ALL_THE_FLAVORS Posts
This past week we released Recipe History, which allows you to track recipe revisions, revert to older versions of a recipe, or save an older version as a new recipe. We also released an update that allows you to copy a new recipe from a Batch of another recipe or update a recipe from a batch that was modified in the calculator before saving it. The third update added the flavor information from the Recipe editor to the calculator freeform and modify features. Finally, we added user cards that can be clicked to activate on Recipes and Formulations.
It's hard to believe we only have 12 weeks left this year. We still have a lot we want to do. This past week I developed the user cards and did some finishing touches on the Recipe History before launch. I also worked on the ability to mix a recipe as a flavor shot, which is mostly functional now, and the ability to select ingredients in a formulation to be part of a premix. These are all built on the branch that adds the ability to mix a formulation without a recipe, so the part that creates a premix.
We are getting close to the calculator state we want, which will allow us to add more functionality to it. We also want to break up the calculator and make it more modular, but that should preserve functionality and just allow us to do more things more easily in the future. I should be getting my co-worker back soon too, so either the pace will pick up or we'll be developing a wider range of features.
This week I opened pull requests (reviews) for updates that add a revision system for Recipes. This displays every change to a recipe, including if it was created from a copy of another recipe or from a batch of another recipe, or updated from a batch from the same recipe.
I also opened a pull request that adds the flavor info to the calculator modify function and to the free form calculator.
After that I've worked on adding the ability to mix a recipe as a flavor shot, at a specific percentage, the ability to mix formulations as premixed bases, and the ability to designed premixes in the calculator. Those aren't complete and, due to the overall complexity of the calculator, are actually a little more difficult to implement than you may imagine.
There is another calculator update on tabs next, which will make it possible to select any formulation from the calculator itself, rather than having to find it on the recipe page. That should catch us up to what most people have requested and lines us up for a new type of ingredient and a new way to create formulations and use formulations. Eventually I want to add some new community features and better browsing features for batches and tags...but I'm slowly getting there.
I've been working on a Recipe versioning system for ATF. It's been...not that easy, but I ended up reverting back to the simplest way I could think of. I've probably built 10 different versions, ironically, of the version system. The system I ended up deciding was the best is mostly like openSUSE's Snapper. It creates a pre and post-change snapshot, with some pre variations, depending on the source of the revision. Currently, the only time a revision is triggered is when a flavor changes, but I am experimenting with other things, like recipe descriptions.
Additionally, I've also been working on the ability to update or create a recipe from a batch. This ties into the versioning system, but is change to the way we normally update recipes. The idea is, instead of simply editing a recipe, you create a new mix and change the flavors within the calculator. You then mix it and try it, if it's good, then you can update the recipe directly from the batch. This creates a new revision of the recipe and ties that revision to the batch and recipe. It's a change to the normal recipe development workflow, but it should make it simpler and reduce the number of clones and things like that.
Finally, I haven't forgotten about clones. If you clone a public recipe, that recipe will be tied to revision 0, which is the initial version. If it wasn't a public recipe, then it acts like the current cloning system and ignores the original version. This allows you to create original recipes, even if they are actually based on a private recipe base. Also, sometimes you may create a new batch that is good, but should be it's own recipe. The new version system will allow you to create a new recipe from that batch, like a clone, except it's from a batch. This means you can start out just creating batches, and when you get to the point where it's a legitimate recipe, then you save it as a recipe from the batch.
So the next features will be recipe versions and recipes (updates or new) from batches. After that we have some calculator updates and some new recipe features, plus some community features. I'm not sure which order those will come, but both are a priority. Among the calculator updates are some new features, mostly for our flavorists and vendors, but they could be exciting for others in our DIY community, who aren't necessarily happy just using regular flavors ;) More to come on those. That's it for the week 38 update. Sorry for the gap in weeks, I'll try to do better with the updates.
Every week I'm going to do a summary of what I've been working on for All the Flavors (ATF) and some of the things we are planning. I'll write it throughout the week and try to publish it by the following Monday. This is the first time, so I'll start with
Week 31:
We released ATF v.2.3.13. It featured administrative tools for creating and managing badges for Users, Recipes, and Vendors. It also fix a bug in the messages application that prevented replies to reports sometimes. Finally, it introduced improved email queuing and sending, without which could make the API seem sluggish at times.
I also submitted the Pull Request for Remixing Batches for Recipe + Formulation batches.
Week 32:
Monday I submitted Pull Requests for improving the button layout in the Recipe editor and permissions system improvements. Finer-grained permissions will allow us to delegate some tasks to specific users, such as a Vendor being able to assign their badge to users or a streamer having a badge for their followers.
I also worked on a new feature earlier in the day, which I wasn't able to complete. It involves a new calculator mode, but I'm not sure when I'll be able to finish it, so I wont say what it is just yet.
Tuesday I worked on ways to make the mix calculator more modular and the new mix mode. The calculator is very complex, so I want to refactor it to be more data driven, but found it was too much work for this time allotment. Then I planned out some ways to utilize public batches.
Wednesday I submitted a Pull Request that adds a Batches list to Mixers' profiles to display public batches. I also restyled the way batches display to make some slight improvements and added a Mix button to both the My Stuff batches and profile batches, which allows you to mix that batch [again].
Thursday & Friday I worked on a data expansion project we are integrating into ATF
Batches on All the Flavors are the result of mixing a recipe. They are an optional last step (Create Batch button), but they are useful snapshots of a recipe's history, and they provide the utility of updating Stash amounts. One of my goals is to make the batches more important and have more utility. The first step in that was to allow batches to be public, which has partially been done, but there isn't a public directory of batches, you have to have a link to find it. Now I am working on allowing you to remix a batch. I'm still working out the exact details, but the goal is to allow you to just go to a batch, click Remix, and do it over again. It's currently functional, but it's not using all of the batch data explicitly, as I'm still working out option for formulations.
This is a pretty big change in the normal workflow and isn't even the end goal. I wont share all of the plans, just yet, but this new feature, combined with public batches, means you can easily share different iterations of a recipe and other users can actually mix them. It also allows you to move recipe development out of the main recipe, because you can edit in the calculator and keep remixing, editing, etc before updating a recipe or needing to make copies of a recipe. It keeps the workflow for a recipe contained to that recipe, without requiring changes that you don't know if you want to keep or not. It also means if you've mixed a recipe and it was later changed, you can still mix the original recipe without cloning it, just remix the batch you mixed before.
ATF v1 had the concept of Badges, which are like awards that users received for doing something, like having a recipe that had 500 views or submitted bug reports, I even have a developer badge on my profile. Badges were just ways to reward users for contributions and a thanks for being a part of the community. Now, badges are coming back in ATF v2.
Yesterday, I submitted a pull request for All the Flavors to reintroduce Badges. They've been present on user profiles for ATF v1 users, but we haven't issued them since moving to ATF v2. Once the pull request is reviewed and approved, we'll be able to introduce new badges for Users, Recipes, and Vendors. ATF v1 only support them for Users.
We have a lot of exciting new things coming with badges, they are just another step and help restore one more feature we didn't fully implement in v2. There aren't many of those v1 features left, so the new stuff coming is pushing us more toward v3 than adding v1 parity.
I hadn't been talking a lot about All the Flavors here, so I think I'll start. This new stuff is maybe going to change our part of the DIY world.