Weekly update – 6 November 2020

[ryan]

This week I’ve continued work on the new modules directory and today have launched an updated version of it on the site. This is just an initial version of it, as there’s still plenty to do. But the basics are up and running if you’d like to take a look at https://processwire.com/modules/ 

The new modules site is using ProcessWire’s multi-instance support to boot a copy of modules.processwire.com and to pull and manipulate data from it. In order to prevent content duplication, I’ve setup most of the pages at modules.processwire.com to redirect to their equivalent versions in processwire.com/modules/. 

There’s not much new here in terms of data that is being displayed, though it is also different in several ways. For starters, it finally has the look-and-feel of the main site. The modules homepage takes a different approach and lists 3 modules each in these different sections:

• Recently added modules
• Recent updated modules
• Popular modules
• Modules recently liked by users

Modules in the “recently updated modules” section are those that have had recent commits at GitHub. 

The “popular modules” section randomly selects 3 modules that have a certain threshold of “likes” quantity and date of user activity, combined with being updated within the last 6 months. Or you can view them all (no random selection) at the dedicated popular modules page ... this section will grow as users interact with it. 

The “modules recently liked by users” section looks for modules that have had the “like” button clicked on recently, and puts them into this bucket. Like the “popular modules” section, this one will grow and increase in relevance once there is more user interaction with the new modules directory.

There’s also a new feature on this modules site where you can maintain a “cart” (of sorts) that keeps track of which modules you have liked. 

In addition, the new modules site estimates how much usage each module has by analyzing request data from the ProcessWire modules web service. This is something the old modules site does not do. It uses this data solely for providing a unique sortable view of modules. Because this data hasn’t been tracked for long, it’ll increase in relevance over time. 

One area that I want to build out quite a bit more is the module “authors” section. Since the new modules site will be using authenticated login sessions with LoginRegisterPro, we’ll be able to maintain a lot more “profile” info for module authors (full name, bio, photo, website, anything else?) 

There are a few things still in development, so you won’t see them just yet: 

• Edit module ability (it directs you to the old modules site for that)
• Add module ability (also directs you to the old modules site)
• Informational pages (how to install modules, etc.)

More to come here, but that’s where it is now. Nothing all that exciting I know, but still an improvement hopefully. If you find anything that isn’t working, or have other feedback or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

[adrian]

Hi Ryan,

Looks like a great start. First thing I noticed is that pagination doesn't work.

I'll let you know if I come across anything else.

[adrian]

Hi Ryan,

Looks like a great start. First thing I noticed is that pagination doesn't work.

I'll let you know if I come across anything else.

I also think it's probably time to remove modules that don't support PW 3 from the sorted lists - highly liked modules that don't work with v3 will be confusing to new users.

[ryan]

@adrian Thanks, pagination fixed. I meant to mention about non PW3 modules above, that I'm going to be removing them from the directory, or at least from the generated lists that it outputs. I don't think there's any need for the directory to maintain PW2 modules anymore, but I wanted to go through them one-by-one just in case there are any that are mislabeled as PW2, or maybe some are still actively developed and work with PW3. But the reason the new modules directory doesn't say anything about PW version is because it was going to be exclusive to PW3 compatible modules going forward. 

[adrian]

@ryan - I see that the PW Upgrades module is now seeing pro modules, which is awesome, but I wondering if you and @netcarver could work together so that his awesome ModuleReleaseNotes module can read the processwire.com git host so we don't get this error:

Sorry, ModuleReleaseNotes doesn't know how to connect to the git hosting service at processwire.com.

Also, PW Upgrades is reporting that FieldtypeTable has a new version: 1.0.0 but when I go to the downloads post for Profields, it still has 0.1.9 as the latest download. And, if I try to upgrade to 1.0.0, then I get this error: ProcessModuleInstall: Unable to open ZIP file, error code: 19

[Ralf]

Hello Ryan,

thanks for the update and yes the new page is more the look-and-feel of the main page.

I'd like to give you a short feedback on two points I noticed during the first view/trial.

1. I have to admit that I personally am a person who likes to visually perceive larger lists. That is to say, I appreciated the fact that in the old page a small picture of the author was displayed with each module entry. I have to admit, if I have a list of 25, 40 or 50 modules in front of me and all entries look "the same" I knew in the past, I'm now looking for a module of author x, who has his picture looking like this... and then I "scrolled" over the search result quite fast.
Would it be possible to include this module Autor Avatar in the new directory?

2. The second point concerns the search function in the module directory. Currently it seems to me as it looks like it probably does not search in the "body" area. Would this be possible?

Explanation: The following problem occurred during my first test, the first module which I always install with every new PW installation is the "ProcessWireUpgrade" module. So my difficulty was, I can't remember the exact name ... don't ask why, I already tried it with postits etc. etc. ... nothing helps. ?  So I entered "Update" in the search field (I know update and upgrade is not the same thing) and it gives me only one entry here: "MarkupBrowserUpdate" ? but that's not what I was looking for. I knew that the module is from you, so I clicked on your name in the author's section and went through all your modules and see, it's not update but upgrade. OK the search can't find anything, but the word "update" does appear in the body text, so why doesn't it show me this?

Long speech, short sense...
wouldn't it be helpful if the search function would also search the body area?
Or a completely different idea (I'm working a lot with the blog system right now) how about a hashtag function for the modules? The module author can then enter 1, 5, 10, ... Keywords to be included.
Or would even both be helpful?

Only my two cents, thanks for reading and a nice weekend

[ryan]

@adrian The modules directory does not distribute Pro modules or track their version numbers. Though I am planning to have it track version numbers for Pro modules, but that'll be added on once the rest of it is finished. Pro modules will continue to be distributed through the dedicated support boards since IP.Board manages the access for all of it. Maybe someday I can build more in that regard, but I don't have the bandwidth for that currently. The new modules directory makes no changes to the web services portion, which will continue to be provided by modules.processwire.com. I didn't want the changes to interrupt anything, as the web service gets quite a lot of traffic. 

@Ralf Thanks for the suggestions. I will look into it further. I have found that searching the body for modules introduces a few too much noise into the results, but including the module summary in the search might be a good middle ground. The keywords are of course a good idea too. 

[adrian]

Just now, ryan said:

The modules directory does not distribute Pro modules or track their version numbers.

Perhaps you can remove them from showing up in the PWUpgrades module, because it's pretty confusing as it is and it's a new thing seeing them there.

[eelkenet]

Something I'm missing in the new Modules page are the requirements for installing, such as PW version and other required modules.