Universal Bot Settings

The Problem: Server Administrators

Currently, server admins are faced with navigating separate online dashboards for each bot, some are often buggy and unintuitive. Some bots however, don't even have a dashboard, and rely on a cluttered settings command. Or worse yet again, a configuration argument for each command, making trying to customise a bot a complete nightmare.

The Problem: Bot Developers

It's often the worst part of bot development in my opinion, we can never exactly get the experience right for users. Maybe I'm being a bit stereotypical here, but most bot developers are normally only skilled in backend development, meaning they either have limited understanding or are compeltely illiterate in frontend development. If they do make the dashboard themselves, it's likely to be a complete disaster. If they don't, it can be expensive and just a general inconvenience dealing with other developers who could scam you at any given moment. Not to mention, hosting can be expensive and something additional that bot developers really don't want to invest in, given the fact that they can simply mash together a command for it.

The current standard for bot developers

Yes; having a dashboard for a bot is necessary in 2021. A massive selling point for bots at the moment is having an easy to use and clean dashboard. That's of course self explanatory, no user, whether it be for a bot in millions of servers or for a bot in 50 wants to go through a cluttered settings command. Commands are just a poor way of allowing users to configure things. While I have seen some very well made settings commands using the new select menus and buttons, these are rare and also require a lot of thought and work from developers. This is also still not universal, and not as straight forward as a set menu, in the same place, for all bots.

The Solution

A universal settings menu for each bot in the server settings menu/by right clicking on the bot in the member list. Like slash commands, bots would be able to have set configuration menus, including text entry, tick boxes, drop down menus, multiple choice boxes, file uploading, etc (basically every feature on other discord menus). Server admins can change whatever they like on the menu, then click the 'save changes' button commonly found on other Discord menus to limit API requests. When this is clicked, the gateway would emit a new event that the bot would listen to and update any databases accordingly.

Evaluation of the Solution

This solution effectively closes the gap between bots with amazing dashboards and bots with poorly designed configuration commands, whether you think that's a good thing or not. In my opinion, it's a positive for developers and server admins. Bot developers can work on features and make every aspect of their bot as configurable as they want, and server admins spend less time looking for relevant dashboard websites/learning command syntax. On the other hand, it allows poorly made bots to disguise their bad design behind a universal and professional settings menu.

Here's a super basic idea of how a menu like this might look:

This is the complete barebones of a potentially great feature, I'd encourage you to leave any feedback you have, good or bad, detailed or undetailed. If you liked it, share the post and upvote it. Thanks!

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