Website: Plugin subcategories

[Antaeras]

This is a feature request for the website.

Good to see that the number of plugin categories has increased (Fullscreen, Language Packs etc), but there is a great need for subcategories (or more categories) also. For instance, there are 477 plugins in "General", which is really just a miscellaneous pile. How many people can be bothered to search through 477 plugins to do the thing they want? It wouldn't take too much to create some more categories such as
hotkey controllers
internet controllers
hardware controllers
statistics
playlist managers
lyrics
radio / shoutcast

This would make browsing for plugins ten times faster.

[DrO]

you get my on the idea

-daz

[Antaeras]

*bump* in the hopes that someone powerful will read this.

505 plugins and counting...

[Antaeras]

569 and counting...

[Mattress]

there is a search feature you know.

[gaekwad2]

when it works...

[Michgelsen]

if it works...

[drewbar]

Google works better

[swingdjted]

good point - I usually have a lot more luck using google when compared to the search on this site. Too many times it isn't working.

[fastingaciu]

Originally posted by drewbar
Google works better

[Antaeras]

Even if the search engine/Google is working, what if you're looking for a certain kind of plugin, but don't know what they're called? That's what this thread is about - browsing. You have to look through all 569...

[DrO]

and what you're forgetting is that someone (most likely me) would have to go through and verify everything there to determine what the plugin does. so realistically until all of them have been checked through we're not going to know what sub-categories would even be needed. and there's also the thing of what to do with some of the plugins that are just too general

really the site needs to be working reliably before doing any re-categorisation. and it's been noted about this and as time permits i'll start working on a basic list of things but as you've said, there's 569+ so it's going to take a while to verify all of them... including updating reviews/comments if there's an incompatabilities especially with the older versions

-daz

[Antaeras]

Verify as in test? Couldn't you just categorise based on the description, and then fix anything later if someone finds something's in the wrong place? I'd be happy to do that...

[DrO]

yes, everything would need to be downloaded, installed, checked, description/review verified &/or updated as required and then the updates (if applicable pushed back through). as the site is working temprementally, doing that currently could cause existing submissions to become invalid so for the moment i'd rather not do that.

what's in the plugin database really needs to be checked for 5.x compatability since there's a few i know in there which only work correctly with classic skin mode, etc and this really needs to be noted down. it has been something on the todo list for a while especially considering how the skin side of the database has been heavily vetted and pruned as required so only 5.x compatable skins are left in it now.

also it's better to make sure anything which would be recategorised is done correctly in the first place. but as i've said, the backend system needs to be working reliably and have to get the webdev team to even implement such a change in the first place (and if they don't want to then it's pointless anyway) so you're going to have to sit it out and see how it goes

-daz

[Antaeras]

Sounds like a lot of work :/ Arguably it's a better use of time just to keep improving Winamp itself.