Re: My first stab at the site

[Joakim Ziegler <joakim ximian com>]

On Fri, Mar 16, 2001 at 09:37:17AM -0500, digitect wrote:

> I'm curious what people envision about the functionality of News. (Is
> the Gnotices name going to stick?) I like the idea of having a user
> account for the site, but am less excited about customization.

> Unless we think the site is going to be pulverized with content, I don't
> have a problem with seeing all news items. For example, I currently
> browse all the SlashDot and NewsForge stories every day. (I just don't
> read many comments, which I see as a separate activity.) If we're really
> worried about paring down the content (which I don't think we are), why
> not just make a few different news pages for each major audience--Press,
> "User" and Developer? Honestly, if a developer wants to see traffic on a
> specific topic, he'll join a list. And browsing through a few
> un-interesting headlines is hardly a burden.

Gnotices (I like the name, I think it would be good to keep it, it's actually
one of the better gno-prefixed names) is supposed to be a site for
disseminating GNOME news, and as an optional feature, it lets people comment
on the news, and discuss it. Also, an important feature is the RDF feed from
the site.


> Regarding comments viewing, amending some slight customization to our
> current "it's-too-big-for-one-page" method might be helpful. Perhaps
> three moderation levels would be flexible enough while keeping it
> simple:
>   0  Not posted from an account
>   1  Posted from an account
>  -1  Abuse, as moderated by the site administrator. This last level
> would be useful for the removal of inappropriate comments without having
> to go into the database and doing it manually (as just recently
> happened). But we're still not talking about the user-moderation
> overhead that SlashDot has. (Picking moderators, delivering
> moderator-specific pages, etc.)

> As far as interface customization, do we really need this? While I turn
> off my SlashDot graphics because of their scary design and speed, I
> don't think Gnotices/GNOME needs to have this kind of flexibility. The
> whole "Themed Portal" concept at SourceForge is a complete waste of code
> IMO. Just give me a well designed site with clear navigation and fast
> graphics. With a dynamic masthead graphic/color scheme, that should keep
> things fresh enough until the next re-design.

I think a minimum of forum type functionality will be enough. Slash is
definitely overkill, and even Squishdot is a little complex for what we
typically will want to do. 

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