
Genesis Of a Web App: 46 Days, 3 Separate Cities, Countless All-Nighters  - jasonlbaptiste
http://blog.ramamia.com/2008/12/genesis-of-a-web-app-43-days-3-separate-cities-countless-all-nighters/
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diN0bot
I was curious about the no passwords feature so I started a page. I logged
out, and then tried to create a page with the same family name. Wow- still
valid. "username" isn't a limited resource. neat.

passwords/usernames are rolled into a single url with a long random sequence
tacked onto the end. Hardly something I could remember, though the 30 day
login might be sufficient. I wonder what kind of feedback you get about this.

Neat attempt at not having usernames/passwords.

~~~
markbao
(Ramamia developer here)

We get some negative feedback about not having passwords. So I think the way
we're going to approach this is allow people to use their instant login link
anytime, so they can bookmark it, keep requesting it from the homepage when
they aren't logged in, etc., but also allow them to set a password in the user
settings.

If they aren't logged in, and set a password, they can log in immediately with
their password. If they didn't set a password, or forgot it, they can request
an instant login link be sent to their email again.

A big portion of the family market are people that aren't insanely
knowledgeable about the internet. They can bookmark the instant login link
when they're logged out, or they can check their email to get it again. For
people on the go, this will allow them to check their site by just logging in
even without an instant login link.

In fact, the new period that we remember you for is 6 months. As long as you
don't clear your cookies, we'll remember you for that long and you won't have
to login again.

Also, re: usernames, nope - even if there are thousands of Smith family
accounts, it doesn't make sense to stuff them into one family.

~~~
diN0bot
cool.

perhaps i misunderstand things, but it seems that anyone who gets a hold of
the url (friends? search engines?) has both viewing and editing power.

~~~
markbao
Yeah, which is why we're phasing out the family URLs. Also, search engines are
prohibited from indexing that content.

------
Timothee
I was thinking about a "Facebook for families" just yesterday actually :)

When I started to think about it though, I realized that one thing is that you
tend to be part of families that overlap. For example: my in-laws don't really
know my siblings and even less my siblings' in-laws (whom I don't know very
much myself) So, the schema tends to become exactly like Facebook: focused on
user accounts linked between each other rather than families with members. So,
I figured it wouldn't be easy to make it work since, as with any social
network, moving over to a new one or managing multiple ones, is not easy. What
are your thoughts about this? How do you deal with that?

Don't get me wrong though, I have been thinking about something like this for
my family!

Also, what does the name Ramamia mean?

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bkbleikamp
Wouldn't the all nighters be a maximum of 46? That is not countless...

I am a fan of the idea (family sharing and communication online is something I
am interested in since I moved across the country from my family) but the
design of the site is not the best, and I don't think I'd use it regularly.

I am very partial to well designed web apps, though, since I am more of a
front end coder / designer than a hacker.

~~~
markbao
Thanks for the feedback!

We tried to keep the design as simple as possible to not clutter the
interface.

How would you improve the design? Are there any areas that are particularly
badly designed?

~~~
bkbleikamp
I am a fan of simple designs, my goal in any project is to never do something
that "looks nice" for the sake of looking nice. But parts of the app just
appear somewhat disjointed to my eye - it feels like a decent design, but not
one that is completely pulled together.

Also, my reason for not using it is not entirely based on the design - I
realize my initial comment sounded like that. I also think getting my less-
than-tech-savvy immediate and extended family to use a website to keep in
touch would fall on deaf ears. They think Geni is a crazy idea, I think it
rocks. There is a disconnect there.

------
mnemonik
Seems to me as if IE isn't your only problem. I'm using FF3.0.4 on Ubuntu 8.04
Hardy and things are looking a little crazy:
<http://i42.tinypic.com/35bfl0l.jpg>

~~~
markbao
Looks like you have Javascript off, or the page hasn't fully loaded, perhaps.

Can anyone else confirm this is happening to them?

~~~
mnemonik
Oops, I've been caught.

EDIT: Saw that you edited to ask if anyone else has the problem. I gave
temporary permissions to everything on the page in NoScript and it renders
perfectly, so hopefully no one else has any issues.

