# 2022-06-27

# Reflections

## Trialling flowershow with ecosystem project

Existing NextJS webapp. How do we convert to use Flowershow?

It has a few custom pages and components.

Pages could maybe disappear by having everything as a component and using it in markdown (a bit painful for hacking but hey it works)

```auto
    site        # want this to be pretty pure flowershow
      pages/
      components/

content/    # markdown content here
    components/ # custom components
    ```

Generally, there are two approaches to creating a "flowershow" based site.

### Option 1

```auto
    npx create-next-app --example=path to template
    ```

then you go ahead and edit your template as you wish.

The problem: how do you upgrade? you have now got manual changes to your template.

(There is a secondary issue of how do i create the template in first place with just what i want)

### Option 2

Install flowershow template app somewhere and you don't touch it.

Create your content and make flowershow aware of it

Benefits: easy to upgrade.

Problem: limited customization. e.g. how do you add your own components? (Is that important? Maybe rule is for flowershow you live with components there or make a node package and install it!)

e.g. with ecosystem: we have some custom visualization.

## Musing on [use-cases](/content/use-cases/index.html)

Today i prefer to draft my ideas in markdown in my personal notebook. For example, today i was brainstorming about an incubator for intentional communities. Now, suppose i want to share with my collaborator. What do I do?

Options I consider:

- Copy and paste into an email. 4/10
  - 👍 old-fashioned ubiquitous text
  - i use email less and less and so a break in workflow to open etc
  - markdown looks poor
  - commenting is not great
- Copy and paste into whatsapp: 2/10
  - 👍 quick and dirty. likely to see it quickly and respond even if just to acknowledge.
  - 👎 ugh, way too long for whatsapp. no way to comment etc
- Get an html version and copy and paste into google docs and share the google doc
  - 👍 great commenting, easy to share in a controlled way. all features of gdocs e.g. notifications on comments.
  - 👎 i've forked my writing location: if i continue in markdown i have to keep copy and pasting (and breaking comments) If i work in gdocs i've effectively abandoned markdown and have to reintegrate.

What if i could have a single command to turn a markdown into a (private) shareable url with commenting turned on (hypothesis?)

Even better would be that the url updates as i edit this doc (or i can re-publish).

Even cooler would be that markdown was editable online (a la hackmd) and that i could sync any changes back down (assuming no conflicts).

## Potential [meta/features](/content/meta/features/index.html) to add

- [ ]  Theme colors **depends on how we do theming**
- [ ]  Xdm MDX compiler **not relevant**
- [ ]  Table of contents component 🔼 **useful**
- [ ]  Layouts ⏫
- [ ]  Analytics 🔼 **already have partially**
- [ ]  Blog comments system ⏬
- [ ]  Multiple authors 🔽
- [ ]  Copy button for code blocks 🔼 (nice to have)
- [ ]  Line highlighting and line numbers 🔼
- [ ]  Newsletter component (v1.1.3) 🔽
- [ ]  Bibliography and Citations (v1.2.1) ⏫
- [ ]  Self-hosted font (v1.5.0) 🔽 **themes will vary plus performance benefit seems minor**