Re: Design document [Draft 1]

[Shawn T Amundson <amundson eventloop com>]

On Thu, Dec 14, 2000 at 11:56:57AM -0600, Joakim Ziegler wrote:
> 
> 3. Navigation structure/usability
> 
> The navigational structure for the GNOME sites is by no means a given. There
> has been a lot of discussion, particularly about the top-level division of
> areas, where there have been suggestions for task-oriented, user group
> oriented, and subject oriented navigation, as well as variations over these
> three basic themes.
> 
> My current proposal is to use a task/subject hybrid structure, with user
> group oriented navigation as an alternative method of access. That is, the
> main categories of the navigation tree are task/subject oriented, and we
> present a small menu in a sidebar or similar on the frontpage for users to
> navigate by user group, which leads to one page per user group, with a
> collection of links that's relevant for that group.
> 
> That still leaves the problem of creating the top-level categories. It's very
> easy to either overspecialize the categories, and end up with too many
> (anything over 10-12 is too many, in reality) or create too broad categories
> that are unintuitive. I created 12 categories which I believe are rather
> intuitive for the user, and span all the information we want to place on the
> GNOME sites. I've not created the actual structure beneath each toplevel
> category, as I think it's not entirely clear yet what things we actually
> *want*, however I believe this structure is general enough that it'll be able
> to hold whatever we want to put into it. The order of this list might be
> illogical.


I think that this is too many things.  I already e-mailed this out a few
minutes ago, but I'll repeat so the comments below make sense:

Toplevel categories:

  The Desktop - All information for the User and non-coding Contributor (www.gnome.org)
  Download - Information on downloading GNOME and GNOME Applications (www.gnome.org/download/)
  Development - For the developer (developer.gnome.org)
  News - News about GNOME (news.gnome.org)
  Contact Us - All contact info, press kit, etc. (www.gnome.org/contact_us/)

Now, I'll comment on where I think each of the following should land in 
my proposed toplevel structure.

> 3.1 Top-level structure
> 
> About
> 
>   Introductory documents. Mainly for those unfamiliar with GNOME in general,
>   and who want a quick way to figure out what this is all about. Includes the
>   a "What is GNOME" document, the general GNOME FAQ, and also documents for
>   companies interested in supporting GNOME, the project roadmap, etc.

This type of thing would go in "The Desktop" area.  

> 
> 
> Screenshots
>   
>   An important link to have on the front page, since this is what a lot of
>   people look for. Idea for structure: Split it up into several different
>   types of screenshots, like "Basic", "Businesslike", "Applications",
>   "Oddities", etc. Perhaps make screenshots imagemaps which can be clicked to
> 	bring you to the appindex page of each displayed application?
> 

The problem with this is, it creates a parallel navigation to
find screenshots.  Say for example, I want screenshots of GTK+
widgets.  If I am on www.gtk.org and I click screenshots, I 
would expect to get GTK+ screenshots, not a long list of differnt
types of screenshots.  Likewise, if I am in the user section,
I probably don't care about widget screenshots - I'd rather see
apps and themes.  Also, if I am at the GNOME Office page I will
expect to see GNOME Office screenshots.

Therefore, I suggest that screenshot links be stuck in the most
obvious place under the category where it makes sense.  This will
still make it obvious.  It will just be on the sidebar instead 
of the toplevel.

> 
> Get it
> 
>   Describe the various ways to get and install GNOME. CVS, GNOME FTP servers,
>   Linux distributions which include GNOME, and Helix GNOME would all be
>   relevant pointers here. It's a matter of resources how much we want to
>   actually support all of this, but we should at least have instructions for
>   how to get, build and install GNOME from CVS and GNOME FTP.
> 

All of this would be under "Download".  In my opinion, "Download" is a 
stronger term than "Get it".  It is more formal and professional.  

> 
> Support
> 
>   How to get help with GNOME. All the documentation should be here, as well as 
>   pointers to mailing lists, bugzilla, IRC channels, etc.
> 

A lot of this applies to both "The Desktop" and "Development".  Links to
this information should be in both locations.  I suggest that "Support"
sounds potentially like commercial support though, so that term not be used 
for navigation.

