Post by Nano Game Lab in Feature Requests / Planned updates

Viewing post in Feature Requests / Planned updates

Hey mate after some use. id love to give some thoughts on the software and hope this helps / gets more features that are actually used will be used in a studio environment like we are. i have so far tested this software over the past few days. and would like to get a few more features so it benefits you and any other dev that picks this up. How does it work if i want a small studio license. - i only need to have this on 3 - 5 machines (will depend on our next meeting as to exactly how many seats we will need to buy).

any chance we can get these colors and icons to be modifyable after creation. at the moment to change them i have to recreate the whole node then reorganise it back in place.

also the “Reverse” button in the timeline doesnt seem to function, at least i havent been able to get it to work.

also is there any chance we could get a few more shortcuts and some extra functionality in the markdown editor? Things like creating checkboxes, possibly tables shortcut and the ability to resize images that are placed in there so we dont have to use as much syntax? that would speed up the use of the gdd creation and what not.

any chance we can get the list of the projects to be resortable? as in in drag and drop the order of the projects? that would make it a lot easier when working with multiple projects that have a successional position but is created later so you can group them. For example i have 6 current projects set up. 1 of them has 3 part series to it. how ever they were not created in order. But now they are a mess lol.

Would also love some information on how i can store backup of the content of this software, Where do the files get stored?

Cheers. So far this software is great. I can see many things that could use some tweaks but im definitely a fan and this software could absolutely be huge. its intuitive. though somethings could definitely benefit from some more documentation and examples that are available to view on the web in the form of text and screenshots rather than an example project.

Some form of version control would be absolutely amazing especialy for documents and with working in a team or at least the ability to create the files in a git based repo. and reinstate that after a reinstall. noit sure if that is possible.

Idea : Maybe the data can be saved in a git repo and the software reads from there, this way when working with a team or even on lots of things, if we need to we can revert something back and track changes based on the user, and make commit reports on what is changed.

Would absolutely love to see task management that wasnt a kanban. Kanban is great but text lists that you can assign to a user (especially with the database multi user) would be next level good. Benefits of creating text based check lists with the aboility to add basic comments to them as in descriptions on them and nest additional tasks would pretty much be a complete package.

Here is a picture of a system we currently use and would love to ditch for a software like yours. this is a dummy task i created to illustrate what i mean: the top arrow referes to a commit tracking number. can share that put it in search and that will come up directly. Not essential but does have great benefits especially when using it in commit messages in version control in the game dev pipeline. the tags is important fort searching as well but not essential but desired. Subtasks are essential as some tasks are nested very deep hence the the task number at the top. and a comment field is useful as well as it tracks the edits.

Also is there any rules regarding using the software while im streaming/recording ? im going to provide a link to all the software im using but id like to know if you are cool with me doing so?

For any one considering this software: i thought about this as i have been using other software to manage my docs, I decided that 15 dollars was worth the risk. Do i recomend it? Absolutely. Just take the time to learn it and you wont look back. Great product and definitely worth the asking asking price. To any idie devs out there. If you dont buy this, your not doing yourself any favours. Get this software. Get it today and dont look back!

VanDuran119 days ago(+1)

Absolutely! I would LOVE to see Git integration, this would more closely mirror my dev environment, and handle merge conflicts just like my applications. I would also like to see task assignment similar to ClickUp (the Screen Shot theMaize included the program is simply amazing! For now I have to run this along side ClickUp for tasks, assignment, and time tracking. I used to be a big Kanban user, but List Views are much more usable from a high level, and Viewing individual tasks while working on them.

Amazing App! Definitely Worth the purchase, looking forward to future development!

baj118 days ago(+1)

Thanks for chiming in and the support!

I agree on the list view approach. However I wouldn’t be able to provide a full featured task management. I think having a list view complementary to the Kanban view would be quite useful indeed.

baj118 days ago (2 edits) (+1)

Hello, first of all, thanks for taking the time to test and leave very useful feedback! Really appreciated, I’ll try to reply below on some of your topics.

Team License: everyone on the team can try the demo, which is fully functional, for as long as they want without issues until you decide if it fits your workflow or not.
Timelines: Honestly, I’m considering removing timelines for v2 as they are poorly implemented and might be redundant with the node based dialogue tree. (which is far more powerful), alternatively I’m also peeking at some libraries like this or this
Improved Markdown editor: This will be the new editor in v2 which I think will cover most of the writing needs. I also added better image support and internal document linking. However v2 is taking a bit of time…
Sortable list of projects: Good idea! Added to the backlog.
Backup: You can backup the whole database of a project as a json file with the “Backup database” action, or just the game content with “Export game content”. The whole app data lives inside %appdata%/drafft or ~/.config/drafft folder. Although there is no supported or easy way to use that folder as a backup. Its better to use the previously named options. There is also the “Auto Export Project Backup “ to save a fresh db backup when loading a project. You can also get a db-dump via the basic API
Version control: this is tricky, as the database lives in the ‘browser’ as an in-memory database (not file based). However I have an idea on how to make a ‘semi portable’ version. this will DISABLE the real time editing benefits of course.
Better Task management: Big fan of ClickUp here! As much as I’d love to see a full featured task management with @mentions @assignees, notifications and the usual goodies we should expect from it, I’m afraid it would be a big effort to implement correctly, especially in this “self hosted” approach. What I will consider is to add a “list-based” basic task manager (emphasis on BASIC) to complement the Kanban view.
Streaming/recording: go for it! Also, if you have useful clips to share I would love to watch/link them on the site.

Also thanks for the support and recommendation!

Nano Game Lab118 days ago(+1)

thanks for the reply, The software is great. looking forward to seeing v2. ill try out the team. i had a think about the real time edit/database vs git /file based approach. i have an idea.

keeping the database is a good idea. but its mainly the documents that i think need the version control instead this could be of use.

when a document is open it could load a file, apon saving that file it could save that file as an auto export to word document in a specified path. While its open it could use a lock file or copy the existing “text based document” into memory allowing multi user still but the file save option will export the file.

still keeping the ability to live edit. but at the same time not locking it away some where and it cant be version controled. Essentially what im getting at is this :

[Server / Software] -> Settings {Set various file path for docs and other files} ––> server / software loads and reads the documents in said file path. {open document} -> initiate get (copy) into mem and add lock file… —> users save it checks and saves over the top or as a separate version and moves old version to a versioned folder.

Because its getting and saving it can be directed to a git controlled folder and be under version control and you dont actually need to change much in terms of software frame work. Plus the auto back up sent to a back up folder in that version control and the whole thing just works under git but keeps the server/software running entirely on its own.

This will help in times of disaster recovery as well as files are accessible fast and easily. as long as the software doesnt care that a change has occurred such as changed meta data to the existing file then git modifications from teams will work. also it will give you more freedom to develop services that matter as if there is a problem with git. thats gits problem. and restoring files is then just a matter of add the directory trees back and it sees the files and makes them available to the user. this will also give studios the ability to distribute the files consistently, know who makes a changes to the repo and when and prevents a complete breakdown if one person makes a mistake.

some things to think about at least. Hope that helps

itch.io

Viewing post in Feature Requests / Planned updates