Archived [OBSOLETE] LMP - PIVX.org Squad

[Kyeno]

Name: LMP - PIVX.org Squad
Term: 1 Cycle
Cycle Amnt: 45,000
Total Amnt: 45,000
Author: Kyeno, Meerkat
Receiver: Kyeno, Meerkat, PIVX Labz
Address: DMaDCokSX1qCG9mQuWws7aBq8EA2pB3PXi
Created: 2023-11-08
Status: Active
Vote Hash: 5c02cc418e6090cb1a0f9cc8782e6eec21ad078f2d3ee2c5229924e8a2f8cb2a

Preamble​

After quite some time of drifting around different projects, teams, holidays and various other situations thrown at us by the life itself... We. Are. Back!
...and we're here to help bringing even more awesomeness to PIVX.org and the PIVX project itself.
It's been a while since we truly "touched" anything-PIVX... and the time flies forward mercilessly.
New bugs have been discovered, the key selling points of the project itself have shifted from "going deep" (enormous amounts of core development) towards "going wide" (a lot of side-projects development + integrations), some things and some partnerships proven to be cumbersome... and the whole world moved forward as well.

Abstract​

This proposal's price is also a Christmas gift for the team. For this premium price you will be getting two multi-skilled team members with about 40 years of combined tech experience - Meerkat being a UX ninja, fast-paced designer and front-end developer, Kyeno being a marketing consultant, full-stack developer, software architect and a UNIX/Linux sysadmin working - and both of us working full-time for an entire month. During this time we want to address as many of the website issues and revamps as we can possibly fit in. The plan, however, is somewhat divided into many categories or potential situations/events:

"The Plan"​

1. First and foremost we want to focus on PIVX.org website. That will generally include:

• "Claiming" MPW the official "light wallet" for PIVX and putting some design emphasis on that
• Flagging old/improper White Paper obsolete; switching emphasis on the new/updated one
• Integrating/pointing towards more useful, third-party PIVX projects that happened in the meantime like docs.pivx.org, toolbox.pivx.org, pivx.poker (if community wants/agrees) and PIVCards.
• Looking around/fixing other bugs/issues found; yet here without a PROMISE that all of them are going to be resolved this month (f.e., if something ultra-major is found or encountered that needs a total revamp, this may take more than a month of work and after consulting with community may be moved to next/another proposal)
• Tweaking/finetuning/upgrading the stack a bit (it's dated); not entirely removing the technological debt of course as this would be more longitudinal process again, but at least slightly strengthening up wherever applies
• Reanimating the Web2Discord bridge and the "support chat" previously done via the PIVot bot. Slightly revamping both the UI and logic according to community's needs. One idea is to actually power it with the PIVI bot's AI initially and only throwing the end-user to Discord if AI is unable to resolve the problem
• Enabling + potentially finetuning fancy stuff like the snowflakes and snowy graphcis for the winter; launching 3D fireworks for 01/01 , maybe more!
• Generally reacting to community's needs, ideas and reports whenever it comes to the main web itself.

2. Then we want to build (or at least reach an MVP) of PIVX' dedicated Block Explorer that @Liquid369 was working on. This will include:

• Iterating over mockups, finetuning, conslting (within Labz)
• Designing the layout graphics
• Deciding on the web technology used (within Labz)
• Building the UI and connecting it with the backend (hopefully "alpha/mvp" version reachable within this month)

Ideally we would want to redo PIVX.org quiiite a bit; including the whole design language and presentation; putting less emphasis on the tech alone, and more on things that may be important for a regular bread-eater.
We do have plenty ideas about it (once discussed with @Sparrow), but this in general would definitely be a more longitudinal process. Still - if point 2 does not fire (and we heard it is currently "uncertain"), we would try to utilize any spare and extra time mocking it up and iterating.

