Awesome Pills for Confluence

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  Department Dropdown

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  Manage Labels Page

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  Meetings Example

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  Status Dropdown

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  Search Page

Inspiration

The inspiration for Awesome Pills came from the challenges teams face in effectively tracking and managing work in Confluence. While Atlassian’s core Status Macro offers some basic functionality, we realised it often fell short of meeting the specific needs of diverse teams. We wanted to create something more flexible, customisable, and visually engaging to improve team alignment and productivity. The idea of pill-shaped labels emerged as a solution to make statuses more intuitive, dynamic, and visually striking—transforming static information into actionable insights.

What It Does

Awesome Pills is a versatile app that enables teams to add customisable status labels in Confluence pages. It’s designed to adapt to the unique workflows of any team, whether in software development, marketing, operations, or beyond.

Customisable Pill Labels Each pill consists of two parts:

• Category: The left side of the pill, representing a grouping like "Status," "Priority," or "Department."

• Label/Status: The right side, which can be set to predefined options or custom values like "To-Do," "In Progress," or "High."

Users can create their own categories and labels, giving them complete control over how they structure information.

Dynamic Status Updates

• Labels can be easily updated by clicking a dropdown menu and selecting a new option.

• Teams can quickly reflect on progress or changes in real-time, ensuring everyone stays informed and aligned.

Label Management Space A dedicated management interface allows users to:

• Add new labels under any category.
• Edit label names and colours for consistency.
• Adjust label order to suit team preferences or workflows.
• Create entirely new categories.

Search Page

• A powerful search tool lets users find specific labels and see all pages where those labels are used.

• This feature makes it easier to track work across large projects or teams and will soon include advanced filtering and sorting options.

How We Built It

We built Awesome Pills using Atlassian's Forge framework , ensuring seamless integration with Confluence’s native environment.

Challenges We Ran Into

• Design Consistency: Creating a visually appealing and intuitive pill design that worked across different themes and screen sizes in Confluence was a challenge.

• Dynamic Label Updates: Implementing real-time updates without affecting page performance requires optimisation and efficient data handling.

• Search Functionality: Building a search tool that could scale with larger teams and projects while ensuring speed and accuracy was complex.

• User Experience: Balancing simplicity with advanced customisation features took several iterations based on feedback.

Accomplishments That We're Proud Of

• Successfully creating a tool that is more versatile and user-friendly than the default Status Macro.
• Designing a visually engaging label system that enhances readability and usability.
• Building a robust Label Management system to give users control over their workflows.
• Launching the initial version with a functional search page, setting the stage for future enhancements.

What We Learned

• The Importance of Flexibility: Teams need tools that adapt to their unique workflows, not the other way around.

• Iterative Design is Key: Regular feedback from beta users helped us refine the app to meet real-world needs.

• Balance is Crucial: Combining simplicity with advanced functionality is a challenge, but it results in a product that appeals to a broader audience.

What's Next for Awesome Pills for Confluence

• Advanced Search Capabilities: We plan to introduce detailed filtering, sorting, and analytics in the search tool, making it even more powerful.

• Enhanced User Interface: Upcoming updates will focus on further improving the visual design and user experience.

• Template Support: Pre-built templates for common workflows like Agile sprints, content approvals, and marketing campaigns.

• Analytics and Reporting: Provide insights into label usage, helping teams optimise their processes.

• Feedback-Driven Features: We will actively gather feedback from users to ensure that Awesome Pills continues to evolve in alignment with their needs.

Awesome Pills is just getting started. We’re thrilled to bring this tool to Codegeist 2024 and look forward to seeing how it transforms the way teams collaborate in Confluence.

Built With

• forge