[cla][patch] Multi-file uploader

[florentvaldelievre]

Hi,

With Sami Dalouche, we have been working on a multi-file uploader that we call MFU. The goal of the project is pretty much similar to dojox.FileUploader?, except that we did not want to rely on Flash and wanted a gmail-like user interface.

You can find more information about the project on : ​http://developers.sirika.com/mfu/

An image-upload demo available from ​http://developers.sirika.com/mfu-demo/samples/mfu-dojo-embedded/mfu-dojo-embedded.html

We thought that it might be beneficial to users if the code were merged into a dojo subproject. There might be a need to rework part of the source code to make it compliant with your coding guidelines, so feel free to make suggestions about our coding style. (might not always be JavaScript?'ish or Dojo'ish enough for you).

Cheers Florent Valdelievre

[Mike Wilcox]

Hi guys,

This is great work, but there looks to be a tremendous amount of overlap for the current Dojox.FileUploader?. What does MFU bring to the table that DFU doesn't already have?

[florentvaldelievre]

Thanks for your reply !

What MFU provides that DFU doesn't (or at least that we think DFU does not):

• pure JavaScript? implementation (no flash requirement for multiple files)

• a UI (gmail-attachment like) that we find more user-friendly for non

technical users (who often don't know about ctrl-click to select multiple files)

• a progress bar which indicates upload status (no flash used)

• the ability to retry uploading files when recoverable errors happen

(network timeout, ...)

• the ability to override the UI : Each component is a widget, which mean users can use dojo template mechanism to customize each part of the uploader : File input widget, error widget(network error, response error...), result widget ( filename, size, mime ...), attach link widget, progress bar widget

• the ability to de-select uploaded files

Let us know what you think

Cheers

Florent

[Mike Wilcox]

Hi Florent,

DFU pretty much has all those things. There is a "force" property that you can set to html. It still supports multiple files - of course you can only select one at a time, but it builds a list of file-inputs (I don't even know what you mean by control-click). DFU is API based, nothing is forced in how it looks; in fact that's where a majority of the work is, in allowing it to be customizable. There is error handling and network timeouts that for each file.

It looks like the only thing unique is the html-based progress, but that is largely a server-side thing. It would be a nice feature for DFU, but it would need instructions on how to implement it in PHP, ASP, .NET JSP (and then different flavors of Java...). Ok, currently DFU isn't doc'd that well, but believe me, the Java instructions would have to be there at minimum.

[florentvaldelievre]

okay ! I understand your point of view. However, if you are interested in some MFU features, feel free to get some code as MFU has the same licence has dojo one.

Thanks for your support

[Mike Wilcox]

Sure thing Florent. Maybe I'll look into the HTML progress meter code next time I crack open DFU.

[dylan]

It could be a candidate for dojoc, or other places in case people prefer it. Ping me off list to discuss.