Hi fellow BTers! Congrats to David and the whole team and members for the "20,000th Topic". Sure glad this one's the 20,001st! So back to business: Is it just me or have you also noticed the plugin library has grown ALOT! I just came over after a while and the number of plugins is just overwhelming now. This makes the plugins page on buzztouch.com very hard to navigate. Especially since there is no sorting mechanism such that you can sort by different criteria like: number of reviews, alphabetical order, date of release, or price. Even tags would be nice later on. Would it be too much to ask the development team to look into this? The plugin gallery is a vital feature of the community and business yet I would say it can be much more user-friendly and helpful. Now that we are at this discussion, I would also like to ask if we can have the number of downloads of each plugin as well. "Most Downloaded, Most Bought, Most Used, ...". That will also give developers and potential members more insight and will be interesting and fun. Am I hearing "gamification" in the background? Well, I just feel this is missing especially since good plugins can really make buzztouch shine even more. I would also give plugin users some extra incentives to post reviews for the plugins. Most of them lack any feedback (of course other than in the forums I believe). What do the rest of the members think? Am I missing something?

The plugin market, since it has re-opened in November has grown substantially. It's incredible. I've got plans to release some of my own (three plugins in the making), however I've got more things on my mind currently. However, a plugin market redesign is a priority and has been for a while. A search and tabs for categories will certainly be coming soon. I think that the categories you've started to outline wouldn't don't be appropriate (eg. most bought...) because this should be developer-only information, however the idea of categories is a key one. When developing a plugin, you've got to categorise your plugin into basic fields, such as 'splash' or 'menu' etc. so it would immediately be easy to see this integrated. Another set of categories would be the operating systems. Being on the list of plugin developers (although haven't published one yet), we have weekly meetings, and the topic of a redesign has been hotly debated, so you can expect a redesign soon!

For the most part I agree with Thomas, however I think WebNevees has a point with 'most popular', et al... And it may be a moot point once the Market gets a redesign… With searching and sorting 'hopefully' folks can find what they need (or close to it) quickly. But there aren't that many plugin categories, and most plugins fall under the 'screen' category, which can run a fairly wide gamut of capabilities… I think 'Market' categories will need to expand a little. 'Plugin' categories can remain the same; it's intrinsic to the operation of the package. I know things are coming down the pipe; I'm anxious to hear what changes will be coming up during Vegas. I think the best thing that can happen 'now' (and I'm as guilty as anyone about 'not' doing this...) is to put more descriptions in our 'read me' files, which is the default page that appears when someone looks at plugin detail. Just my $0.02 Cheers! -- Smug

Thanks Thomas, Thanks Smug. I'm an analytics guy so when I think of different categories and metrics, usage statistics and user behavior come to my mind. It was just a quick sample of different types of categories. I'm not insisting on anything specifically, other than categorization (or sorting), reviews and feedback, and some sort of parameter showing the popularity of each plugin. Won't it be great if a user comes in and in a snap knows the must have plugins to get a jumpstart? He can then take a longer time looking at specifics and other plugins. The number of downloads also gives developers a better idea of what type of plugins are more in demand. I've also developed a couple plugins but didn't get them finalized (scope creep!) for submission. Unfortunately I haven't been successful in keeping up with the developers program because of a 12 hour time difference, but have regularly watched the webinars to hear the news. That said, I feel data and insights can help developers decide where to focus more. Of course there is plenty of qualitative feedback in the forums and that really helps. You can have devs build all sorts of crazy plugins (...and they will...), but which ones can benefit most members faster? And remember Buzztouch isn't just a quickie app maker system like the tons out there. It's a beautifully put together platform community that get's you to create and maintain an app while learning how it's done, minus a lot of the dirty parts. The amount you learn through this experience is huge, and everyone learns something. Basically most members are "developing" in some sort or another, and this is what I understand David tries to convey all throughout by saying it's not the programming and coding that's difficult. So as much as I like to be special, I don't think "developer-only information" is what will help us all! Aren't we all trying to be developers and trying to pack our experiences into plugins to grow the community? @Smug. Cheers. I'm all for good news as well. Thanks.