Steemit.com Development Updates - GitHub Issue Report

Here is the latest the latest news about what the Steemit dev team is working on. The dev team has been busy since the last update! We have notifications now, and a new editor was given a live demo on the test site. Very cool!! Several issues have now dropped off the list :)

Since other users have written posts about the new features that have been added, I will exclude anything that is now done/live and keep focusing on features that are still in the works.

Reminder - these are changes are being considered as well as being worked on. There is no guarantee that all of these will actually be implemented and put up on to the site! It does give you a good idea of what they are up to though :)

If you are wondering what is taking so long for things you were hoping would be live by now, I suggest you check out this post: Steemit Development Timeline - Why "Coming Soon" might not seem very soon.

Since a lot of the information is a carry-over from the previous post, I am using these tags to make it clear what has changed:

[NEW] - This is a new issue that has been added to GitHub since the last report.
[ADDED] - This is not a new issue in GitHub, but I have added it to the report.
[UPDATE] - This issue has been updated since the last report.
[NO CHANGE] - This is an issue that has had not changed since the last report.

Clarify Post Payouts [ADDED]

When viewing a post payout, the "Potential Payout" shows how much the post is estimated to pay out while the post is active. It has the author+curator payout added together. When the post pays, the final amount gets moved into "Past Payouts", and then below that it shows the author and curator split. For people not familiar with the site, this can be confusing because they see "Potential Payout" the whole time, then they only get the 75% "Author Payout" at the end. It is bad for the user experience, because many users are disappointed when they get less than they thought they were going to make on a post.

GitHub Issue 87 is requesting that the Potential Payout be made clearer, so that authors have the right expectations for their final payouts. This was recently linked to Steem blockchain GitHub Issue 491 (opened by Ned), to add API calls to return pending author/curator split. This would allow the UI to clearly present the author vs. curator amounts as part of the "Potential Payout" number.

See All Tags [NO CHANGE]

Currently the tags lists only show the top tags. A lot of users would like to be able to see all tags. GitHub Issue 115 and GitHub Issue 116 is where this is being discussed, and it looks like they are planning to implement it.

User Profiles [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 118 is where they are discussing the addition of user profiles (bio line, url, etc.). There have been a few updates to this within the past week, so maybe it is something they are planning to do soon :)

[Previous Update] The dev team linked the issue to their private Trello board, so it is getting some attention behind the scenes.

Advanced Search [ADDED]

This would allow users to search for historic posts using advanced search criteria (author name, date, keywords, etc.) GitHub Issue 125 is open to add this. The dev team linked the issue to their private Trello board, so it is getting some attention behind the scenes.

Schedule Post Time [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 147 is an enhancement request to allow users to schedule what time a post gets created. The dev team acknowledged the request about a month ago, but no updates have been made since. It seems like something they will eventually implement, but it is a lower priority feature.

Posting Rules Guide [UPDATE]

I am not 100% sure what GitHub Issue 153 will do, but it is going to add some type of help guide / dialog when people post, to help clarify the rules. The change has already been committed, so we should expect something related to this to show up soon!

[Update] The dev team linked the issue to their private Trello board, so it is getting some attention behind the scenes.

Medium-like Editor Integration [UPDATE]

In GitHub Issue 185, the developers are talking about changes to the post editor. This would be a very useful change if they were able to make posting easier!

[Previous Update] The dev team has started actually working on this! I don't know what to expect as far as the changes, or when they will actually be released - but it is exciting to see progress!!

[Previous Update] The dev team has done a lot of work on this. It looks like they are planning to do a major overhaul of the posting editor interface. I am not 100% sure, but based on what I can see in the code it might include the ability to paste in HTML, the ability to save drafts, and an image upload feature!

[Update] As most of you know, there has been a lot of progress with this issue. There is an exciting new version of the post editor on its way! I expect we will see this launched to the main site fairly soon, and many users got to try it out on the live 'test' site: https://test.steemit.com

Flag / Downvote Changes [NO CHANGE]

Changes to flagging/downvotes are being discussed in GitHub Issue 215. This issue is still in the discussion / design phase, so nothing is decided yet. The community and dev team are still trying to decide on the correct way to change things.

[Previous Update] The discussion continues, but no huge progress.

[Previous Update] The discussion has moved out of the Steemit.com thread and into a separate Steem issue, since this will likely require a hardfork. The dev team acknowledged this is part of their roadmap, although it sounded like it might not be implemented for a while.

Translation Support [NO CHANGE]

I glossed over this one last time because I couldn't understand what it was, but it looks like the dev team is spending a lot of time on this. GitHub Issue 233 will update the site to be able to present the UI in multiple languages, depending on the language setting of the browser accessing!

[Previous Update] The dev team has continued to work on this.

