does anyone else see any utility in a plugin api for consultcomm? really i'm just thinking of a mechanism for loading jars from a known location, with a few event listeners available to plugins like a timer event, an idle notification for supported platforms, maybe an execute interface, or perhaps jython or beanshell integration. the main reason i bring it up is because i'd like to integrate it into a database on my website which i don't host, so i don't have tcp/ip access to the database so i was thinking of a webservice to do it instead. i figure everybody and his brother has a plugin api so it might be something you'd like to consider as well. :) (another possiblity for a plugin would be something collaborative via jabber, etc... i could see a lot of uses for such an api)
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
That's not a bad idea... use the JavaBeans API to call plugins. I thought of implementing something like that before, but just wasn't sure that there would be enough interest. It would be nice to have a Jabber plugin and make skin loading a plugin instead of a library that's statically defined.
I'd have to beef up on JavaBeans and such... unless you were interested in hacking CsltComm ;)
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
Actually I did begin to hack this feature in at one point but got sidetracked. the idea I wanted to do was to have cc ping a web service whenever I went on or off a project, download a list of projects from a server, etc... I was going to use either tutos or phpgroupware for the server initially, but neither had the webservices built in, so i started working on that, blah blah blah,... (now you see how i got sidetracked :) i'll look into what i had started over the next few days and see if i can't put something together.
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
I have just taken a look at the product, it is awesome! appears to be just what we need, however, it lacks one feature, the ability to add notes to project as you are working. Also, I am not sure if I can kludge something together for multiple users or not, I have not checked out the JDBC setup yet. We have about 9 people in our shop, and need a solution such as this for tracking work on multiple projects, the project info we can grab from our web-based project mgmt system, but the ability to enter notes is required.
Would plugins allow this? Are plugins available? I did not see a version 3.0 on the downloads page.
advTHANKSance
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
I think the JDBC plugin would address most of the features you're talking about. Version 3beta4 is available on the downloads page - it does include a plugins architecture. Plugins would take care of adding features you're talking about - but with the JDBC plugin you can have mutiple people sync to a single database that you can query from.
Here's how it works at my company (about 30 people):
- Everybody has an individual version of ConsultComm installed on their machines
- We have a database with two tables - an HOURS table that stores individual hours for each project and employee, and a PROJECTS table that stores the name, description and notes for every project
- At the end of the day everyone syncs their time to the HOURS table in the database. ConsultComm automatically checks to make sure the projects exist in the table PROJECTS, then the hours are submitted into the table
- When we need to query employee time, we just link the PROJECTS and the HOURS table together and we get the hours, employee, project and project description for everyone's daily activity
Hopefully this makes sense. If this doesn't answer your feature questions let me know and we can work out something else.
If you would like to refer to this comment somewhere else in this project, copy and paste the following link:
does anyone else see any utility in a plugin api for consultcomm? really i'm just thinking of a mechanism for loading jars from a known location, with a few event listeners available to plugins like a timer event, an idle notification for supported platforms, maybe an execute interface, or perhaps jython or beanshell integration. the main reason i bring it up is because i'd like to integrate it into a database on my website which i don't host, so i don't have tcp/ip access to the database so i was thinking of a webservice to do it instead. i figure everybody and his brother has a plugin api so it might be something you'd like to consider as well. :) (another possiblity for a plugin would be something collaborative via jabber, etc... i could see a lot of uses for such an api)
That's not a bad idea... use the JavaBeans API to call plugins. I thought of implementing something like that before, but just wasn't sure that there would be enough interest. It would be nice to have a Jabber plugin and make skin loading a plugin instead of a library that's statically defined.
I'd have to beef up on JavaBeans and such... unless you were interested in hacking CsltComm ;)
Actually I did begin to hack this feature in at one point but got sidetracked. the idea I wanted to do was to have cc ping a web service whenever I went on or off a project, download a list of projects from a server, etc... I was going to use either tutos or phpgroupware for the server initially, but neither had the webservices built in, so i started working on that, blah blah blah,... (now you see how i got sidetracked :) i'll look into what i had started over the next few days and see if i can't put something together.
A plugin API has been developed now for ConsultComm 3. It's based on the JavaBeans API and JDBC, timeout and KDE integration are being moved to it.
Should be in alpha stages in a few weeks.
I have just taken a look at the product, it is awesome! appears to be just what we need, however, it lacks one feature, the ability to add notes to project as you are working. Also, I am not sure if I can kludge something together for multiple users or not, I have not checked out the JDBC setup yet. We have about 9 people in our shop, and need a solution such as this for tracking work on multiple projects, the project info we can grab from our web-based project mgmt system, but the ability to enter notes is required.
Would plugins allow this? Are plugins available? I did not see a version 3.0 on the downloads page.
advTHANKSance
I think the JDBC plugin would address most of the features you're talking about. Version 3beta4 is available on the downloads page - it does include a plugins architecture. Plugins would take care of adding features you're talking about - but with the JDBC plugin you can have mutiple people sync to a single database that you can query from.
Here's how it works at my company (about 30 people):
- Everybody has an individual version of ConsultComm installed on their machines
- We have a database with two tables - an HOURS table that stores individual hours for each project and employee, and a PROJECTS table that stores the name, description and notes for every project
- At the end of the day everyone syncs their time to the HOURS table in the database. ConsultComm automatically checks to make sure the projects exist in the table PROJECTS, then the hours are submitted into the table
- When we need to query employee time, we just link the PROJECTS and the HOURS table together and we get the hours, employee, project and project description for everyone's daily activity
Hopefully this makes sense. If this doesn't answer your feature questions let me know and we can work out something else.