Compendium building tools

Some months ago a manager for a game company mentioned that he wanted to develop a roll20 compendium for one/some of their games, but said that roll20 was changing the way that compendiums are assembled, and that he felt it best to wait until they were done, and that it might be quite a while. the wiki page on compendium building does not mention anything in development. I don't often visit this sub-forum, so I apologize if this has already been explained here, but I wonder if something has/can be said about what is or is not happening? 

Roll20 is very tight-lipped about any updates or release scedules that relate to IP of other companies and licencing agreements related to their products, so usually nothing is heard until just before something is released. I don't remember if there have been said any updates on how the structure of the  compedium, but some weeks ago the Starfinder Compendium was released. But I guess even if the concept of the compenduim isn't tide to other IP, Roll20 haven't to my knowledge given any long term road map for it or other wanted/worked on features. I'd say the manager should just contact Roll20 directly through email and talk out how things function and get the ball rolling instead of sitting outside and waiting an undefiendte amount of time for a relevant update for them. Even if some major change would be on the way, getting the talks started now is smarter as the manager could get a heads up on relevant things to the deal they want to make.

as i understand the whole make your own compendium thing outside of what Roll20 will do... it is best to go thur marketplace creator route and make one and then ask roll20 team via email about how you can help them build it into a add-on that can be purchased... after all it is up to the copyright holder to determine what roll20 can do with said content and licensing requirements. at this point all roll20 does again that i am aware of is convert the digital book into a format for roll20 games. sometimes this is done in house such as WOTC games and sometimes this is handled by the license holder akin to PAIZO and pathfinder products. again as i understand it Paizo was one a few Content owners given permission by roll20 to make Add-ons ATM. the rest as @andreas said above is correct. 

The topic came up because I volunteered to help make the compendium for them. I was approaching the company as opposed to Roll20, since the company would have to grant the license as a very first step. The manager wanted a roll20 compendium, but had already talked to Roll20, and said his understanding was that it was better to wait a while due to the tools being updated soon. But my understanding is that there are two ways to make a compendium, import from JSON files, or build it directly into Roll20. It seems to me the better solution would probably be to build the JSON files, but I don't know that the manager was not assuming they would be editing it manually. If the tools are being updated, I assume that only the JSON import or the manual build is being updated, probably not both.  So I am hoping to get an idea if the manager is waiting for some tools to be updated that I would not even be wanting to use anyway.  So am wondering what tools are being updated? Do they affect the JSON build or the manual build? In what circumstances (does / does not) it make sense to delay starting a compendium?

I was really hoping that somebody from Roll20 would shed some light on this.  If somebody wanted to license and build a compendium, is waiting for further tools recommended?

If you wish to open a dialog with Roll20, your best bet would be direct email, as they would be unlikely to discuss such nuts and bolts in open forum. You can send them an email at <a href="mailto:team@roll20.net" rel="nofollow">team@roll20.net</a>.