Additionally​

Meerkat offers herself to contribute in variety of social media designs, "postcards" and whatever is required - as she previously did in strict collaboration with @LeacyMcK or other team members.
Kyeno offers himself to support PIVX Labz and PIVX Community members with various technical issues (hardware, software and programmatic)

Voting​

To vote yes:

mnbudgetvote many 5c02cc418e6090cb1a0f9cc8782e6eec21ad078f2d3ee2c5229924e8a2f8cb2a  yes

To vote no:

mnbudgetvote many 5c02cc418e6090cb1a0f9cc8782e6eec21ad078f2d3ee2c5229924e8a2f8cb2a no

Thank you!

 

[Eric_Stanek]

Well written proposal @Kyeno !

I simply ask that you avoid the risk of extensive effort and scope creep of going down 'The Rabbit Hole' of a system 'revamp', or 'Ideally we would want to redo PIVX.org quite a bit; including the whole design language and presentation', until the other items are complete. Also, please avoid super technical 'nice to have' things, like a custom OS compile, or Symfony setup/configuration tweaks, that make it near impossible for an average person to migrate the site to another server if needed. As with other things related to PIVX infrastructure, we need to know that if you 'get hit by a truck', that PIVX can continue to maintain the site.

For the 3rd bullet, I hope you can add Travala to the useful 3rd party projects. The cool colorful plane image from @sh_rn can be leveraged for that.

Have fun!

 

[Kyeno]

Hey @Eric_Stanek!

Thanks for the tips and suggestions!
You are right that I slightly "widened" the scope here - but still I had to play a few uncertain cards while making most use of my time.
Let's indeed talk about the revamp later, after the mandatory TODOs are done.

On the other hand - I believe @Liquid369 is a very much capable person here who could take over from me if the truck scenario ever happens; at least on the sysadmin side.
I'm not trying to defend it with "all I've got" - but rationally speaking - sometimes I cannot truly avoid at least *some* customization or extra configuration to achieve great performance and results.
Still, I believe there are other ways around it to make it more accessible for "future generations" too, like:
- in-depth technical documentation and READMEs (stating exactly what I did and why)
- providing the hand-built packages as system-integral .deb files; and maybe a PIVX's own PPA that can be easily added.
Still - this is technical now.

Travala - of course - zero problems.

And thanks again

 

[Eric_Stanek]

@Kyeno , I apologize in advance for the 'tough love', but here it is.

A recent discussion, on an unrelated topic, in the PIVX Discord has reminded me how you like to make things WAY WAY WAY over complicated, when there are simple solutions that are more than sufficient. I am not sure if this is to prove to everyone how smart you are and boost your ego, or because you are a perfectionist that loves technology and likes playing with all the cool complex solutions. Regardless, the end result is the same; we have a website that only you can update. We are basically held hostage.

This causes problems, because you aren't always available. So, the pressure builds, and eventually others step up to try and make changes to the site. It is a huge learning curve, and then all their efforts are squashed when you become available and we lose control to you again. Of course, you are going to want to 'undo' what the others did to make the site and the server it is on less complicated, and we pay again.

Basically, it means the PIVX.org site and server, become centralized, and the Community has their hands tied behind their back. That undermines the DAO, and the decentralization of PIVX.

It is better to find a much less complex website tech stack, that most anyone in the Community can maintain and migrate to that. For example, we need to be able to whip up a landing page dedicated to a new campaign in an hour. Currently, it would take significant effort and multiple people, requiring a proposal be funded, and therefore likely more than a month. That means we can't react in time to leverage current events, making the landing page useless, even if eventually created.

With a simple solution, the site won't look as pretty, but there are WAY more successful projects out there, with very simple websites. Plus, the Community can be active maintaining it, we can move MUCH faster, and support decentralization, the Community and the DAO.

As such, I have the following feedback for this proposal, that hopefully allows us to focus funds on what immediately adds value and avoids pouring more funds into the current tech stack. Perhaps this creates room in your budget for effort to engage the Community on what other website solutions would be more appropriate for the PIVX DAO.

