@ Sybren A. Stüvel
> I disagree here. Having an online repository would:
> - make updating add-ons easier, allowing add-on developers to push
> updates faster than once per Blender release,
> - provide a unified way for add-ons to be published and made available
> in Blender, making more add-ons available with the same ease as the
bundled
> ones,
Having an online repository could make it easier to update what are
currently non-bundled add-ons, and it would give more freedom to the
developers of the add-ons currently bundled with Blender, but it
wouldn't provide a unified way to publish add-ons unless all other ways
are shut down. It seems to me that as it stands now, another add-on
repository would just further fragment add-on distribution.
Also, I think the price of having to release updates less often and
adhere to Blender's release schedule is perfectly acceptable for the
benefit of having your add-on in the hands of everyone who downloads
Blender.
Now, if you want to add a way to search and download additional add-ons
from an online repository into Blender's UI, that could be a good
improvement.
> - given that it would still be possible to bundle add-ons together and
> provide them as one downloadable package, still allow for
private/offline
> installs.
Yes, you could make a bundle of add-ons available for download and
side-load it, but that adds another step and another download, and not
everyone will be aware it exists, as opposed to having the bundle of
add-ons present in Blender by default and ready to use.
> Blender is made for artists and other users, and not for the benefit of
> tutorial makers. Tutorials can be updated, and new ones are made all the
> time.
Tutorials can be updated, but most of them probably won't be, and I
don't think it serves users/artists to decrease the number of relevant
tutorials they have access to.
> I agree, to the point that having easy updating, a publishing platform
> that's available to more people, and that can include things like
ratings,
> reviews, a bug reporting system, etc. would benefit the people &
> communities around Blender.
It is already easy to update the add-ons that are bundled with Blender,
simply update Blender. For add-ons not bundled with Blender, it may be
easier to update them this way, but then you have added security
concerns like Dan McGrath mentioned. The bundled add-ons already have a
built-in bug reporting system, and most other add-ons are hosted on
sites like GitHub, which also have built-in bug reporting systems. As
to ratings and reviews, I've never seen a need for bundled add-ons to
have those because they are high quality, otherwise they wouldn't be
bundled with Blender. As to other add-ons not currently bundled by
Blender that could be added to this new online repository, it would make
more sense to me to integrate them into something like the Blender
Market which is already well known and already has ratings and reviews,
rather than further fragmenting add-on distribution.
> Having a curated list of add-ons is tangential to the way these
add-ons are
> distributed. This curation work could still happen for an online
repository
> as well. Might be an easier process too, and might make it more
visible for
> developers how to get your add-ons in there.
I don't see how a curated list would add anything, the bundled add-ons
are already Blender's "List of Favorite Add-ons" and while having lists
from other people could be useful, you can already find such lists online.
> I don't think that it's a matter of "denying them [the same marketing]".
I was referring to Brecht's comment of "as an add-on author you get both
the freedom and the responsibility for development, docs, and marketing.
If anything we should decouple such things more, rather than integrating
them." which to me suggested that he thought add-ons should not be a
part of the release notes at all, i.e. denying them marketing.
> Where in the community is there a "changelog"
> or "release notes" page that can be copied to the official fancy Blender
> release notes?
I am speaking of the add-ons that come bundled with blender, so the
release notes page for them that can be copied into the official fancy
release notes is the Add-ons page of the wiki release notes [1]
> Who is taking it up themselves to do this work, to not only
> keep track of what's changing, but also to cherry-pick the most important
> changes, and to contact artists to show these off in some visually
pleasing
> way?
The developers of the add-ons bundled with Blender are responsible for
keeping their section of the wiki release notes up to date and they
often provide images to showcase their changes. As to cherry-picking
the most important changes, I can only speak from my own experience, but
I have never been asked to do this, although I would be happy to
highlight the important changes to my add-on for the official fancy
release notes.
> There is a difference between a paid-for online repository (like Blender
> Market) vs. a Blender Foundation run (or backed) free repository that's
> used by Blender by default. I think the latter would still be attractive,
> regardless of the fact that there are other online add-on
repositories out
> there.
It seems to me that it would be far easier to add a free section to an
already established repository like Blender Market (just an example) and
integrate Blender with that, than to host your own repository, plus you
would have the added benefit of all the add-ons already present in the
repository.
@Brecht Van Lommel
> Add-ons are reviewed once, mostly to see if they are useful and don't
have
> significant design or implementation issues. The UI/UX is not
reviewed the
> same way. Many of them would need to go through more iterations or get
> significant design changes to be accepted in core Blender.
Interesting. All I can say is that I've never found add-ons to feel out
of place when it comes to their UI/UX and the rest of Blender.
> For an official online repository that is integrated into Blender, users
> would not notice much difference compared to bundled add-ons. I think it
> would be valuable to have a way for more developers to share their
add-ons
> in the same way.
If the bundled add-ons were moved out of Blender and into an online
repository each user would have to explicitly search for and download
them instead of having them ready to be used out of the box. And of
course it would be nice to have a one stop shop to get add-ons, but
adding another place to download them is not going to provide that, it
will only add another place users have to check (unless you can
integrate with other sites like Blender Market, Gumroad, etc. as a sort
of meta search. That would provide some added value, although I still
wouldn't move the bundled add-ons to this new service).
> I don't see what changed? Add-ons have had their own page in the wiki
> release notes for a very long time, and in the blender.org release
notes I
> only see an occasional mention of a new add-on.
- The release notes for 2.80 [2] directly mention at least the glTF
add-on, and Rigify.
- The release notes for 2.81 [3] directly mention at least Rigify, the
glTF add-on, the FBX add-on, and the add-ons page on the wiki release notes.
- The release notes for 2.82 [4] directly mention at least Rigify, the
Amaranth Toolkit add-on, the Sun Position add-on, the PDT add-on, the
Collection Manager add-on, and the glTF add-on.
- The release notes for 2.83 [5] directly mention at least the
Collection Manager add-on, and the glTF add-on.
- The release notes for 2.90 [6] directly mention at least the glTF
add-on, and the add-ons page on the wiki release notes.
- The release notes for 2.91 [7] directly mention at least the Blender
Kit add-on.
- The release notes for 2.92 [8] no mention of add-ons.
- The release notes for 2.93 [9] no mention of add-ons.
Some of these mentions are new add-ons and some of them are updates to
current add-ons .
Interestingly, 2.81-2.83 don't link directly to the main page of the
wiki release notes.
> There are certainly challenges implementing such a system [official
online add-on repository], though it's been
> done many times in other applications. It's too early to go into such
> details, it's not clear this will even happen or when.
I think it's important to discuss the challenges of a particular course
of action before the decision to take that course is made, and since
this will directly affect add-on developers, I'm glad you have brought
it up now for discussion.
@Dan McGrath
Thanks for chiming in, you raise some very good points! Blender seems
to prefer going with fully open source solutions if possible, so I would
guess they would go with self-hosted here.
@Harley Acheson
Yes it would, and it has been done, inconsistently, in the past. I
personally would prefer a whole section for add-ons with some pictures,
but your solution would work too ;)
You'll notice that I didn't raise this issue until 2 releases had gone
by with no mention at all of add-ons within the fancy release notes.
I'm also still wondering why no one has added add-on commits to the
credit gen script.
Ryan
[1] https://wiki.blender.org/wiki/Reference/Release_Notes/2.93/Add-ons
[2] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-80/
[3] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-81/
[4] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-82/
[5] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-83/
[6] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-90/
[7] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-91/
[8] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-92/
[9] https://www.blender.org/download/releases/2-93/
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