feat: july milestone

[dhmlau]

Trying something different. Opening this PR early so that we can get more inputs from @strongloop/loopback-maintainers and the community. The general theme is docs issues takedown. Please edit this branch directly or comment on the PR.

Reference: Q3 roadmap

Checklist

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• npm test passes on your machine
• New tests added or existing tests modified to cover all changes
• Code conforms with the style guide
• API Documentation in code was updated
• Documentation in /docs/site was updated
• Affected artifact templates in packages/cli were updated
• Affected example projects in examples/* were updated

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[hacksparrow]

I vote for #5697. It is mostly a refactoring task, but will have a drastic effect on the state of our documentation.

Most of our users are looking for a REST framework documentation, but what we have is a documentation about the general-purpose API framework with the REST features documented in parts in different sections of the grand document like a jigsaw puzzle.

With a REST extension, we would have created the entity whose documentation our users are looking for. It also makes it clear LoopBack is a general-purpose API framework that can be used to build REST/OpenAPI, GraphQL and other APIs.

I would like to take up this task myself.

[hacksparrow]

Let's dedicate some time to analyze and discuss this PR - #5366.

[dhmlau]

I vote for #5697. It is mostly a refactoring task, but will have a drastic effect on the state of our documentation.

Most of our users are looking for a REST framework documentation, but what we have is a documentation about the general-purpose API framework with the REST features documented in parts in different sections of the grand document like a jigsaw puzzle.

With a REST extension, we would have created the entity whose documentation our users are looking for. It also makes it clear LoopBack is a general-purpose API framework that can be used to build REST/OpenAPI, GraphQL and other APIs.

@hacksparrow, I'm a bit reserved about getting #5697 on the July milestone, probably because I (as a user) cannot see the benefits of having a separate REST extension. I'm thinking if the items we've listed in the Q3 roadmap should have a higher priority over #5697 for the Q3 time frame.
Would also like to hear from @raymondfeng and @bajtos.

[bajtos]

I agree with @dhmlau regarding #5697. The scope of the issue looks big to me, I am not convinced the benefits to our users will justify the effort required to make the changes happen. We have bigger fish to fry.

Most of our users are looking for a REST framework documentation, but what we have is a documentation about the general-purpose API framework with the REST features documented in parts in different sections of the grand document like a jigsaw puzzle.

Let's find a way how to improve our documentation to make it easier for our users to find information about REST features, so that it does not feel like a jigsaw puzzle anymore.

[dhmlau]

Probably need to defer Clean up extension template and docs #5336 to Jul.

[dhmlau]

@agnes512, since you'll be the scrum master for next month, could you please open a new issue for the milestone? Thanks.

[agnes512]

Closing this PR as #5837 is opened.