Hey everyone!
There’s some passionate people in this thread for sure. Let me put my perspective on it out there and what I am aiming for with Foundry. Maybe you’ll see my point of view, or maybe you’ll disagree with me wholeheartedly. But at least you’ll know where I’m coming from on this topic.
Foundry is meant to be a framework that people of all levels of experience can use and still create great looking sites. I want it to be approachable for even the brand-new RapidWeaver user. Someone mentioned that frameworks aren’t for everyone. I think this insinuates that mostly the higher level, more experienced users are the ones that would use something like Foundry. I don’t see it that way. I think people of all levels want to be able to use something that allows them to layout their pages as they wish.
When I built Foundry I tried to look at things that might intimidate users. Code intimidates users. FTP intimidates users. Databases intimidate users. These are just a few of the higher level things that some of us take for granted when we’re building sites because we’ve been doing it for a long time and are seasoned in these areas. But we’re not the majority when it comes to RapidWeaver users. Really. We’re a vocal minority.
So let me address some of the points so far in the thread –
###I think most here do completely disregard that many, many (maybe most?) of us are doing client work / client sites with RapidWeaver.
(A) I do not disregard that people use RapidWeaver for client work. I think that is something that a lot of people do. Personally I would find it dangerous to allow clients to replace images on the server using FTP myself and wouldn’t allow them to do so. That is just my personality though.
While I think a lot of users are using RapidWeaver to developer for clients, I think a great deal of users pick up RapidWeaver to design sites for themselves or friends and family. Then like myself, or you all they start looking at RW as a way to expand. Foundry is a great way for them to make that transition to build more complex sites, but with the same sort of ease they’ve had with themes.
###Perhaps a “third way” would be to create an add-on pack (even if free) that provided warehousing-only equivalents to relevant image stacks in Foundry. Then the disclaimer to downloading and using the warehoused stacks would be that support for how to warehouse, etc. would be minimal or non-existent.
(A) I would feel horrible having any product out there that I don’t stand behind 100% and support. If I did any less I would feel really bad. I totally understand the sentiment here, but I would have this horrible inner struggle to not support something like that fully.
###Adam wants this to be a dead simple drag and drop solution for Rapidweaver. Warehoused images just does not fit that model at this time.
(A) Steve knows this not because he’s an employee, but because he was a beta tester. He was even one of the many that brought up “warehoused” images as an option during the early days of testing. I explained my viewpoint to the testers and after using Foundry for a while I feel like they saw where I was coming from. What I saw in Foundry. I feel like they got the user experience I was aiming for eventually.
###RapidWeaver’s drag-and-drop currently does not allow SVGs.
(A) This is correct. I think Realmac is working on this. It has been brought up in developer forums I believe as well. But you know what greases the squeaky wheel the most? Emails from users, asking politely for a feature. Realmac is intent on making RapidWeaver an even better platform than it already is. Dan is actively asking for suggestions and feature requests. So email him with them. He is very open to these sorts of requests. If you need his email address, please just ask and I will furnish it for you.
###How though is Warehousing using code???
(A) I don’t think Steve was suggesting that “warehousing” images is using code. I think he simply was mentioning the Foundry was meant to have the ease of drag-and-drop. Just a misunderstanding.
###You are limiting your user base…
(A) I might be. Really. I don’t doubt this. I’m not saying your opinion about “warehoused” images is wrong, just that it isn’t the choice I’ve made for Foundry at this time.
I want a product that is approachable for everyone. This is something I am really passionate about. Bringing new people to this method and style of site design. Bringing new RapidWeaver users deeper into developing amazing sites where they can devote a little time and get a great looking site. Not all tools are to everyone’s liking, but I want Foundry to be that tool that anyone can pick up and start building a gorgeous site within hours, no matter their level of experience.
###Could Foundry have a “warehoused” feature for image placement?
(A) It could. There’s not anything stopping that from happening. That feature is just not one I’m looking to implement at this time. Foundry is still young.
Is Foundry wrong or a bad piece of software because it doesn’t have a specific feature? I don’t think so, but I’m biased. I think it is a good tool for developing really versatile sites in RapidWeaver.
One last thing – I want to ask that everyone be kind and courteous to one another on this forum. It is one of the main rules of the forum in fact. We all have differing points of view. That is what makes us all so different and interesting. Otherwise we’d all just be boring, carbon copies of one another. Blah. Who wants that, right? But we can all try and respect each others view points, I hope and have open discussions.
Hopefully I’ve answered everyone’s questions on “warehousing” images, as it currently stands in Foundry. If I haven’t, post here and I’ll answer them for you specifically. I probably overlooked some as the thread was really long before I even got to sit down and read through it.