RFC: Cumulus Roadmap

Hi,

I started to work on cumulus months ago. stbochert did make a great patch for cumulus that would move the module to a views plugin so you could get anything in the cloud.

As I did start working on it I figured that flexibility has its downsides because it is possible to create views that won't work with cumulus any more and cumulus would lack a "out of the box" view.

So I started to rewrite the whole thing.

Currently my road map is:

1. Add the JS in three different ways:
- library folder
- given path
- use static google link so it works out of the box

2. Us three fields for the view
- Title
- URL
- optional weight
By this we can make sure anything we give to the cloud will create something that can be used.

3. Create a default view
Views cloud is a great module and very helpful with this. I even believe we could merge the modules later. I will create a normal views style and an argument style so we can get a taxonomy view with usage as weight right away.

4. Make the Display pluggable
I did write emails to the creator of cumulus for wordpress, Roy Tanck and believe he is a great guy. But still the flash cloud has its downsides. No UTF-8 Support currently. No Images easily usable. We probably get someone in house in January who knows AS3 but still flash is not really easy. And I dislike Roys data structure.

So I did look for alternatives and canvas could be a great thing. But it will lack support so it still isn't my first choice.

But if I clear up the data structure I can basically use anything to display this data. With a pluggable interface we can use anything and I will try to support canvas and jquery for the display later on.

This is my roadmap and currently I do this alone. So please people don't get angry. I am on it any patches are appreciated and stay tuned for a better cumulus :)

Best wishes Kars-T