[Site] Improving the main site

[Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org>]

Hi,

we discussed last week at the hackathon a little bit on how to improve
our site. With the move to git and the new system it should be easier.

Looking at the main site, there is a lot of stuff there which we
probably shouldn't have.

News/Releases

The "news" section is more or less just listing releases, so we can move
this to a separate "releases" page. We can then decide whether we can
come up with real news like once or twice a month. For example we could
have mentioned adaptTo there etc.

History

The history section is nice for us, but I guess everyone new to Sling
does not find any value in this. So we should move this to a separate
history page, and maybe add a little bit there. Or we add this simply as
the oldest entries of the news page and avoid having a new page no one
really looks at.

Use Cases

Again I'm not sure about the value for new users. So rather removing it
or moving it to a use cases page.

References

I think we confuse people with listing all this different parts on the
front page. So removing it and moving it to a references page might be
better.

This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to improve
the introduction "Sling in 100 words"

Regards
Carsten
-- 
Carsten Ziegeler
Adobe Research Switzerland
cziegeler@apache.org

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com>]

On Mon, Oct 2, 2017 at 4:50 PM, Robert Munteanu <ro...@apache.org> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Sat, 2017-09-30 at 12:09 +0200, Carsten Ziegeler wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> we discussed last week at the hackathon a little bit on how to
>> improve
>> our site. With the move to git and the new system it should be
>> easier.
>>
>> Looking at the main site, there is a lot of stuff there which we
>> probably shouldn't have.
>>
>> News/Releases
>>
>> The "news" section is more or less just listing releases, so we can
>> move
>> this to a separate "releases" page. We can then decide whether we can
>> come up with real news like once or twice a month. For example we
>> could
>> have mentioned adaptTo there etc.
>
> +1, not sure how relevant this is for site visitors.
>
>>
>> History
>>
>> The history section is nice for us, but I guess everyone new to Sling
>> does not find any value in this. So we should move this to a separate
>> history page, and maybe add a little bit there. Or we add this simply
>> as
>> the oldest entries of the news page and avoid having a new page no
>> one
>> really looks at.
>
> +1 for moving out of the main page. People curious about history will
> look for it.
>>
>> Use Cases
>>
>> Again I'm not sure about the value for new users. So rather removing
>> it
>> or moving it to a use cases page.
>
> I'd say drop it completely and link to a page of applications built on
> top of Sling - commercial and open source. Rather than tell our users
> what they can do, let's show them :-)
>
> Maybe also include the Sling samples here.
>
>>
>> References
>>
>> I think we confuse people with listing all this different parts on
>> the
>> front page. So removing it and moving it to a references page might
>> be
>> better.
>
> +1
>
>>
>> This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to
>> improve
>> the introduction "Sling in 100 words"
>
> +1. Let's just find a volunteer :-)
>
> Robert
>
>>
>> Regards
>> Carsten

+1

regards,

Karl

-- 
Karl Pauls
karlpauls@gmail.com

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Robert Munteanu <ro...@apache.org>]

Hi,

On Sat, 2017-09-30 at 12:09 +0200, Carsten Ziegeler wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> we discussed last week at the hackathon a little bit on how to
> improve
> our site. With the move to git and the new system it should be
> easier.
> 
> Looking at the main site, there is a lot of stuff there which we
> probably shouldn't have.
> 
> News/Releases
> 
> The "news" section is more or less just listing releases, so we can
> move
> this to a separate "releases" page. We can then decide whether we can
> come up with real news like once or twice a month. For example we
> could
> have mentioned adaptTo there etc.

+1, not sure how relevant this is for site visitors.

> 
> History
> 
> The history section is nice for us, but I guess everyone new to Sling
> does not find any value in this. So we should move this to a separate
> history page, and maybe add a little bit there. Or we add this simply
> as
> the oldest entries of the news page and avoid having a new page no
> one
> really looks at.

