Re: Design document [Draft 1]

[Joakim Ziegler <joakim helixcode com>]

On Mon, Dec 18, 2000 at 11:24:26PM -0600, Shawn T Amundson wrote:
> On Thu, Dec 14, 2000 at 11:56:57AM -0600, Joakim Ziegler wrote:

> 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.

I think this is too few things, by far. Look at any largish company site that
has a set of products and activities ranging as wide as the GNOME project.

On the Microsoft frontpage, I count 32 top-level navigation links, not
counting the links inside the actual body part of the site, sorted into 6
categories of links. The KDE site has 37 links on the front page navigational
structure, separated into 10 categgories of links. Adobe has 7 main
navigation categories. Red Hat has 19 links in 6 categories. The new Helix
Code site will have 9 top level categories. All are more than 5, some a lot
more. (Yes, I'm making the assumption here that these sites do things right.
I think that's a reasonable one.)


>> 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.  

It's not just about the desktop, though. As I've said so many times that
people might actually find it boring already, GNOME is a lot more than a
desktop, and the desktop is already the thing getting the most exposure. The
other about stuff are introductions to GNOME as a whole, history of the GNOME
project, roadmaps and release schedules, what companies are backing GNOME, etc.


>> 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.

There's nothing wrong with parallel navigation. In fact, just about any
nontrivial information structure will have to tangle the hierarchy, or you'll
have incredible headaches about where to put stuff. A good way to do the
screenshots thing would likely be to make it a trivial script, so you can ask
for screenshots including a specific app/widget/whatever. You'll end up with
parallel navigation no matter what, since if you're on the page for an app,
and click on "Download", you should be taken to the "Download" section.


>> 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.  

Sure, this could be renamed. What are other people's opinion?


>> 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.

Commercial support should probably be in here too, actually. There's a
reasonably large number of companies offering commercial support at the
moment (take a look at http://www.gnome.org/commsupp.html ).

I think support is a good candidate for a top level categorie precisely
because it applies to several other areas. Tangling the hierarchy with
something that's just linked to from two different branches, but isn't
accessible on its own seems very counterintuitive to me.


>> 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.

Downloading the software is just a small part of what you do with it, though.
And some of it also belongs in "Developer", since there will be libraries and
development tools and whatnot. This spread suggests to me that it should be
its own category.


>> 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".  

Actually, if we were to put it somewhere, I'd put it in "About" (Which I'm
100% sure is a good idea to have as a top-level item, per the reasons above).


>> 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".  

Actually, it might belong on news.gnome.org (in other words, under "News",
now that I think about it. The main problem with the events page as it is, is
that it's hard to keep it up to date, traditionally.


>> 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".  

They're not really news, though. If you were looking to find out who the
people behind GNOME were, would "News" be your first choice? I think keeping
people as a top level category has a strong symbolic effect too, in this time
of corporate involvement.



>> 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.  

They can be that, but it's by no means necessary. Role oriented navigation is
a valid navigational metaphor, and "Quick links" are an excellent way to
point the way to things that are often used, but aren't top level categories.
In fact, if we cut down on the number of categories, the quick links would be
even more important (screenshots would become one, for instance).


-- 
Joakim Ziegler - Helix Code web monkey - joakim helixcode com - Radagast IRC
      FIX sysop - free software coder - FIDEL & Conglomerate developer
            http://www.avmaria.com/ - http://www.helixcode.com/