Yeah, other apps do require accounts as well, but I suppose they have better free-level accounts. I do think Fibery needs to think differently since it is trying to be this generic domain modeling and process tool. After thinking about it as a basic use case, here is where I run into issues:
- I’m a new product manager proving out the value of fibery to me and my organization with a Team plan
- I start setting up some of my roadmap or issue backlog
- I want to associate a person that may or may not be a direct collaborator of some kind in the future (ideally everyone would be in the org, but that might take some time)
- That entity already has a relationship to the Users type, so I try to add a new user for that person
So, the issue I have here is that I cannot reference this person even via a regular relationship at this point without creating a new People type and setting up all the relations or by adding them as a paying User account which invites them. Even if I want to setup the new type, it gets really messy. This just doesn’t seem like a great experience for someone getting started.
I’d rather have time to set everything up ahead of time ready for the broader organizational use, then be able to trigger invites to people, pay for more licenses, etc. The licensing gets in the way of modeling, which is what I have a problem with. I’d be fine with requiring an email address as part of the People model as long as it doesn’t trigger the whole account creation process for that person until I’m ready for it.
That seems reasonable, but I don’t think they necessarily need to be separate Types to achieve that functionality. If you just consider how the rest of Fibery is built, the Users type just doesn’t fit the same pattern. A Type should be a basic Type and any custom behaviors are added via extensions. The extensions, as far as I know, don’t limit you from adding entities to that type. The Users type does. The problems I’m running into I believe wouldn’t exist if this architectural pattern was applied consistently.