Re: Section 1, Bullet 4:
Ideally, there shouldn't be any bugs, and when there are, I don't think we should be paying for them to be fixed. That just supports the scenario where there will be more and more bugs.

Re: Section 1, Bullet 5:
Best to wait with "Tweaking/finetuning/upgrading the stack.." until the Community decides if, long term, we should continue down this path of such a highly specializes website tech stack.

Re: Section 1, Bullet 6:
The Web2Discord was offline for at least 8 weeks, before anyone noticed. Prior to that it was very quiet. So, I am not sure that is worth the time and effort. Probably should ask the Community.

Re: Section 1, Bullet 7:
I presume turning on the snowflakes etc. is just a switch that can be turned on in the CMS by anyone. Did we have fireworks already? If so, it is just a switch too right? If not, why not?
Is there any data showing the value added for such special effects?

I am hoping for discussions on the above to happen here in this forum post. I will promote that in Discord if needed.

Looking forward to your feedback.

 

[Kyeno]

Hey! I find the initial sentence a bit of personal attack here, but I'm not going to dig on that; all in all - I honestly always wished for the best. That includes giving support or advice; often just as one tech-enthusiast to another - and really that. There is no "second bottom".

Again, that is highly untrue that "only I can update the site"; and if it rendered true for the whole time of my previous absence - it would only mean there never were the right people in the team that took over from me; as in - you can't expect the vulcaniser/tire changer to do your engine renovation, right?

I initially joined the team as a contractor with a laid out goal of creating an *awesome* site that goes fully multi-lingual (meaning: *everything* is translatable) and has quite a bit of extra functionalities - like fetching stuff either from the blockchain, GitHub APIs or CoinGecko APIs, then rendering it *efficiently* on the web. I chose the stack accordingly to the budget, timeframe and requirements... and still was a bit behind (you probably remember; as you PM-ed it yourself).
Then I (or shall I say - we) only added extra features; f.e., ones that allowed you to turn off PIVXCentral and alike; nowadays copied by MyPIVXWallet as well.

tl;dr, aside from *some* tweaks here-and-there, the site remains a very standard Symfony/PHP stack that truly does follow the convention almost to the letter; probably with an exception to the translation engine which indeed I slightly re-done - but not in a way that could ANYHOW limit or obscure further editing possibilities. More than that - when I left, I still provided both guidelines, support and clear instructions where to look for other Symfony developers if needed be - and I believe those were never followed.

I joined as a professional, was paid a professional money to deliver professional services; and that's exactly what I did.
I never considered myself a "guru" or "ego maniac"; especially in the presence of furszy or Zebra back then or Rezzi. I rather looked forward to learn from them + asked quite a few noob questions on my way.
I never had the slightest intention of "locking out" anybody from moving or updating the stack. That's very much a double edged sword if you think about it...


Usually I would not attempt any personal comments as for "why"... but I'd assume a certain developer who *tried* to take over had *very little idea of what he was doing*... as well as very little funds in his pocket; so he believed he could basically "ninja through" any possible learning curve required for literally *any* tech stack around, do something OK-ish and call it a day. Sorry, but this really looks like that. I lead companies and hired people in the past; that included hiring a totally-different-stack PROGRAMMERS that were to join a Symfony project and they all were able to start being productive within a matter of a few days...

Regarding the landing page - indeed it's very "static" here and it *should* definitely be made easier for various events/campaigns to "shine" there; but this again isn't really my doing. Remember that Chris basically single-handedly laid out the whole structure for us to follow; almost in "no-questions-asked" manner, despite both me and Meerkat had a completely different vision for it at the time. Still again - changing it is literally editing HTML and CSS; albeit with a difference that HTML is called .html.twig and CSS is called .scss (SASS).
The same goes for most everything else when it comes to website *structure*; hence I suggested revisiting that part. Especially as we're really quite some time in the future now...

(IRL emergency, to be continued...)

