File request

[artonge]

This is a modal dialog that helps a user create a file drop link & send it to people. A specific dialog makes it easier to find and use, and more visible to users. But the end result is 'just' a file drop link.

Similar to https://help.dropbox.com/share/create-file-request Sub task: Enter name when you upload some files, sort in folder

Use case:

• university teacher requests homework from the students. The student has to enter their name. Their uploads are stored in subfolders by their name. Expiration date = deadline for homework turn in time!

Flow:

• Somewhere (maybe in the + menu) choose 'request a file'
• Give a title (will be the name of the file-drop link)
• Description (optional) (put in note to recipient)
• choose a location (folder) the files should go into
• choose if the files should go into a subfolder based on name of uploader (optional)
• choose deadline (optional but might be set by default) (goes into expiration date) - should have a warning that once the expiration date is hit, the request disappears and a new one has to be created.
• choose password (optional but might be enforced)
• choose recipients (optional) - should be possible to be users/groups/email addresses (from address book?)
• click 'create' & get a link.
• would be good to go to the folder and how the file drop in the side bar, so the user also 'learns' where the link now is, where they can modify it etc.
• we should add a 'file requests' to the share sidebar, showing all file drop links
• We also need to make the share note much more visible to the recipient - it is now quite hidden. It should ideally also allow a bit more 'richness' in its markup, but that's not so critical.

[jospoortvliet]

Additional request - let's discuss how much of this we can do.

Scenario

Teacher has to give homework to students. Google has a feature for this: the teacher selects a file, selects a group of students, and a deadline. Students each get a copy of the file and have until the deadline to finish the homework. This feature has been requested in Sweden and Denmark and also mentioned in other places. Even as blocker or a major boost vs competition.

Now this does NOT fully fit the file request feature as above, as that maps fully onto file-drop and thus would be a frontend-only task.

My thoughts on what probably needs doing for the "homework scenario" on top of the file-request feature

• ability to attach a file to a file-drop, not just a 'note'.
• when clicked, ability to automatically copy that file into the file-drop and then open it for editing.
• ability to remember what files a user has added to a file-drop and keep them visible until the file-drop expires (only for logged in users of course)

The flow for the teacher would simply be to add a file to the creation of the file request. The flow for the student would be to go to the file request, click the document and edit.. the student can go to the link again the next day, continue to edit the file.

A partial implementation would be to allow the teacher to add a file to the file-drop. This would allow the student to download that file, work on it, and upload it manually. It's less convenient, but still a step up.

[sorbaugh]

PR that will close this issue: https://github.com/nextcloud/server/pull/46007