Centillion as information API - and information dashboard

[charlesreid1]

Note: this issue is about long-term strategy, and something to discuss here. It is not something currently in progress.

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Thread 1: linking with onboarding

While writing issue #70 about advanced search and thinking through what users might need to search for with an advanced search panel, it occurred to me that I had an excellent example of what I mean when I say that centillion is a kind of information API - something more general than just a search engine.

A user doing a search might say, here's an email address. Now they want to know a few things about that email address: what documents/issues/email discussions involve this email address? When is the email mentioned, versus an active participant or owner? What Google Drive files does this email address own? (This leads to other thoughts - could we develop a DCPPC social graph by following document/issue/email thread links between people?)

This would become even more powerful if could be linked to onboarding information - something @ctb has mentioned as a goal. I think once the onboarding process. Then individuals could be linked through Github handles and email addresses to create a more comprehensive picture of the project and its contributors.

Thread 2: dashboard

This is where possible scope increase/divergence may happen. Given the thoughts above about ways of slicing/dicing/presenting/analyzing information from centillion, if used as an information API, it seems like there is now a suite of functionality being built around the underling search index, and that raises the question of whether we want to build a centillion dashboard.

What do I mean by a suite of functionality? One is the search index - the simple ability to type things into the search box and get some results. Another is the advanced search function (to be added), which greatly increases the user's searching powers. The master list of documents is another function. Others might include a project velocity visualization dashboard, a D3.js graph visualization of the DCPPC social graph, ......think that's enough ideas to mention for now.

Main question:

Is the dashboard approach one that we want to think about adopting long-term? Do we want centillion to be the centerpiece running all the dashboards, or do we want to make centillion a component in something else running dashboards? (Note: relates to question of how we balance keeping centillion general/useful for other projects, and embellishing it for the DCPPC.)

[ctb]

**Main question:** Is the dashboard approach one that we want to think about adopting long-term? Do we want centillion to be the centerpiece running all the dashboards, or do we want to make centillion a component in something else running dashboards? (Note: relates to question of how we balance keeping centillion general/useful for other projects, and embellishing it for the DCPPC.)

what do you think about having centillion be the background API, and having different JavaScript front ends that do different mashups? I like the separation of concerns involved. that having been said, we probably want to avoid complexifying the frontend too much until we see that people are using it enough to justify more investment.