[Qgis-developer] organizing plugins

[Micha Silver]

On 04/28/2010 03:20 PM, Andreas Neumann wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Following the user meeting in Berne we are now doing a user survey. So far
> we have 25 responses from the 80 participants.
>
> We will share the complete results later.
>
> Among the results people state that they find the plugins organization
> partially confusing. They would expect many of the things that plugins
> provide today "out of the box", within the core of QGIS.
>
> Not only once there was a question in the audience - "can I do this and
> that" and not only once the answer was "well, there is a plugin that can
> do it ..."
>
> Also, the plugin descriptions could often be more meaningful/complete.
>
> I think for an upcoming version (1.6 or 2.0) one should consider
> integrating some of the more popular plugins into the core, or delivering
> them by default, like we did with fTools.
>    
I'd like to throw in my $0.02 worth. One of the attractions of QGIS 
compared to most other offerings (both proprietary and OSS) is its ease 
of use for experts as well as first timers. And all the fancier 
operations are accessible thru plugins.

I wouldn't want the core interface to be stuffed full of additional 
menus and buttons. But when activating a plugin I do expect the new 
functionality to appear as a new menu - just like it works now.  In 
other words, I'd prefer that most plugins do *not* become part of the 
core application.

On the other hand, +1 for categorizing plugins and splitting them into 
sub-menus.
> Andreas
>
>
> On Wed, April 28, 2010 9:36 am, Paolo Cavallini wrote:
>    
>> Hi all.
>> I have been giving several courses on QGIS recently, and I think we got to
>> a point
>> where the current (dis) organization of plugins is no longer tenable. It
>> is getting
>> very difficult to find the appropriate menu to start the plugin. the
>> plugin bar is
>> often too big to fit into a 1280 screen.
>> Would it be feasible to add a tag<section>  (or similar), with values:
>> raster,
>> vector, web, general (more?) and make separate menus for the various
>> sections? This
>> seems to me relatively easy, and not invasive. Plugin authors would not be
>> forced to
>> use it, but all plugins without a tag could go in the "miscellaneous"
>> menu, so
>> authors would find it advantageous to add the tag so their plugin will fit
>> into the
>> right menu. I can help with the classification if necessary.
>> Thoughts?
>> All the best.
>> --
>> Paolo Cavallini: http://www.faunalia.it/pc
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>>
>>      
>
>    


-- 
Micha Silver
http://www.surfaces.co.il/
Arava Development Co.  +972-52-3665918