BoneDexter Development Road Map

BoneDexter is a project with big aspirations run by a small group of volunteers. As such, we need to be honest and realistic about what we can do and the order we need to do it in. Below is the current road map for developing BoneDexter to its fullest potential as a useful tool for consumers to discover, research and compare products across makers, models and designs.

Step 1: Bulk Data Entry, Initial Page Design, and Learning the Tools

Being volunteers, our small team is motivated by how BoneDexter will be helpful to others and comes at a personal cost. This means most of us didn't start with the tools, skills or understanding that creating such a website requires. As such, we're learning by doing. Bone Dexter's foundation is product data, the first and most useful thing that anyone would want to look up about the various models and makers available on the market. By collecting, organizing and entering this data, we're learning the tools required to manage and make BoneDexter tick, building a foundational knowledge that will carry us through the next steps of this project.

This stage's goals are simple:

• Collect a list of makers from across the internet, with a focus on the well known first.
• Create simple, readable layouts for these maker's pages on BoneDexter.
• Create and complete pages for each product offered by those makers.
• Create simple and easy to read methods for users to quickly read a product's dimensions and other applicable information.

Since there will always be new models on the market, collecting and entering data will be a forever task. As such, this evergreen task will be folded into the future steps as well.

Step 2: Creating a Comparison Tool and Comprehensive Tagging System

Simply having products searchable and laid out by maker is great is you already know what you're looking for, but that doesn't do much to help discoverability. Other than centralizing a list of makers out there, it wouldn't be much different than going to the maker's website yourself and browsing their gallery of products. That's why search-ability and a dedicated comparison tool for side by side dimension comparisons is step 2.

This means:

• Creating a standardized method of displaying model metrics and measurements.
• Identifying non-standard information useful to users (model species, features, design elements, etc).
• Researching, creating and implementing a comprehensive and intuitive tag list for products.
• Creating an intuitive tool for quickly searching, ordering and filtering models based on maker, model features, specific metrics, etc.

This step is a big one and will go through many design iterations. We'll be looking for feedback from users on what is and isn't useful, what is and isn't intuitive, and what we might have overlooked. We expect this step to take a while to get right.

Step 3: Iteration, Expansion, and Additions

While simple to say, endurance will be the most difficult step in maintaining and expanding on BoneDexter's usefulness and cause. There will always be new makers, new releases, special events that need to be documented, and new information that needs to be collected, distilled and displayed. As such, the BoneDexter team cannot remain small if it is to keep up with the ever changing landscape of the internet.

This means:

• Expanding the BoneDexter team and, eventually, opening pages up to limited editing by the public.
• Further refining our process and design for gathering information and adding new makers, models and metrics to BoneDexter.
• Working out any bugs with the comparison tool, adding missing features, and keeping the data up to date.
• Expanding beyond the current product types by either integrating them directly into BoneDexter, or by creating sister sites built around specific categories of kink gear.

Should BoneDexter be successful in its mission and build a community of contributors who can sustain the current scope of the project for as long as it is useful, the far future goal of bringing a comprehensive catalog for other types of products and kink gear sits on the horizon. Some products like sounding rods and ride-able machines might fit well under the banner of BoneDexter, but things like Latex and Vinyl body gear might be better off under their own umbrella.