Droid-ify
Better Repositories UX
I like there are already a lot of repositories preloaded in the app, and all is needed is to activate the ones one wants. And I have some suggestions which I believe could improve the overall experience when dealing with repos:
- Repository icons (it really helps visually to identify them)
- A safer way to check/unchecked. A simple accidental tap on any repo, and it can get checked/unchecked and user may not even notice. Perhaps a confirmation for UNCHECKING would be a workaround? I mean, accidentally adding a repo to the list may not be a big issue, but accidentally removing one, could become annoying.
- A visual indicator of freshly added repos (some kind of highlight, background hue/color, text in bold...), to inform the user of the current state of repos list (which repos were already active and which ones were just added). This could help against accidental checking repos, without the nuisance of a constant confirmation box.
Be careful about the icon suggestion. Some icons are trademarked and you may not be allowed to bundle them (for example, most icons under MPL license, such as Firefox).
Also, many repos don't have icons (collection of apps repos).
If you are interested, I also opened #672 and #673 on the same topic of repositories UX improvements.
I'm pretty sure if the repo has an icon, fetching it won't breach any copyright. Imagine if you'd be sued because a website you loaded in your browser displayed its favicon, which the developer put there with the intent of being displayed 😄. A lot of repos have icons. Just load them in F-Droid, and you'll see. Even repos with one app, such as Bitwarden.
Ah, my bad, you're right, I didn't know it was a native feature of repos; I thought we had to download manually icons for each repo and put them in Droid-ify source code. In that case, it's the intended behavior of repo maintainers indeed ;)
A safer way to check/unchecked.
I have come up with a way, that is, don't update the application list immediately.
When changes are made to the repositories, we can show these as pending changes (with a highlight, risen position or something else). After the user made their expected changes, they can press Save to apply them.
This approach also ensures no unnecessary network usage and resource occupation.
I thought we had to download manually icons for each repo and put them in Droid-ify source code.
🤔 Kind of inappropriate. Repository icons may update from time to time, should rather download them when updating the application list and save them in cache form.
A safer way to check/unchecked.
I have come up with a way, that is, don't update the application list immediately.
When changes are made to the repositories, we can show these as pending changes (with a highlight, risen position or something else). After the user made their expected changes, they can press Save to apply them.
This approach also ensures no unnecessary network usage and resource occupation.
This sounds good. Indeed, there is no need for immediate update.
and as the icon would take the place of the check-mark on the left side in the list, i suggest to also use a slider on the right side to indicate & change the status of a repo (similar to fdroid). and additionally if you tap (instead of a long tap) the name, description or icon, go to the repo details. - please don't ask how often i accidentally (de-)activated a repo although i just wanted to see the details. :disappointed: - ...perhaps even use a vertical separator in every line before the slider (as it is often done with a setting gearwheel) to clearly indicate that there are 2 different functions.