 

[Eric_Stanek]

There are 2 options, with respect to the developer that 'took over':

1. He lacked the skills needed - but that's the best the Community could come up with.
2. He had the skills needed - but the site is far more complex than needed.

Either way, the outcome is the same; you are the only one that can make changes to PIVX.org.

Your feedback is that we could source a different Symfony/PHP developer. This ignores 2 extremely important characteristics. That is, they need to 'Bleed Purple' and the site needs to be maintained quickly and easily by the Community.

Hope your IRL emergency gets resolved quickly. Looking forward to a response to my feedback limiting the scope of this proposal to items that provide 'Immediate Value-Add' and finding a new tech stack.

 

[Kyeno]

(...sorry)

Regarding the server alone: Indeed I did quite a bit of "hand optimizations" and custom compilations there that basically make the automated deployment/devops work a tad more difficult. I was trying to be the most cost-effective and squeeze every bit of performance out of a whatsoever medium-specced machine.

Still again as I suggested within the very first comment here - this can be countered/helped by READMEs and PIVX PPA with .deb files to greatly simplify the future deployment process.
I could additionally suggest Docker, but that would be an extra slow-down, so I'd rather go for the custom/plain debs.

So that can be countered quite easily.
Regarding "centralization" - well... each and every website or actually webapp in case of PIVX needs to sit on some server somewhere. We could use one of the cloud webservices providers to counter that, but... that'll probably be really overpowered for what we need, at least at this stage.


Re: Section 1, Bullet 4:
In a perfect world - right... but even when giving everyone's best or going full-on TDD - It's not possible not to have bugs. Not in the real world. Please keep in mind that PIVX.org is a webapp, not a website.

Re: Section 1, Bullet 5:
OK

Re: Section 1, Bullet 6:
OK

Re: Section 1, Bullet 7:
It's actually re-enabling some classes in the main asset driver (app.js) and replacing some of the graphic slices with pre-prepared snowy ones by Meerkat.
Added value? People always *loved* it and loved to play with it. It created "more love".
In marketing/statistical terms - it greatly lengthened each user viewing session.

(to be continued...)

 

[Eric_Stanek]

New question. How much of the 45,000 PIV is expected to go to PIVX Labs? What will they spend it on, and why isn't it just part of one of their proposals?

 

[Kyeno]

...further replying as to "why" when it comes to both the tech stack, optimizations and eyecandiness - I am sharing some of the feedback I've been screenshotting for a while after our launch and some updates.
Both from our team and various partners/parties that were involved at the time:

 

[Kyeno]

 

[Kyeno]

There are 2 options, with respect to the developer that 'took over':

1. He lacked the skills needed - but that's the best the Community could come up with.
2. He had the skills needed - but the site is far more complex than needed.

Either way, the outcome is the same; you are the only one that can make changes to PIVX.org.

Your feedback is that we could source a different Symfony/PHP developer. This ignores 2 extremely important characteristics. That is, they need to 'Bleed Purple' and the site needs to be maintained quickly and easily by the Community.

Hope your IRL emergency gets resolved quickly. Looking forward to a response to my feedback limiting the scope of this proposal to items that provide 'Immediate Value-Add' and finding a new tech stack.

I am *not* the only one that can make changes to PIVX.org, I can't stress this enough...
There even are commits to the repository and deployments that weren't made by me - that alone basically contradicts this statement right away.

Keep in mind also that during the development alone we (and again I say *we*, as you were literally a project manager then) focused on the presentational part for the user while leaving the managemental part for our staff at very minimal level.
Maybe whole this talk basically suggests this is where we made a mistake and what is truly required now?

And as for Symfony developer - honestly I believe nobody really tried. I remember providing a link to one of many Sf oriented Discords where you could truly ask and likely get a developer + potentially a purple community member as well.
You can't know those things without trying...

 

[Kyeno]

New question. How much of the 45,000 PIV is expected to go to PIVX Labs? What will they spend it on, and why isn't it just part of one of their proposals?

