Visibility of upcoming/in development features

Developer
1

Hi all,

First, thank you. I’ve been contributing for a few weeks now (#1771, #1772, #1774, #1775, #1795), and the more of the code I read, the more I appreciate how much care and time went into Seamly over the years, mostly in people’s spare time. The reviews I’ve had were thorough and kind, and I’ve learned a lot from them.

A bit about me: I’m a product manager by trade so I really love a good roadmap :smiley: Coming in fresh, the one thing I’ve struggled with is seeing the big picture: what’s planned, what’s in progress, and where help would be most welcome. Long-time contributors carry that knowledge in their heads, which makes total sense. As a newcomer I sometimes do the research for a feature and then find out it’s already being worked on. I’d love to make that easier, for me and for whoever joins next.

An example: fabric layout and markers

While working on #1795 (optimized nesting) I found a lot of issues, discussions and branches that all touch the same area. They’ve grown over the years, each from a good idea:

Issues

  • #56 Marker and Yardage Calculator
  • #102 Layout orientation according to grainline
  • #293 Foldline
  • #1287 Select fabric as folded or single, snap patterns to fold
  • #337 Manually adjust pattern layout
  • #338 Improve auto-generated layout algorithm
  • #110 Improve layout performance
  • #1795 Optimized nesting option for layouts

Forum discussions

Branches: a Marker branch (fabric width, spread, selvages) and a foldline branch, both last updated in 2025.

To me these look like pieces of one feature, and I think they should be folded (pun intended :slightly_smiling_face:) into a single feature, or at least designed together: grainline, fold, quantity, spread, fabric width, manual placement and automatic nesting all depend on each other. A short shared design would let several people work on separate parts without stepping on each other’s toes. I’d be glad to help write it.

A few lightweight ideas

Nothing heavy, and happy to drop whatever doesn’t fit how the team likes to work:

  1. Assign the issue when you start. The simplest “I’m on this” signal. If there’s no issue yet, a one-line one is enough.

  2. Share work in progress early, as a draft PR or a public branch, even if it doesn’t build yet. It helps others see what exists and offer help in the right places.

  3. A gentle “still on it?” check. If an assigned issue has been quiet for a few months, a friendly ping, and it’s free again unless the owner says otherwise. No pressure on anyone.

  4. A shared definition of done, for example merged into develop, included in a release, and documented or announced on the forum.

  5. One pinned roadmap. The labels 0 - Backlog … 4 - Done and the milestones already exist, so a GitHub Project board could use them. Or a pinned forum topic with a small table:

    Feature Issues Owner Status Branch / PR Help wanted?
    Fabric layout / marker #56, #102, #293, #1287, …

  6. A few good first issue / help wanted labels. They already exist and would give newcomers an easy way in.

Questions

  • Would something like this be useful to you? Would you prefer a GitHub Project or a forum topic?
  • For fabric layout: is there a current plan or code I could look at, and which parts would you welcome help with?

Thanks again for building and looking after Seamly!

2

Susan is already working on an overhaul of the layout section.

3

It also lets the competition see and steal what we’re working on.

4

Hello, and welcome, @seam and thank you for the introduction.

Firstly, let me just tell you that I am a “User” of the software and most certainly not a programer in any sense of the word. So I try to check that things are working well after they have been implemented, give a few suggestions and do a little helping here on the forum.

How we normally work is, we discuss something on the forum before it even gets to Github, to see how much it is needed in the software and how important it is. Bugs get 1st priority, new features and upgrades take a 2nd place.

Once a new feature has been discussed then a Github issue is created. Normally, the development of the feature will be discussed on the forum from time to time and especially towards the completion and it is normally announced that it will be in the next update.

What happens on Github, is something that I haven’t followed, so to answer your 1st question, I’d like it on both the Forum & Github.

With that said, @Douglas has spent the past 8+ years studying QT and the Seamly code and tidying it up, so there are some very hard and fast guidelines as to how we prefer our code to be. Not least of which is that one must check their code that it is properly formatted for the generations to come, that it will build correctly in QT and that the changes actually do work in Seamly (in their own branch before sending the PR) and not create further issues that will cause the users (of the software) problems and thereby taking @Douglas away from the new features that he’s working on to do the checking, etc. himself.

Now that the lecture is over :blush: … We do need a few more dedicated (not full-time, but dedicated) devopers on our team. If you would like to join us in our discussions, etc. please send a private message to @SueAtSeamly and @Douglas . I’m sure they’ll be happy to have you on board.

5

9+ years… but who’s counting. LOL

Already been working with Seam AKA Palepal on Girhub. :slight_smile: