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Please consider merging with active_admin #799

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ndbroadbent opened this issue Oct 25, 2011 · 6 comments
Closed

Please consider merging with active_admin #799

ndbroadbent opened this issue Oct 25, 2011 · 6 comments

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@ndbroadbent
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It seems to me that rails_admin and active_admin are 'competing' without any good reason. I think it would be great if both teams could work together and build something even better.

I'm not an expert in either project, but they certainly look like they do some of the same things.
I love how active_admin seems to give more flexibility for the way data is displayed, but rails_admin has really awesome automatic forms and a great export feature. I personally prefer the filter sidebar on active_admin, but I like rails_admin's history and dashboard.
There might be some disagreements about the look-and-feel, but it would be great to be able to choose themes anyway.

So is there any reason why a merge can't be negotiated?
We could stop building the same stuff, and focus on features like choosing which columns are displayed, or merging records (which I'd personally like to build).

Cheers,
Nathan

@ndbroadbent
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(also see: activeadmin/activeadmin#677)

@sferik
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sferik commented Oct 25, 2011

I'm open to the idea. I actually had a conversation with @gregbell about it 6 months ago, at RailsConf.

Merging projects is one of those things that's easier said than done. Even if we agree to do it, there will be a number of issues that need to be resolved. Here are just a few, off the top of my head:

  • What name will we use for the project?
  • What codebase will be the starting point for the merger?
  • What design will we use?
  • What kind of templates will we use?
  • What configuration DSL will we use?
  • What features, if any, will be removed?

@ndbroadbent
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Thanks for your thoughts! I agree that merging would be very difficult to do, but I know it turned out really well when Merb merged into Rails 3. People say that competition is a good thing, but I don't know how well that applies to open source projects with similar goals.

I do think there are many cases in the ruby world where a merge wouldn't work out. Small, highly focused projects would be more trouble than they're worth, e.g. devise with authlogic, paperclip with carrierwave, or formtastic with simple_form.

But Rails Admin and Active Admin are both tackling a large set of features, so that's why I believe it warrants a merge.

The issues you raised are certainly difficult to resolve, but here are my personal opinions (FWIW):

Active Admin came out after Rails Admin. So I'm guessing that maybe the name 'Active Admin' was chosen because 'Rails Admin' was already taken? So I would go for 'Rails Admin'.

I personally feel that Active Admin has a nicer design, and a better approach to templates and configuration DSL. They also have a really, really nice website.
So perhaps they could be the codebase to start from.

I don't know enough to say if any features would need to be removed. But maybe Spree's extension architecture could be borrowed to reduce bloating, if it's a concern.

Anyhow, I don't really have a vested interest in this - I just thought it would interesting to start the discussion. Please feel free to just close this issue if it's not going to happen :)

@bbenezech
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Not going to happen.

@bbenezech bbenezech reopened this Jan 16, 2012
@bbenezech
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Kidding. I have no real opinion on this. Just that AA is an admin builder, RA is an automatic admin.
Do they really share the same goals? Maybe. The same way? Unlikely.

IMO, if they are too close, one will darwinshly die, the other survive. Won't be a loss anyway: each one improves from the other's paradigms.

@bbenezech
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AA and RA are too different.

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