+1 for moving out of the main page. People curious about history will
look for it.
> 
> Use Cases
> 
> Again I'm not sure about the value for new users. So rather removing
> it
> or moving it to a use cases page.

I'd say drop it completely and link to a page of applications built on
top of Sling - commercial and open source. Rather than tell our users
what they can do, let's show them :-)

Maybe also include the Sling samples here.

> 
> References
> 
> I think we confuse people with listing all this different parts on
> the
> front page. So removing it and moving it to a references page might
> be
> better.

+1

> 
> This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to
> improve
> the introduction "Sling in 100 words"

+1. Let's just find a volunteer :-)

Robert

> 
> Regards
> Carsten

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 11:51 AM, Bertrand Delacretaz
<bd...@apache.org> wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 8:24 AM, Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org> wrote:
>> ...I think the missing parts are:
>> - update to Sling in 100 words
>> - adding references to applications build with Sling..
>
> I have reworked http://sling.apache.org/ as per (my understanding of)
> our discussions here.
>
> I like the fact that it's short and to the point now but we can still
> tweak of course.

+1

regards,

Karl

> -Bertrand



-- 
Karl Pauls
karlpauls@gmail.com

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Bertrand Delacretaz <bd...@apache.org>]

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 8:24 AM, Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org> wrote:
> ...I think the missing parts are:
> - update to Sling in 100 words
> - adding references to applications build with Sling..

I have reworked http://sling.apache.org/ as per (my understanding of)
our discussions here.

I like the fact that it's short and to the point now but we can still
tweak of course.

-Bertrand

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Konrad Windszus <ko...@gmx.de>]

Good idea, done with commit 46a4438.

> On 6. Oct 2017, at 14:35, Stefan Seifert <ss...@pro-vision.de> wrote:
> 
> 
>> - all releases are now on a separate releases page
>> 
>> - news contains no module releases anymore, only major releases. We
>> added links to adaptTo conference
> 
> looks good - maybe add a link to the releases page on the homepage below the news section, because people might got used the last years to find them directly on the home page?
> 
> stefan

RE: [Site] Improving the main site

[Stefan Seifert <ss...@pro-vision.de>]

>- all releases are now on a separate releases page
>
>- news contains no module releases anymore, only major releases. We
>added links to adaptTo conference

looks good - maybe add a link to the releases page on the homepage below the news section, because people might got used the last years to find them directly on the home page?

stefan

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org>]

Hi,

I did some changes to our main site:

- all releases are now on a separate releases page

- news contains no module releases anymore, only major releases. We
added links to adaptTo conference

- history: I moved this to the news site. This avoids another page

- use cases: dropped

- references: merged into the links site where we already had these
references

Our main page now looks much cleaner :)

I think the missing parts are:

- update to Sling in 100 words

- adding references to applications build with Sling

If someone wants to give those a try please feel free

Regards

Carsten


-- 
Carsten Ziegeler
Adobe Research Switzerland
cziegeler@apache.org

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Oliver Lietz <ap...@oliverlietz.de>]

On Wednesday 04 October 2017 16:18:56 Carsten Ziegeler wrote:
> I think "headless" puts us into a specific bucket. You can build
> anything with Sling, being it headless or not. AEM is definitely not
> headless :) I think it doesn't make sense for a framework to use that
> characterisation, otherwise a lot of frameworks are headless (in the
> sense of not having a UI)

+1

O.

