Feedback on Ubuntu App Developer

[Michael Nelson]

On Thu, Dec 15, 2011 at 11:10 AM, David Planella
<david.planella at ubuntu.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Andrea just gave me his permission to forward his message to the list.

Hi Andrea! Thanks for the great (useful!) feedback...

> -------- Missatge original --------
> Assumpte: Feedback on Ubuntu App Developer (was: Re: Updates about MyUnity)
> Data: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 11:03:05 +0100
> De: Andrea Colangelo <warp10 at ubuntu.com>
> A: David Planella <david.planella at ubuntu.com>
>
> Hi David!
>
> On Mon, Nov 21, 2011 at 14:47, David Planella
> <david.planella at ubuntu.com> wrote:
>> We're trying to get more Open Source apps in extras and people to use
>> the Ubuntu App Developer site, so if you would like to consider
>> submitting MyUnity to https://myapps.developer.ubuntu.com and give us
>> some feedback on how the process worked for you, that'd be awesome.
>
> I just uploaded MyUnity on developer.ubuntu.com. It was pretty easy
> and straightforward, and the whole website looks pretty clean and
> neat. Nevertheless, I would like to report you a few points I didn't
> liked very much:
> - a very minor point: it would be nice to add a box to mark an app as
> free, rather than forcing the uploader to write 0.00 in the "Price"
> box.

Yes - Michael Vogt just filed a bug yesterday after he experienced not
being able to type just '0', I've commented their about improving it
with just a checkbox:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/developer-portal/+bug/904738

> - Although MyUnity is free (as in free beer), the submission process
> asked me for a PayPal account. This is a little confusing.

Yes - that will be fixed in the next few days when we release (lukasz
landed a branch which removes the payment step from the workflow -
redirecting you there when you submit your app for review only if the
app is not free and you haven't already filled in your payment
details).

https://bugs.launchpad.net/developer-portal/+bug/865506

> - According to the documentation found on the website, in case I
> upload the source code only, Canonical will provide a packaging with
> /opt as the default install directory and configuration within ~.
> Since I had a package ready, I uploaded my debian source package. I
> had to tarball the three files, but this is pretty uncommon: I use to
> upload source packages using the .dsc file only (which automatically
> pulls the other two files), so the request to tarball everything
> sounds a little weird (although I see it has strong technical reasons,
> being the process browser-based).

Yes - we're currently optimising the process for people who know
nothing about debian packaging, and that meant a simple upload field.
That said, just the other day someone was discussing allowing App
Review Board apps (which are often already packaged and published in a
PPA), optionally to specify instead a PPA/package name from which the
package can be copied. If this was added, perhaps it would ease the
process for people like yourself who are already comfortable with
debian packaging - although it wouldn't work for paid apps unless we
provided access to some private PPA.

> - Further, it is not clear if the package I uploaded should default to
> /opt as well. I uploaded the very same package I dputted on
> PPA/archive, so it install on /usr. Actually, as an experienced Debian
> packager, I would not like to modify my debian/rules to install in
> /opt, because: 1) this not allowed by Debian Policy (which is to me
> just like the Bible is to Catholics :)); 2) since I have this package
> in precise, I don't wish to maintain two different "flavours" of the
> package. I'm not sure this one is a common use case, but I guess you
> should consider it carefully anyway.

This is something for James and Jonathan to consider I think? Guys?


> - It is still unclear to me in what distroseries the package will land
> and what the version number will be. I expected I could choose to
> upload MyUnity in natty and oneiric only, and not in precise (it's in
> the archive there) and maverick (unity is missing there), but this
> didn't happen. Also, I uploaded it with version
> 1.0.11-0ubuntu0~extras, and I'm wondering if and how it will be
> renamed.

Right - currently it is the reviewer who uploads the app to a PPA -
and then sets the related distroseries for the record published to
Ubuntu Software Center, but we have no way in the UI currently for the
developer to specify which distroseries they want the app published in
- except for the extra notes you can add when submitting your app. I
agree, it'd be great to make this information more explicit - or
alternatively, if lots of devs won't know/care much and just want
their app released, making it part of the QA step which thee dev will
do themselves (that is, wheen they QA approve the app, they tick the
boxes for which distroseries they've QA'd and aree happy with). Hrm,
not 100% on that one.



>
> Apart from these minor issue (probably a non-packager user would
> completely ignore the #3 and #4). Globally, I liked it very much. The
> interface is really clean and I loved the USC preview the website
> showed me in the last step. I have seen I will have the possibility to
> track the number of download over time, this is a really nice feature.

Thanks for all the feedback Andrea!
-Michael

>
> Have a great day,
> Andrea.
>
>
>
> --
> Andrea Colangelo
> Ubuntu Developer                        |  http://www.ubuntu.com
> BeeSeek Member                          |  http://www.beeseek.org
>
>
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-- 
Michael Nelson
Canonical Ltd.
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michael.nelson at canonical.com
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