Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Info about new community or project announcements, implemented features, classes, modules or APIs. Might get technical!
PLEASE DO NOT POST HELP REQUESTS OR OTHER DISCUSSIONS HERE!
Forum rules
Be nice to others! Respect the FreeCAD code of conduct!
Post Reply
User avatar
chennes
Veteran
Posts: 3878
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 3:38 pm
Location: Norman, OK, USA
Contact:

Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by chennes »

The Addon Manager is a critical part of FreeCAD: easily finding and installing new workbenches and macros (and now preference packs) is key to FreeCAD's power and flexibility. Today I'm very excited to finally release an updated version of the FreeCAD Addon Manager. The backend remains the same Addon Manager you know and love, created by Yorik van Havre, Jonathan Wiedemann, Kurt Kremitzki, Gaël Écorchard, and others, now with a redesigned GUI and several new features to support further growth of FreeCAD's Addon ecosystem.

The main new features of this release are:
  • A redesigned GUI based in part on the ideas from ExtMan, by mnesarco
  • Filtering the list of addons by regular expression
  • Preference Pack installation support
  • package.xml metadata support for better addon info display
  • Multi-level data caching to improve responsiveness on slow connections
  • Run macros without installing them
  • Auto-install macro toolbar buttons on installation
  • Improved display of README and Wiki page data
  • More reliable SSL network connections
  • Better proxy support
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Known issues (updated 20 Dec 2021)
  • QtNetwork dependency is missing from some packages (to workaround, in some cases you can manually install the python3-pyside2.qtnetwork package)
  • Addon Manager window sometimes loses focus on Windows
To-do list (updated 5 Mar 2022)
  1. Implement "offline mode"
  2. Remove parameters on uninstall
  3. Find a way to eliminate redundant macros
  4. Add support for nested/referencing packages
  5. Support macros installed as packages
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Here's a look at the new interface, in "Expanded" mode:
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202211.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202211.png (72.82 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

For addons that provide a package.xml metadata file (fetched from their git repository and cached locally on the first run), the Addon Manager now displays several additional pieces of information (thanks to @Chris_G for being an early adopter!). It is also no longer necessary to commit your addon's icon to the main FreeCAD repository, it can be fetched dynamically by the Addon Manager (and is of course cached locally). Eventually this will be expanded to read the metadata stored in macros as well.

There is also a "Compact" view if you prefer:
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202237.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202237.png (75.2 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

You can filter the list by typing some term in the filter box:
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202059.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202059.png (41.7 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

The filter box accepts regular expressions (case-insensitive):
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202144.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202144.png (56.12 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

Clicking on an Addon brings up the README file from the addon's repo, or the description (if it's a macro):
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202306.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 202306.png (111 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

Finally, the settings for the Addon Manager have been moved into the main Preferences dialog:
Screenshot 2021-12-18 205616.png
Screenshot 2021-12-18 205616.png (63.41 KiB) Viewed 16090 times

This has been merged as of git commit acfde1a4b (on 18 Dec 2021). There are still many features I'd like to add to it: please feel free to suggest your own ideas below, as well as to post bug reports (it's a 5000+ line code change, so there will certainly be some!). Thanks!
Chris Hennes
Pioneer Library System
GitHub profile, LinkedIn profile, chrishennes.com
User avatar
Shalmeneser
Veteran
Posts: 9474
Joined: Wed Dec 23, 2020 12:04 am
Location: Fr

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by Shalmeneser »

:D
balrobs
Posts: 449
Joined: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:58 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by balrobs »

Thanks for your early christmas present and kudos for your great work :D
I'm so excited to use it in FreeCAD master.
User avatar
Chris_G
Veteran
Posts: 2579
Joined: Tue Dec 31, 2013 4:10 pm
Location: France
Contact:

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by Chris_G »

Congratulation, and many thanks !
heda
Veteran
Posts: 1348
Joined: Sat Dec 12, 2015 5:49 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by heda »

awesome chennes

also all kudos to you for all the usability and clean-up questions you successfully have taken on and managed to move forward.

hats off!! (also to all others that are participating in improving fc, both code and docs, noone mentioned, noone forgotten!!)
paullee
Veteran
Posts: 5098
Joined: Wed May 04, 2016 3:58 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by paullee »

Really awesome ! Thank you and all the developers ! :)

BTW, Merry Christmas !
User avatar
Kunda1
Veteran
Posts: 13434
Joined: Thu Jan 05, 2017 9:03 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by Kunda1 »

Thank you so much @mnescaro and @chennes and everyone else involved!
Alone you go faster. Together we go farther
Please mark thread [Solved]
Want to contribute back to FC? Checkout:
'good first issues' | Open TODOs and FIXMEs | How to Help FreeCAD | How to report Bugs
User avatar
mnesarco
Posts: 446
Joined: Thu Mar 26, 2020 8:52 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by mnesarco »

Thank you @chennes, great work.
I will archive ExtMan as I don't have time to maintain it and it is not necessary any more.
carlopav
Veteran
Posts: 2062
Joined: Mon Dec 31, 2018 1:49 pm
Location: Venice, Italy

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by carlopav »

Great work, kudos to @mnescaro and @chennes!
follow my experiments on BIM modelling for architecture design
balrobs
Posts: 449
Joined: Fri Apr 24, 2020 8:58 pm

Re: Addon Manager Redesign 2021

Post by balrobs »

Today I used the redesigned Addon Manager with the new FreeCAD_weekly-builds-26683-Win-Conda_vc14.x-x86_64 and its a pleasure ...
Maybe a possible GUI improvement could be to show some action buttons in the addon lists so users can go through the installation process without showing up the README file. Also an additional button (readme or detail) IMHO would help users to navigate more intuitvely to more informations.
AddonManager.JPG
AddonManager.JPG (53.67 KiB) Viewed 15628 times
Post Reply