Rails admin UI research

  • Thoughtbot’s Administrate
    • Cons
      • Slow / dwindling maintenance
      • Lack of compatibility with Rails 7 propshaft” approach
        • This PR solves it, but unmerged at the time of this writing.
      • Depends on jquery-rails
    • Pros
      • MIT licensed
      • No DSL
      • Thoughtbot has a good reputation for gem maintenance
    • Notes
  • Avo
    • Cons
      • Commercial project with unclearly worded free community license.
      • Phones home to verify license.
        • Even the free community version has telemetry.
      • Unclear whether can be customized / monkeypatched freely (either community or Pro versions). The author says this is okay, but the license + pricing page create a conflicting impression.
      • Has Avo branding built into layouts, unclear if can be disabled, even in Pro version. The author says yes, but again, license and pricing page create a conflicting impression.
    • Pros
      • Very well designed and maintained.
      • Very easy to use, and get quick results.
    • Notes
  • Self-rolled admin based on Tabler

Decision log:

  • 2023-08-06: Author responded with some answers. Updated the notes above.
  • 2023-08-04: I asked some license-clarifying questions in Avo discord. While waiting for a response, I’m experimenting with self-rolled Tabler-based solution.


Date
August 5, 2023