Twitarr v5
I'm planning some changes to Twitarr for this year.
In addition to technical changes (faster on older phones, mongoDB instead of Redis, non-ember version) there are some NEW FEATURES!
The biggest feature is the addition of FORUMS. One thing I noticed last year was that people wanted to have more focused conversations on the boat, such as shadow cruise events (Dance party!) or experiences (Non-disney Jamaica makes me sad) or what have you. The twitter stream 'o consciousness doesn't really facilitate conversations. I could do like twitter does, and have threads run through the stream, but I feel that is hard for people to understand and won't work well on a phone.
I'm thinking there will be a way to start a forum post from a twitter-style stream post. So if you see something that is worthy of more discussion then a link will take you either to the existing forum or start a new one. This will replace replies in the twitarr stream.
The UI will be much more mobile focused. I'm removing as many of the bells and whistles as seems practical.
Seamail will look a little more SMS-like than last year. You'll also be able to invite people to an existing conversation. Should help with scheduling.
Search - probably the most requested feature. Not 100% certain how this will work but I'll figure it out.
Seamails will mark as read once you've read them. That was a borderline bug from last year.
Profile photos are a possibility. It's on the backlog.
Tracking forums might be a useful thing too. I'll have to put more thought into that.
Unliking posts because phone has tiny buttons.
...
I think that's about all I've got for now. Thoughts?
(I suppose it's technically not v5, but it helps to associate the version to the cruise iteration)
Comments
I can have the server up for you at any time for testing. I know it's probably not convenient this far out, but let me know when it would be useful.
My registration for the domain "twit-arr.com", which I registered prior to JCCC3, is expiring soon. The domain is useful because the internal networks on ships generally allow DNS resolution even if one is not paying for Internet access, and so the eponymous host name (and host names within the domain) could be set to resolve to an internal address on the ship.
Would anyone like to take it over? Or should I let it lapse?
Hosting is separate and can be done by anyone with a server, or the domain can be "parked" at a registrar for free. I just figured it should be in the custody of one of the people who are actually developing and deploying the system... or maybe given to the "home office" for Drew to manage. I'll approve a transfer to any of the above if it is requested; just let me know.