Hi all,
I have been looking at diffrent web app-stores on the Internet and there
are a number of different ideas that might work, but I am still unsure of
how to synthesise these ideas together into a cohesive layout.
I think the FirefoxOS marketplace is the cleanest in regards to the app
pages, but this is let down by the Google+ like layout on their main page.
Therefore I am only going to comment on the app page design for now and
will order my comments based upon the FirefoxOS app page layout (although
their's is not too dissimilar to ours).
-
Lead Section:
The lead section on HDS is much smaller than other app stores, who use a
much larger application icon and provide either a large or medium
application name as a page title near the top of the page. The application
name should also appear as the webpage's title (at the top of the web
browser) for SEO purposes, such as "Beam | HaikuDepot Server". Ubuntu Apps
puts their summary info just under the application's name.
Other websites also list the publisher or publishing organisation in the
lead section and a few of the websites allow you to search for other
applications by the same publisher by clicking on their name.
This is where the install button is located on all other websites apart
from Ubuntu Apps, which puts it half way down the page. Ubuntu Apps also
uses a png image rather than creating the button via code, which doesnt
look that great and so it would look much better if we were to use a plain
button instead (in one of the colours of the Haiku Colour palette).
Google Play adds an "Add to Wishlist" button that allows the user to save
the application for later installation, which comes in handy if you are
not using an Android device at the time (Ubuntu Apps and Google Chrome
store both have a "reminder me later" by email feature). They also give a
warning here if there are in-app purchases or if it is only trialware. I am
not sure what the plan is for paid content/trialware, but using Stripe
Connect would be an easy way to do so with low maintenance (
https://stripe.com/connect).
Screenshot Section:
The screenshot carousel is fine, but I think it should be a bit larger. I
like what FirefoxOS does here, although what we have is not too far off.
Example desktop app on FirefoxOS marketplace:
https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/misstake
Description Section:
The description section is fine. Maybe include a sub heading for it like
what is done on other app stores? This could be done for the other sections.
FirefoxOS marketplace puts the "update" bit here, while Microsoft puts it
in the details section as "Notes". Apple and Google give it its own section
called "What's New", Steam shows the latest two updates called "Recent
Updates" and provides a link to a sub-page called "announcements". I think
it looks better with its own section.
This is where FirefoxOS marketplace also puts the links to the apps
website, support page (or bug tracker or support email address) and to a
privacy policy subpage that either displays a copy of the policy or shows a
link to a copy on the publisher website. The buttons that they use are
simple rectangles with text, but they nonetheless look pretty good. Most
other sites put these links under the details section/additional
information section.
Reviews Section:
FirefoxOS marketplace uses a button with "Sign in to Review", shows 6
reviews on the main page and has another button that links to a subpage
that lists 22 reviews per page. It would be good if we could mark a review
as being helpful, or maybe how Ubuntu Apps allows you to mark a review as
unhelpful (which shows up as "4 out of 5 people found this review
helpful"). Otherwise we need a way to flag/report a review, all of this
could be done on the review info page.
Google Play has a graph that displays how people are rating the application
at each rating level and allows the user to filter the reviews on the
review subpage by rating, newness and helpfulness. They also alternatively
show the rating as a decimal number (i.e. "4.4"), but I don't know if we
would necessarily need this.
Apple interestingly shows not only the overall rating, but also the rating
for the latest version. Something to think about, but again we wouldn't
necessarily need this.
Details Section:
Some of the other websites list the licence in the details section, maybe
we could combined that with the "source available" field. Something like
"Licence: permissive open source (source available)", "Licence: Free/Libre
(source available)", "Licence: proprietary shared code (source available)",
"Licence: public domain code (source available)" and "Licence: proprietary
software (source not available)"
Firefox and Google Play both list the publisher here for a second time,
while Microsoft divides part of this section into the lead section.
Microsoft lists the supported languages, the supported platforms and any
system requirements (Hardware accelerated video on Haiku R1B1 etc). Many of
them list the content download count.
Firefox Maretplace, Google Play, Apple Mac app store and the Windows store
also show age classification for all content. Firefox and Google now use
the free IARC global age rating system (https://www.globalratings.com),
which has legal accreditation in a number of countries including Australia
(the IARC rating is automatically converted to create a preliminary OZ
rating, and in turn NZ uses the OZ rating as a preliminary rating).
Google Play also links to a sub-page or pop up window that lists the system
permission that the application has access to. We won't need this until R2
when/if Binder is back ported to Haiku.
Google Play provides a link here to report/flag the content as
inappropriate, while Firefox puts it ("Report Abuse") at the bottom as a
red button in it's own mini section. The other websites don't have this
feature on the web version of their app store.
-
As stated, I am not too sure that all of the missing features are
necessarily needed for Haiku, but I would be keen to hear what others think
of them. I also understand that some of the features will be less feasible
than others.
Regards,
Richard.
