ficus.io

Ficus was an app for creating online presentations with interactive real-time slides, such as polls, comments, and ratings. It was built in 2014, but it is currently discontinued.

Embeddable Ficus polls

The web app isn't available anymore, however you are free to use embeddable components in your code:

// import ESM directly from ficus.io CDN
import { createPoll } from "https://ficus.io/widget.js";

const [update, unmount] = createPoll(rootElement, {
  type: "classic", // see configuration section below

  config: {
    question: "Yes or No?",

     // optional, where the poll is being presented
    url: "ficus.io",

    answers: [
      { id: "n", color: "red", label: "NO!" },
      { id: "y", color: "blue", label: "YES!" },
    ],
  },

  // optional, you can use `update` to populate the poll new the new responces later on
  votes: [
    { id: "1", answer: "y" },
    { id: "1", answers: ["n", "y"] }, // multiple answers per response are allowed!
  ],
});

// update the poll with the new responses
update({ votes: [...] })

// destroy the widget when you're done
umount()

Configuration & Theming

Poll configuration is flexible and supports both short and verbose forms. See examples below:

createPoll(el, {
  config: {
    question: "Cats or dogs?",
    answers: ["Cats!", "Dogs!"], // ficus will assign ids ('0' and '1') and colors automatically
  },
});

update({ votes: ["0", "0", "1"] }); // two votes for 'Cats' and one for 'Dogs'

There are 4 types of polls (e.g. the graphic visualization of the polling process):

"classic"
"bar"
"cloud"
"bubble

Check ficus.io website for reference.

createPoll(el, {
  type: "bar", // or "classic", "cloud", "bubble". Default: "classic" 

  config: { ... },
});

Fonts and colors are also customizable:

createPoll(el, {
  config: { ... },

  // override default theme settings (every prop is optional here)
  theme: {
    font: 'Comic Sans MS',   // default: system-ui
    backgroundColor: 'blue', // default: white
    textColor: 'red',        // default: black

    // default: 4:3
    // Ficus will automatically resize the poll to fill the parent container's width
    aspectRatio: '16:9'
  }
});

How `widget.js` is deployed

Website and widget are built separately by Vite. Widget build outputs manifest.json that contains a mapping between the entry point name and hashed chunk name. All static assets and chunks are cached indefinitely, except for /widget.js which is a serverless endpoint that returns an ESM shim.