Vast majority of it goes directly to Meerkat and myself as a compensation for full-time month of work; with a tiny-bit of reserve left out for potentially bumping up the OpenAI account in case the AI chatbot is brought to web and burns through multiple credits.

 

[Eric_Stanek]

Yep. The current website looks absolutely amazing. I have never said otherwise. But, it is important to remember, that the PIVX.org site is also a MARKETING TOOL. As such, we need to be able to make changes to it quickly. We can't. That needs to change. Maybe after considering the effort removed from this proposal given my feedback above, you can apply those funds to resolving that issue.

As far as me being the project manager I came into the game late, and we had to cut, cut, and cut scope to meet a deadline. It was simply damage control.

OK. Show me who can add 3 or 4 templates for Campaign Landing pages.

Show me who else can make changes to showcase MPW and PIVcards as well as Travala etc.

Show me who can add CMS functionality to the areas not covered yet.

Show me who knows how to migrate the site to a new provider if needed, including any custom compiles of the OS etc.

I believe that Sparrow was very vocal about all the massive technical hurdles that both he and @palmtree had to go thru to move the site.

Also, all those above points will require $$$$ when they should be easily handled by the Community for FREE, or for very little $.

Basically, if you get 'Hit by a truck' we're toast. We can't have that.

 

[Gerrald]

Unless he has created a new coding language that no one in the world understands I don't see why no one with that knowledge cannot step in? Is it because the current people do not have that knowledge is the problem you see?

Nothing in this world is free. I wouldn't offer to do something I couldn't do and that is how it sounds your talking about? Some in the community have offered to do the site but don't have the knowledge.

If how the site Is made works more efficiently why does it need dumbing down? Maybe these people who want to work for free are better off learning how to do it this way.

 

[Eric_Stanek]

Your points have already been answered. Please read what I wrote.

 

[Kyeno]

I believe we came to the very same conclusion here.
The website was built as it is also due to various constraints and - as you mentioned - "damage control" as well; and maybe indeed nowadays the effort should first and foremost be put into simplifying managing of things.
That could include:
- docs and .debs for the server stack
- either expanding the CMS with an easier landing page modification capabilities (I'm afraid this could be a larger task than we think) or maybe "plugging in" the landing page from a remote source? I have to sleep on that.

Answering your questions:

1. Anybody with simple HTML, CSS and potentially a bit of design knowledge can add such landing pages. There is "templates/" directory where a subdirectory like "Campaigns" can be created and then files added. Those files can, but don't have to extend the main layout and can, but don't have to use the original CSS. If they do, the CSS resides in "assets/css/" directory. Images in "assets/images". Hence: probably quite a few people from Labz would be capable of doing it. Those are absolute basics with zero "advanced stack" knowledge required. Tutorials to get this running usually take 15 minutes. Nihil novi sub Sole.
2. The very same person and the very same way as in response #1.
3. Here you would need a PHP/Symfony developer that indeed is familiar with much more advanced methods within the Symfony stack alone. Both the question and the answer here could be similar to as "Who can add an extra window/screen to the Qt PIVX Core wallet with some forms that modify something"; although the reply here would be a C++ developer with Qt framework knowledge. Different tech, different stack, similar work, same principles.
4. That - as we agreed - indeed needs a bit of guidance and should be worked on. You could call it a "legacy tech debt". We never expected/forseen that it would have to be moved; not even you back then.

On the last part - I *totally disagree* about the money. Full stack senior developers or even people capable of doing magic in front-end development alone (cool CSS, cool JS) are highly specialized and highly trained professionals and thus usually not cheap, nor they should be. Simply, following this old principle:

And yep, I totally get you about the "hit by the truck" scenario too and I'm trying to help with that as well; always did, since the time I previously left.

 

[Gerrald]

Your points have already been answered. Please read what I wrote.

