Software center server roadmap

Work items:
[mpt] specify how the user of USC can easily access their account page (previous purchases, etc.) on apps.ubuntu.com
(moved to <https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/consumer-p-software-center-enhancements>)

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High level plans:
- personal recommendations (global, per-category, per-app) - got its own spec: consumer-p-software-center-recommendations
- oneconf webinstall queuing - got its own spec: desktop-p-one-conf
- apps.ubuntu.com improvements

= Session notes =

12.04 is an LTS, so get everything stubbed out early in the cycle.
- Metrics+reports
 - Start gathering more metrics around software center / application developer success etc.
- My Account / refunds
 - We need somewhere in UI that enables users to see al ltheir transactions (in Pay?)

- Wrap ARB integration
- Making the process public (need requirements from the ARB on what needs to be public)

- apps.ubuntu.com SEO, redesign, languages (in line with regions/preferences)?
  - showing apps per regions (how to do this on the client? Regional settings?)
  - similar for exhibits on sca (client could send a header for region there).
- Recommendations
  - new service - aggregate from RnR, popcon, purchases zeitgeist (app usage), oneconf, etc., to store anon. recommendations.
  - It would be great to do something public with the metrics (and from ARB).
- Binary auto packaging integration
- apps.ubuntu.com "logged in" experience:
    * recommendation integration
    * review submission (limited to installed apps - using oneconf?)
    * offline install (queued actions which are carried out after confirmation)
        - we'd also need to know machines, and icons/logos - a librarian. or S3/openstack.
- Translated description/tagline/keywords for apps
  - A standard way for packaged apps in universe using gettext and LP. Could be tricky for commercial apps.
  (keywords aren't currently exposed in the api)
  - Translations for reviews (displayed on apps as well as elsewhere), ie. a button that uses a translations service to make reviews more useful? MPT: might be useful for moderators etc., but not so much for users, due to the quality of machine translations. We could just add a greasemonkey script for moderators to use.
  - We should try to grow the review moderators to get more diversity. Make a list of criteria for moderators to ensure that it's done in a fair/consistent way, with professional responses.
- System requirements
  - ability for a dev to specify which capabilities are required/recommended on a box to be able to install.
  - display capabilities in USC and on apps/myapps so that users know if they are taking it into their own hands, or can trust that it will work.
  - for the moment we can add an api for describing capabilities (deb-tags, but encoded on web api in some other way).
  - Can we re-investigate opening up private-commercial (not private-only) PPAs so that packages.gz is publically available.
 - display capabilities in USC and on apps/myapps so that users know if they are taking it into their own hands, or can trust that it will work.
  - for the moment we c
- Multiple images per exhibit
- Multiple screenshots per application (s-c supports this for apps in the archive)
  - devportal needs to update to support multiple media (rather than the current App.screenshot_url)
- Coupons / Discounts
 - Important for multiple projects, so hopefully we can design a generic way that will work for multiple services.
- "pay what you want" model
 - Humble bundle type model - software center agent would need to be involved in the transaction before it goes to Pay.
- Trial/demo version of an app
 - Can we sell the license separately? ie. just purchase the license key to unlock
 - Allow two separate apps (Free and Full) to be uploaded, but related somehow so that we only list it once in the store depending on the install state.
 - Use test-drive for try-before-you-buy - but wouldn't work well for Games. DP: not in this cycle, although important.
[myapps, software-center].ubuntu.com - currently not OSS but working towards there
reviews.ubuntu.com and apps.ubuntu.com - already OSS and receiving community contributions.
Friday 10am: ARB discussion for backports vs. PPA etc.
What is the general level of excitement for ARB? It's brand new so lots of excitement, but it needs to be channelled.
Q: The RnR capability - how general is that? Would it be able to support juju charms? There is a use-case for a user to say (from USC) deploy me a rails stack locally - but whether GUI integration for that in 12.04 is realistic is another question. That stack can then be thrown at any given cloud.
Is the thought to have one RnR server which would server different objects? Could be a different origin (ie. currenly we hav Commercial, Canonical (partner), Ubuntu, could also have Charms).
  - Unrelated: There is someone keen to work on https://dev.launchpad.net/ArchiveIndex