the "most popular"-box on the start page. It should work better than the old one. If you have Javascript disabled, the box doesn't stay blank anymore. It will display the package with the best rating.
News-Site
To keep you up to date, I added this little news blog with a comment function. Feel free to leave your opinion as a comment (http://www.opkg.org/posting_1.html#comments).
Bug fixes
I fixed a lot of bugs in the system (thanks to Thomas Bertani again) and one mayor bug in the layout, which let the menu fall down to the footer. This shouldn't happen anymore.
Well, that's it for now. I have some great features in mind. Depending on how much time I can invest, they will be available soon. I'm also happy if you give me your feedback trough the contact form (http://www.opkg.org/contact.html).
Regards,
Tobias
