Re:Four Facebook Alternative Alternatives
by michaelchisari on Thursday November 25, 2010 @04:04PM
(#1940997)
Actually, Appleseed's framework abstracts out the user-facing code into a "foundation", which can be removed and replaced (and even inherited) without changing any of the underlying server-side logic.
So there's no reason I couldn't implement a radically different UI like this without changing any of the base code. Theoretically, you would even be able to switch between the UI's with a simple button.
http://www.behance.net/Gallery/Facebook-Facelift-Home-Profil...
Re:Four Facebook Alternative Alternatives
by joe_the_user on Thursday November 25, 2010 @04:19PM
(#1941026)
How does the foundation talk to the server?
Do you have to use php?
Re:Four Facebook Alternative Alternatives
by michaelchisari on Thursday November 25, 2010 @04:37PM
(#1941063)
If you wanted to build a new foundation, you'd do it in client-side JavaScript. You communicate with the server through a REST API.
Re:Four Facebook Alternative Alternatives
by joe_the_user on Thursday November 25, 2010 @05:47PM
(#1941173)
Have a link describing the REST API?
Re:Four Facebook Alternative Alternatives
by michaelchisari on Thursday November 25, 2010 @11:48PM
(#1941655)
Not yet, actually, it's still in flux, and documentation is sparse to non-existant. The next few releases will be ironing out a lot of the implementation, and I'm going to prioritize a guide for how to get started with it.
One problem with any Facebook alternative where you have just one "reference application" implemented is that people will glance at the page and judge it by looks regardless of how configurable it is. That's a problem with any UI sadly enough.
I guess that's why I like the idea of creating layers and protocols to allow easy, multiple implementations. IE, my idea of five minutes ago - plugins for Drupal, Wordpress and Phpbb to ties multiple sites into a single large social network. The issue of design might then not be front-and-center.