Topic: idea repository (Page 1 of 1)

As WS suggested I'm posting it down here so that those little hard-working google bots won't publish it to the world. This is the first real attempt at trying to summarize what I want to accomplish with this project. Also enough for me to start thinking about technical solutions.

Concept
A web-based notebook, idea publishing and social networking environment.

Niche features

   1. Ability to publish ideas, predictions, political messages, promises etc and in the process waive all control of
       them thus for example making it possible for everyone to check back later and compare initial promises
       with actual actions and results.
   2. Ability to write ideas on one date, lock them and make them automatically public on a another specified 
       date/time.
   3. Trustable service. A guarantee that an idea that is 'out' and locked is not manipulated with by any parties 
       (unless the writing is illegal).
   4. A social network that is integrated with the notebook's and publishing features so that peers can review, 
       grade and comment on others' ideas and notes.

General features
The system consists of three major logical modules that are tightly integrated with each other. Notebook, idea 
publishing and social networking.

   1. Notebook - All features should be oriented towards usability and intuitiveness. Needs to be suitable for 
       everyday and occasional use alike.
         1. Text redactor
               1. Font styles, sizes, lists and links. One click everything. No visible tags, forms or extra fields.
               2. Note's visual size increases/ decreases as needed in real time.
               3. Keywords for filtering, sorting etc.
               4. Date of creation and date of last update are non-editable.
         2. Notes organizer
               1. Tree-view of folders, notebooks and notes.
               2. Interactive note 'board' for organizing notes in a more chaotic manner and getting a good overview.
   2. Idea publishing
         1. Every idea receives a permanent public key when published. Can be used as a reference and helps 
             avoiding confusion between possibly similar/near identical ideas.
         2. Ability to lock an idea or leave unlocked when publishing. Locking means inhibiting any future changes in
             the idea. Unlocked ideas can be edited but history of the changes is still visible to everyone.
         3. Published ideas stay available to the public forever.
         4. Ideas can be published to everyone or to specific communities. Ideas that have been published to a 
             community may be re-published to everyone.
   3. Social networking
         1. Main page
               1. New ideas
               2. Popular ideas
               3. Watched users' new ideas
               4. Custom filter
         2. User's own page
               1. Stats
               2. Favorites
               3. Messaging
               4. Simple weblog
               5. Own recent work
               6. Settings
         3. Another user's page
               1. Recent work
               2. Favorites
               3. Simple weblog
               4. Ability to add user to a personal 'watched users' list.
         4. Community's page
               1. New ideas
               2. Popular ideas
               3. Simple forum
               4. Administration of the community.
         5. Idea's page
               1. Commenting
               2. Grading

Marketing and finance

   1. Marketing slogans
         1. TODO
   2. Integration with other major service providers who provide similar services such as social networks and
       online notebooks.
   3. Focus on the social networking aspect of the system which is expected to be the most important part of it 
       from the customer's perspective.
   4. Free service. Possibly open source or may become open-source on an undetermined date. May use 
       unostentatious text-ads and possibly donating but not initially.

(Edited by Arthurio on 03-13-2008 17:47)

I'm not sure where there's overlap, but I'm sure I've seen at least one site for 'ideas' before. Let me see if I can find it. Can at least use it to see where they've done not-so-well.

There's at least one more forum too right ... yet here we are

What would you take away from it? Seems like a pretty huge project to me but that's what thought I'd need to make it 'attractive'.

In general my priorities go like this: (the order in which I'd start developing it)
1) basic notebook implementation
2) basic publishing
3) notebook improvements
4) publishing improvements
5) main page of the social networking module
... etc

As I don't understand the concept fully yet, I just can give general purpose advice.
Poi can probably enhance that advice or refine it for the format :

- consider a time budget which includes possible failure of the implementation of this/that module
- consider replacements/options (for example : what would you do if this or that part does not receive any visits? Kick it? Can you maybe swap it with something?)
- consider a gantt diagram (some tasks can be done in parallel, some should be done in sequence, how many days/man each task?). It's really easier to prepare than the name suggests
- you can also use simplified object diagrams, uml diagrams : trying to represent the ways modules relate to each other (they may be ways to do this more suited to the web format)


And last but not least : I may be very wrong, but for web things, it makes a lot of sense to start building them
WHILE you are elaborating the plan, and to adjust the plan as you progress (because of the fast paced, evolutive nature
of the web).

Hope it helps.

Haven't read the whole bunch, but the concept sounds like something between a pastebin and sourceforge.

It even has the concept of groups/communities to keep ideas/notes semi private. Goodie.

The project does sound interesting. You should start with a subset ( probably a simple public repository of ideas/notes with user rating and comments ), see how it fly and add features on top of that as you go.

Actually my main sources of inspiration are:
www.deviantart.com, www.google.com/notebook/ and tiny bit of orkut
If you haven't seen google's notebook yet you should really check it out ... I hadn't seen it since today and I'm amazed and inspired by it.

I figure I'm pretty out of date on php actually. I used to do it years ago but surely things have changed meanwhile...

What is the best + free sdk for php these days?
Any other general suggestions?
Cool libraries, web controls etc that I may find useful?
Any 'effects' js libraries that come to mind?

What are the things to keep in mind security-wise?

(Edited by Arthurio on 03-14-2008 16:28)

Please look at this:

http://www.idearepository.org/html/test_editor.html

Obv WIP ... what do you think of the concept of draggable, resizable editor windows? Do you think it adds anything?

I was looking forward to seeing something here

My first thought is that it is very nice -- I will definitely make my mind up when I see how it integrates with the rest of the interface

Just a thought: you could perhaps think through the post-it metaphor?
Also, to indicate that your windows are draggable, you might think of adding visual clues like you did in the corners to indicate resizing -- otherwise people may not realise they are draggable; I am thinking of some "gripping lines", similar to these.

I don't know if it was meant to be like this, but an empty square appears at the top center of each window on roll-over.

The empty square is supposed to be an editable title. I'm trying to figure out how to do that as a TinyMCE plugin.

quote:

---

kimson said:
Also, to indicate that your windows are draggable, you might think of adding visual clues

---

I understand the need for something like that but I'm not yet sure about any of the regular options ... title bar is one option but all areas except the 'textarea' are grippable... and a different cursor would look ugly...

It's all progressing very slowly. Some of the busiest time in my life ... I haven't had time to go to the supermarket for two weeks now. I'm going to have to look for some 'professional help' if this goes on for too long. A few hours a week is all I can spare for that project.