Block Button [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 239 is where they are discussing the implementation of 'block' functionality from the Steemit UI. I know this is an important feature for several users. One of the developers assigned this to himself about a week ago, so it looks like there is some progress on this!

Additions to the Wallet Page [ADDED]

There are a few issues open to add more things into the wallet page. GitHub Issue 260 will show a summary of in progress SBD->STEEM conversions. GitHub Issue 51 will update the wallet to show open market orders. These issues have been linked to the developers' private Trello board, so they are getting some attention behind the scenes.

Show posts that are paying 100% in SP [NO CHANGE]

This is being worked on in GitHub Issue 261, and it sounds like it will be something they will add soon!

Specify Language for Post [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 300 is open for this. I don't see much progress on it, but I will continue to track it.

Avatars! [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 322 is where avatars are being discussed. It sounds like they have a possible solution in mind, but it hasn't been confirmed if it works yet.

Verifications Page [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 355 was opened to add a verifications page using this post from @mynameisbrian as an example. This issue was opened up by @ned himself, so I suspect it will be given high priority :)

[Previous Update] The dev team and community are still discussing the best way to implement this.

Display Resteem Count [NO CHANGE]

It looks like this is going to be worked on in GitHub Issue 356.

Resteem Undo [NO CHANGE]

This is being discussed in GitHub Issue 374. I don't see much progress on it, but I will continue to track it.

Tip Button [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 401 was opened to add a "tip" button to comments and posts. It looks like there is interest in this, so they might start working on it.

[Previous Update] There has been discussion on how to best implement this.

Updated Follow Button Location [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 402 was added to create a more visible follow button, with the same style as the promote button, making it easier to follow user's instead of having to click the drop down menu from their name. It looks like this has been assigned to a developer.

Welcome to Steemit Page [UPDATE]

@bitcoiner and I are working on this. We are planning to add a new "Welcome to Steemit" page that users will see when they first create an account on the site, which will have a bunch of helpful information for new users. This is being tracked in GitHub Issue 404.

[Update] A pull request has been checked in, so this is getting closer to showing up on the live site!

Make resteemed posts stand out in feed [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 495 is a new issue opened by a user to differentiate more between authored and resteemed posts. Possible solutions include using a different background color and/or giving the user to turn off Resteemed posts. No action has been taken on the issue yet.

Update to Comment Depth [NO CHANGE]

GitHub Issue 497 looks like they are considering expanding the comment depth beyond 6. The main thing to figure out is how to make it look organized on the page if the comments keep nesting further and further.

Fix for Chinese Image Verification [NO CHANGE]

Many of the Chinese users are reporting that they cannot sign up using the new verification process, because the image verification uses Google, and Google is blocked for them. I opened GitHub Issue 515 for this.

Remove 'Welcome to the Blockchain' Banner from Posts [NEW]

Many users have complained about the "Welcome to the Blockchain" banner that appears on all posts. It is distracting when a user is trying to share their content with other people, since that is the first thing that people see when they click on the link to read the post. The Steemit dev team opened GitHub issue 546 to remove this from post pages, so it will only appear if users land on the actual homepage.

Sort Follower/Following Order [NEW]

GitHub issue 554 was opened to sort the order of followers and people you are following in chronological order. This will allow you to easily see who your new followers are!

Fix Image Upload on New Editor [NEW]

Dan opened GitHub issue 555 to fix the image upload problem with the new editor on the test site. This is likely the last thing that is needed before the new editor will be launched on the Steemit.com webpage. How awesome will it be to be able to upload images directly into Steemit.com when creating a post?!

Posts Views Counter [NEW]

The Steemit dev team opened GitHub issue 581 to show a "view count" on posts. This will be a great addition for users to see how much attention their posts are getting! Note - this will only count views through the actual Steemit.com website though, and will not count views done through other interfaces (like bots, steemd.com, SteemStats.com, and other similar tools).

Fix Promoted Posts List Display [NEW]

The promoted posts page is only showing the top 5-10 promoted posts, and the rest are not being displayed. GitHub issue 586 is opened to fix this. It looks like it is caused by an issue with the Steem blockchain API code though (and not the UI), so it was linked to Steem blockchain issue 549.

Fix False Alarm Feed Notifications [NEW]

Since the new notifications have been added, there are occasionally "false alarm" notifications (where it shows there was something new, even though there has been no update). GitHub issue 592 is opened to fix this.

This concludes the list of relevant issues that I found to report on. There were quite a few other updates to things that I figure most users would not care about (or even understand), so I excluded those. There are also a lot of feature requests that don't seem to be getting any attention at the moment - so I left those out as well.

If you are interested, you can view all of the open issues here:
https://github.com/steemit/steemit.com/issues

You can also create an account on GitHub if you are interested in adding issues of your own, or commenting on the issues that are there.

I am a backup witness. If you think I'm doing a great job, you can vote for me here :)
https://steemit.com/~witnesses