My goal for this month is to get more people using the git-annex assistant, and fix issues that might be blocking you from using it. To do this, I'd like to get an idea about whether you're already using it, or what's keeping you from using it.

If you use git-annex at the command line and have no reason to use the assistant, please instead fill in this poll on behalf of less technically adept friends or family -- what's preventing you from introducing them to the assistant?

[[!poll open=yes expandable=yes 8 "I'm using the assistant!" 27 "I need a Windows port" 30 "I need an Android port" 3 "I need an IPhone port (not holding my breath)" 2 "Well, it's still in beta..." 11 "I want to, but have not had the time to try it" 5 "Just inertia. I've got this dropbox/whatever that already works.." 3 "It's too hard to install (please say why in comments)" 2 "Perceived recent increase of bug reports and thus sitting it out." 25 "Initially the lack of direct-mode. Now concerns about the safety of direct mode. Perhaps after the next release." 9 "I haven't always well understood the differences between commandline operation & the assistant, so the differences would confuse me, and I found the command line more understandable & less scary. Now trying to learn to like & trust the assistant. :)" 21 "An Ubuntu PPA would be supercool! Thanks for your great work!!" 18 "Not yet in Debian sid amd64" 6 "Waiting for Fedora/CentOS rpm repository." 2 "throttling transfers, it upsets people when I saturate the connection" 2 "partial content" 1 "Not yet available in macports" 4 "No build yet for Nokia N9" 3 "Using only git-annex webapp to config does not seem to work: Create walkthough?" 5 "No build for OSX 10.6" 5 "Needs more focus on the UI." 1 "Just inertia. I don't have a Dropbox/whatever." 4 "Replaces files with a symlink mess." 2 "configurable option to only annex files meeting certian size or filename criteria" 4 "I'm really confused about how to make it sync with a remote NON-bare repository. I'm even afraid to try git remote add, since there is no clear method to completely forget a git-annex remote..." 5 "A build for te raspberry pi would be supercol!" 1 "Would be nice to exclude subfolders from the gui or through a config file" 1 "I wish I had transparently encrypted git repos in the cloud available, like jgit." 1 "too many inodes used in direct mode. maybe it's possible to keep more info as git objects instead?" 2 "I need to be able to restrict in which repo dirs changes get auto-committed" 1 "Provide .deb package" 1 "Better documentation/walkthroughs on using git-annex within an existing git repo. AKA mixed use" 1 "Union mounts to have a single view of file collection on the network" 1 "Ubuntu PPA does not build with webapp" 1 "I set it up, but am confused about what I set up! It would be great to be able to start from scratch."]]

Feel free to write in your own reasons, or add a comment to give me more info.

What should I work on in April? I expect I could get perhaps two of these features done in a month if I'm lucky. I have only 3 more funded months, and parts of one will be spent working on porting to Windows, so choose wisely! --Joey

[[!poll open=yes expandable=yes 4 "upload and download rate limiting" 15 "get webapp working on Android" 5 "deltas: speed up syncing modified versions of existing files" 8 "encrypted git remotes using git-remote-gcrypt" 0 "add support for more cloud storage remotes" 19 "don't work on features, work on making it easier to install and use" 2 "Handle duplicate files" 6 "direct mode (aka real files instead of symlinks) [already done --joey]" 3 "start windows port now"]]

References:

• rate limiting
• Android
• deltas to speed up syncing modified files (at least for remotes using rsync)
• encrypted git remotes
• more cloud providers (OpenStack Swift, Owncloud, Google drive, Dropbox, Mediafire, nimbus.io, Mega, etc.)
• old poll on "what is preventing me from using git-annex assistant" (many of the items on it should be fixed now, but I have plenty of bug reports to chew on still)

Background: git-annex supports storing data in various special remotes. The git-annex assistant will make it easy to configure these, and easy configurators have already been built for a few: removable drives, rsync.net, locally paired systems, and remote servers with rsync.

Help me prioritize my work: What special remote would you most like to use with the git-annex assistant?

[[!poll open=yes 15 "Amazon S3 (done)" 12 "Amazon Glacier (done)" 9 "Box.com (done)" 70 "My phone (or MP3 player)" 18 "Tahoe-LAFS" 7 "OpenStack SWIFT" 28 "Google Drive"]]

This poll is ordered with the options I consider easiest to build listed first. Mostly because git-annex already supports them and they only need an easy configurator. The ones at the bottom are likely to need significant work. See cloud for detailed discussion.

Have another idea? Absolutely need two or more? Post comments..

Help me choose a goal for the month of December. The last poll showed a lot of interest in using the git-annex assistant with phones, etc.

Background: git-annex uses symbolic links in its repositories. This makes it hard to use with filesystems, such as FAT, that do not support symbolic links. FAT filesystems are the main storage available on some Android devices that have a micro-SD card. Other, newer Android devices don't have a SD card and so avoid this problem.

I can either work on the idea described in desymlink, which could solve the symlink problem and also could lead to a nicer workflow to editing files that are stored in git-annex.

Or, I can work on Android porting, and try to get the assistant working on Android's built-in storage.

[[!poll open=no 81 "solve the symlink problem first" 17 "port to Android first" 1 "other"]]