Enhancing Polls: Flexible Changes & Metadata Preservation

Introduction

Flexible poll management and metadata preservation are crucial aspects of enhancing user experience and ensuring data integrity in poll-based applications. The ability to adapt poll types and retain valuable metadata when recommending or importing polls from previous events can significantly improve the efficiency and effectiveness of event planning and decision-making processes. In this article, we will delve into the challenges, proposed solutions, and implementation details surrounding these enhancements, providing a comprehensive overview of the features and their potential impact. We will explore how addressing these limitations can lead to a more versatile and user-friendly polling system, ultimately benefiting event organizers and participants alike.

The poll recommendation feature, while successful in aggregating polls from past events, faces limitations in poll type flexibility and metadata preservation. Addressing these limitations is crucial for enhancing the feature's usefulness and user satisfaction. Currently, users cannot change the poll type (e.g., from star rating to binary) after creation or when recommending polls from previous events. Additionally, essential metadata, such as images and recommender information, is lost when importing items (movies, cocktails, etc.) from prior events. These issues hinder the flexibility and richness of the polling experience, necessitating comprehensive solutions to overcome them.

Problem Analysis

Current System State

To fully grasp the challenges at hand, it's essential to understand the current system's architecture and limitations. The existing poll schema, as defined in lib/eventasaurus/events/poll.ex, outlines the structure of a poll, including key attributes like voting_system and poll_type. The voting_system attribute can take values such as binary, approval, ranked, and star, representing different voting mechanisms. The poll_type attribute categorizes the poll's subject matter, including options like movie, places, custom, and more. Currently, there's no built-in mechanism to modify the voting_system after the poll has been created. The poll option schema, found in lib/eventasaurus/events/poll_option.ex, further defines the structure of poll choices. Crucially, it includes fields for image_url, metadata, external_data, and suggested_by_id, enabling the storage of rich information about each option. While metadata is stored in the database, it isn't consistently carried over during poll recommendations, leading to information loss. The poll suggestion logic, implemented in lib/eventasaurus_app/polls/poll_suggestions.ex, focuses on transferring poll_type, voting_system, title patterns, and option titles. It does not carry over images, external_data, metadata, or recommender attribution. This selective transfer of information diminishes the value of poll recommendations, particularly when detailed context is essential.

The current system state reveals key areas for improvement in poll management. The rigidity in poll type modification and the incomplete transfer of metadata during recommendations significantly impact user experience and data richness. These limitations underscore the need for enhancements that allow for greater flexibility and data preservation.

User Impact

The inflexibility of the current polling system can significantly impact user experience in various scenarios. Let's consider two specific cases to illustrate the pain points.

Scenario 1: Poll Type Change Needed. Imagine a scenario where, in a previous week, an organizer conducted a star rating poll for movies. This week, however, the organizer wishes to use a yes/no/maybe voting system instead. Currently, the system does not allow changing the voting system directly. This forces the organizer to manually recreate the poll, which means losing all the previously added options. This manual recreation process is not only time-consuming but also prone to errors, as the organizer has to remember and re-enter all the details. The desired functionality would be to allow the organizer to change the poll type seamlessly, either before or after adding it to a new event, without losing the poll's content. This would save considerable time and effort while ensuring consistency across events.

Scenario 2: Metadata Loss. In another common scenario, consider an event where a movie poll was conducted, complete with TMDB posters for each movie option. When importing this poll to a new event, the system currently loses all the movie images. This metadata loss forces the organizer to manually re-add the movies to restore the images, a tedious and time-consuming task. Furthermore, the recommender attribution, indicating who suggested each movie, is completely lost. This loss of context diminishes the value of the recommendations, as users may not know why certain movies were included. Preserving metadata during poll import would greatly enhance the user experience by maintaining the richness and context of the poll options. These scenarios underscore the need for a more flexible and data-rich polling system that adapts to the diverse needs of event organizers and participants.

The user impact of these limitations is substantial, highlighting the necessity for solutions that provide greater flexibility and data integrity.

Proposed Solutions

To address the identified limitations, two key features are proposed: the ability to change poll types and the preservation of metadata for recommended items. These features aim to enhance the flexibility and richness of the polling system, ultimately improving the user experience.

Feature 1: Poll Type Change Capability

Enabling users to change the voting system of a poll can significantly enhance flexibility and adaptability. This feature would allow organizers to adjust poll types to better suit their needs without having to recreate entire polls, saving time and effort. The proposed implementation involves adding a