launchpad-dev team mailing list archive

[Jonathan Lange <jml@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 11:41 AM, Jeroen Vermeulen <jtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> We keep seeing different problems with our UI and user interaction when a
> branch has been registered (in the database) but not created (on
> codehosting).

Yes. We should just prevent people from registering hosted branches.
It creates a heap of problems and doesn't solve any that I can see.
See https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/launchpad-code/+bug/288645

> People not familiar with distributed version control fail to
> figure out how to start a branch.  Project owners set up translations
> exports to nonexistent branches.

I am familiar with DVCS and I think I'd be tripped up by this one. Why
doesn't the translations exporter create a new branch?

>  "Configure a series branch" on a product
> series can appear to do nothing, with no next steps becoming obvious (bug
> 567065).

Looking at the bug, I think that's a different problem too.

> 1. For branches that have had no changes scanned yet, lots of places that
> link to them could benefit from a standardized warning icon and tooltip, or
> even a full paragraph.  Maybe even all places.
>

Not quite what you describe, but see:
 https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/launchpad-code/+bug/368312
 https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/launchpad-code/+bug/320065

> 2. The branch page itself ought to draw attention to the situation and guide
> the user towards next steps.
>
> It'd be very comforting to see a more detailed notice on the branch page:
> "This branch has not been pushed to yet.  Here's what you need to do.
>  Here's a link to a help page explaining your options.  If you've already
> pushed, please wait a few minutes for the change to be noticed."

The branch page should definitely be better in this regard. The code
team are working this week to reduce a significant part of the latency
between pushing and appearing in the web ui.

Before a link to help will help, Launchpad needs to be more honest
about the state of the branch. See
https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/launchpad-code/+bug/445424. We should
also have an ajax widget that updates when the branch is ready, rather
than the embarrassing "please refresh" thing we have now (same goes
for MP diffs).

jml