OK so the people who offered to do something for free don't understand the website coding. Gotcha

If that was how things worked no company would ever need a Web developer.

 

[Eric_Stanek]

@Gerrald
Er. You still didn't read what I wrote. Anyways ....

@Kyeno
Highly skilled people deserve a high wage. Not disputing that.
But, why do we need highly skilled people for everything?

For example, we could have blog.PIVX.org point to our Medium account. www.Adbank.Network does this.

adbank blog – Medium

centralized information for a decentralized platform.

medium.com

That takes care of an entire section that we don't need highly skilled web development people for. We can act quickly and easily, and we don't even need the skills from Labs. They can stay focused on what they do, and pretty much anyone can write blogs. Unless @Gerrald thinks every company needs a high end web developer to type words, instead of a Community member.

We could expand that approach to other areas of PIVX.org too. Perhaps we have marketing.PIVX.org point to a new service for landing pages.

Sounds like there is even more we can remove from this proposal to save funds, become more agile, improve Marketing, simplify our infrastructure, involve the Community, improve decentralization, and support the DAO. All for low $$ and minimal effort.

 

[Kyeno]

Hey! I'm **absolutely not arguing** about pointing blog.pivx.org to Medium account. Actually - that's a very good idea I'm backing up with both of my hands.
I can even (probably) fetch that feed and auto-update something on our site from it for that matter to fit the "current marketing need" even nicer.

marketing.PIVX.org - probably doable too in a way. Wix? SquareSpace? InstaPage? To be considered.

Mind that this proposal is not a recurring one; just "one shot" - and it can be pretty tight timeframe for the ever increasing scope.
Though indeed we could likely step down on the funds in the future proposals *if* we decide to continue building together in the minified manner.

 

[Eric_Stanek]

Happy to support a proposal with these line items:

1. "Claiming" MPW the official "light wallet" for PIVX and putting some design emphasis on that. Include PIVcards here too.
2. Flagging old/improper White Paper obsolete; switching emphasis on the new/updated one.
3. Adding focus/integration to official 'micro-sites' like docs.PIVX.org and toolbox.pivx.org.
4. Showcasing 3rd party sites like pivx.poker, Travala and CoinsBee.


Need clarification on these items, before I can support them, for reasons noted:

5. Official PIVX Block Explorer UI/UX and API.

We really need an official block explorer, with the functionality missing from others, to support MPW etc. better.
But, it looks like we are losing Liquid and I don't know the current status of his work. Do we need to wait for that?
Seems this proposal is to 'harden' his work, and then make it pretty. But, if his work isn't done, we should wait.

6. Restoring the Web2Discord:

Again, it looks like we are losing Liquid, and he was very often in the support channel spending a ton of time helping users.
In Discord, I did a simple scan to see who the main people are that are offering support.
Sorry if I missed anyone, but here are the numbers for the time frame from Jan 01 2023, until today.

PIVian in Support Channel:	Comments in Support Channel:
Liquid	555
Eric Stanek	368
PalmTree	133
Vampryen	117
JSkitty	77
Fuzzbawls	71
Total:​	1,321
People Leaving: (See notes below)​	1,056
Drop in support staff availability:​	80%

People Leaving:
Now, we know PalmTree is still here, but now focused on life outside PIVX.
Myself, I am just weeks away from moving to Mexico for the winter, with no idea if I am coming back to Canada.
Plus, if Liquid leaves, then obviously he won't be here to support users.

Justification:
No one really noticed the Web2Discord bridge was missing for something like 8 weeks. So, I think it needs to be justified first. Then, we need to make sure we have people to support it, because we are losing 80% of the support we've had during all of 2023.

7. Everything else in the proposal.

Sorry, but everything else is investment in things that don't add value in my opinion.
I will need to see either a logical argument, or hard data, plus estimated costs, before I can decide if I support them.

Closing:
We probably need to resolve all the above, and then determine if the costs drop enough to justify a new proposal.