> 
> News
> 
>   Gnotices in some shape or form. Basically newsitems with discussion.

Same.

> 
> 
> Software
> 
>   A revamped, expanded version of the Appindex. Should let you search for
> 	software in a variety of ways, including category, file types it'll read
> 	and write (very practical for all the people who come onto IRC and say
> 	"What GNOME program can read a .foo file?", and so on. Possibly also an
>   equivalence index, where people can say "I need something like Outlook",
>   and it'll take you to Evolution.

I suggest that this belongs primarily under "Download", with links in 
"The Desktop" as well.

> 
> 
> Developer
> 
>   Entry for the developer minded. Basically the combined content of today's
>   developer.gnome.org and www.gtk.org.

Same.

> 
> 
> Press
> 
>   All the info members of the press would need to represent GNOME in a
>   correct manner. Journalists work under time constraints, so this is where
>   we have the chance to give them all the info they need in one neat package.
>   Should include a press kit (possibly in PDF format), a list of contact mail
>   addresses and phone numbers (I know, phone numbers are so 1985, but some
>   journalists prefer them), press photos (preferably, each press contact
>   listed should have a downloadable high-resolution photo for the press to
>   use when interviewing), representative screenshots (of the nice and simple
>   variety), and so on. The press kit itself should be a brief presentation of
>   GNOME, talking about the project history, the foundation, the current
>   status, what corporate backers there are, etc.

This should be under "Contact Us".  

> 
> Foundation
> 
>   All the formal stuff about the foundation, how a company can join the
>   advisory board, current board of directors, board meeting minutes, and so
>   on. The exact content of this section should be up to the people more
> 	directly involved with the foundation, I believe.

This might justify another toplevel navigation.  I hadn't taken it into
consideration.

> 
> Contact
> 
>   Ways to contact the GNOME project and the members, for various purposes.
>   This should definitely be broken down by task, so that bug reports can be
>   directed to bugzilla, press inquiries to the press section, etc.

Under Contact Us.

> Events
> 
>   An events calendar, listing upcoming tradeshows where GNOME will be
>   present, as well as scheduled upcoming releases.

A link should exist to this from "The Desktop", "Development", and
"Contact Us".  

> People
> 
>   Developer index, developer interviews (I'd like to resurrect that section,
>   even though I only ever did one interview, I think it was a good one, and
>   it's a great way to show the faces behind the software. Actually, it's such
>   a good idea that KDE cloned it off our site), and so on.

Well, a developer index should go under Contact Us.  Developer interviews
should go under "News".  

> 
> 3.2 Other navigation methods, shortcuts into the structure, etc.
> 
> The structure outlined above is a reasonable main navigational structure, but
> one structure will never fit everyone. Hence, I'm suggesting augmenting it
> with a few metastructures that will mainly be accessible through the front
> page:
> 
> 
> Role description
> 
>   Allow people to choose who they are from a small menu (about ten items,
>   perhaps), and arrive on a page of quick links for the group they chose. The
>   links go directly into the structure, and are the ones we believe are
>   useful for that group, in the order they should be read.
> 
> Quick tasks
> 
>   Allow people to choose a few typical tasks from a menu, and go directly to
>   those pages. These should be the 4-8 pages people visit the most, but that
>   are still not logical to make into top-level categories. Things that spring
>   to mind as obvious candidates are "Report a bug", "I need help!", etc.

I think both "role description" and "quick tasks" are fixes that are employed
on sites that have navigation so difficult as to be usable.  Hopefully we
can do better and won't need these things.  The problem with menu things is
people are drawn to them and may ignore the rest of the navigation.  

> Search the site
> 
>   A search box on the front page is a necessity, and should search the entire
>   site.

Yes.

-Shawn

--
Shawn T. Amundson                       amundson eventloop com	
Research and Development                http://www.eventloop.com/
EventLoop, Inc.                         http://www.snorfle.net/

"The assumption that the universe looks the same in every
 direction is clearly not true in reality." - Stephen Hawking