My interest in Gallery
- Loose integration into Artist's Web Sites (see this site) , where almost every image is stored in G2, including those on static pages as well as the body of the gallery itself
- Use of Gallery as a general media management tool for complex web sites where the media may be viewable in albums, embedded in drupal (or other CMS) pages, attached to forum posts or simply catalogued and stored.
If G2 is meant to be "Your Photos on Your Website", it is waaay out of control :)
What Gallery2 means to me as a user
- My pix on my site - though it is overkill, G2 provides the features that my clients want to present albums of media.
If this was all I needed, I would not use G2 - there are plenty of lighter-weight scripts that will organized pix in some simulacrum of albums.
- image management for a website - e.g. the above mentioned site.
This makes G2 interesting to me as a part of my development kit. This obviates the need for other tools. My clients appreciate that.
- Multiple-way Embedded image toolkit for web sites - I have a client who das a drupal site that offeres forums, each of which is accompanied be a G2 album. They also allow direct album access in the G2 framework. G2 provides sophisticated media management/presentation in cooperation with drupal.
This makes G2 an essential, valuable tool.
What Gallery2 means to me as a implementer
- I have choices with regard to media presentation that span a wide range, allowing me to use G2 as my preferred package, whatever the implementation.
Thus I only need to learn to use one kit.
- When needed, I can use images relatively easily in site design
I often build "mini-CMS" sites where the pages look static but my client can alter text, headings and images. I find G2 a good fit.
- If parameters and configurations, and/or theme alterations can do the job, implementation without development is usually practical and feasible.
And G2 has most everything I have ever needed for many clients. Without me having to hold hands forever.
What Gallery2 means to me as a developer
- Gallery2 code is challenging to alter. - Slowly, the coding style and structure as well as the multi-level strategies are beginning to become clear. I don't know whether my problem is my skills or the style/structure that is hanging me up.
- If code is meant to be accessible, proper documentation is not optional. I conclude that maintainable/modifiable code is simply not a priority. I don't like it but do not feel that I know it well enough to fix it.
Gx
(I may be just restating concepts that are already part of the discussion. I make no claims of originality :) )
- Make a strong design/function statement at the user level before discussing technical development. We need to understand whether G2 ability to function as a general media repository/manager/presenter framework (with OR without addons) is intended.
- Make the core very small and make it do whatever solves the project owner's concept of the can be properly implemented, documented, supported, and maintained as a "whole" package.
- Make everything else separate (modules, themes, addons, whatever) and require owner/champions for them, resisting any temptation to take them into the "core". If somebody has a great need for anointing non-core code (certified, acceptable, "works with", etc.) fine, but not without a designated owner/champion, ever. I suppose some code will make it's way back into the core. but with the right attitude, this is controllable.
Development Team - A View From Waay Outside
Gallery is too big a project to be casually managed. The team that codes it should be too big to be casually managed. Though I never met a project manager that I really wanted to have a beer with, I respect them and what they do. I have been the one that others avoided having a beer with. The best I have worked with could not have coded, documented, installed or used the product being managed. But they understood how to see that the pieces got done properly. It is very hard to manage a project and have low-level technical tasks as well. I have never seen a non trivial product or team where this wasn't true. This is not meant as a criticism, but as an emphatic (as well as empathetic) remark.