> Carsten
> 
> 
> Bertrand Delacretaz wrote
> 
> > Hi Karl,
> > 
> > On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 3:44 PM, Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> ...3. It is more than 100 words :-)..
> > 
> > I don't think that's important, "short" is good enough IMO.
> > 
> > Ruben suggests "headless" which I like (and it's a good excuse for
> > many of our examples UIs ;-)
> > 
> > So two suggestions from my side, inline:
> >> Apache Sling is a framework for RESTful web-applications based on an
> >> extensible content tree.
> > 
> > "headless framework"
> > 
> >> In a nutshell, Sling maps URL requests to resources based on the
> >> request's path, extension and selectors. Using convention over
> >> configuration, request processing itself is based on scripts and
> >> servlets selected based on a given resource. Together, this enables
> >> meaningful URLs and resource driven request processing while the
> >> modular nature of Sling allows for specialized server instances that
> >> include only what is needed.
> >> 
> >> Sling serves as basis for a variety of applications - ranging from
> >> blogging engines all the way to industrial strength content management
> >> systems.
> > 
> > ...where its robustness and simplicity shine
> > 
> > -Bertrand

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org>]

I think "headless" puts us into a specific bucket. You can build
anything with Sling, being it headless or not. AEM is definitely not
headless :) I think it doesn't make sense for a framework to use that
characterisation, otherwise a lot of frameworks are headless (in the
sense of not having a UI)

Carsten


Bertrand Delacretaz wrote
> Hi Karl,
> 
> On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 3:44 PM, Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> ...3. It is more than 100 words :-)..
> 
> I don't think that's important, "short" is good enough IMO.
> 
> Ruben suggests "headless" which I like (and it's a good excuse for
> many of our examples UIs ;-)
> 
> So two suggestions from my side, inline:
> 
>> Apache Sling is a framework for RESTful web-applications based on an
>> extensible content tree.
> 
> "headless framework"
> 
>>
>> In a nutshell, Sling maps URL requests to resources based on the
>> request's path, extension and selectors. Using convention over
>> configuration, request processing itself is based on scripts and
>> servlets selected based on a given resource. Together, this enables
>> meaningful URLs and resource driven request processing while the
>> modular nature of Sling allows for specialized server instances that
>> include only what is needed.
>>
>> Sling serves as basis for a variety of applications - ranging from
>> blogging engines all the way to industrial strength content management
>> systems.
> 
> ...where its robustness and simplicity shine
> 
> -Bertrand
> 
-- 
Carsten Ziegeler
Adobe Research Switzerland
cziegeler@apache.org

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Bertrand Delacretaz <bd...@apache.org>]

Hi Karl,

On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 3:44 PM, Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com> wrote:
> ...3. It is more than 100 words :-)..

I don't think that's important, "short" is good enough IMO.

Ruben suggests "headless" which I like (and it's a good excuse for
many of our examples UIs ;-)

So two suggestions from my side, inline:

> Apache Sling is a framework for RESTful web-applications based on an
> extensible content tree.

"headless framework"

>
> In a nutshell, Sling maps URL requests to resources based on the
> request's path, extension and selectors. Using convention over
> configuration, request processing itself is based on scripts and
> servlets selected based on a given resource. Together, this enables
> meaningful URLs and resource driven request processing while the
> modular nature of Sling allows for specialized server instances that
> include only what is needed.
>
> Sling serves as basis for a variety of applications - ranging from
> blogging engines all the way to industrial strength content management
> systems.

...where its robustness and simplicity shine

-Bertrand

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Oliver Lietz <ap...@oliverlietz.de>]

On Wednesday 04 October 2017 15:44:12 Karl Pauls wrote:
[...]
> Apache Sling is a framework for RESTful web-applications based on an
> extensible content tree.
> 
> In a nutshell, Sling maps URL requests to resources based on the
> request's path, extension and selectors. Using convention over
> configuration, request processing itself is based on scripts and
> servlets selected based on a given resource. Together, this enables
> meaningful URLs and resource driven request processing while the
> modular nature of Sling allows for specialized server instances that
> include only what is needed.
> 
> Sling serves as basis for a variety of applications - ranging from
> blogging engines all the way to industrial strength content management
> systems.

+1 (s/industrial strength/enterprise/)

O.

> regards,
> 
> Karl

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Karl Pauls <ka...@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 8:34 AM, Bertrand Delacretaz
<bd...@apache.org> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 12:09 PM, Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org> wrote:
>> ...This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to improve
>> the introduction "Sling in 100 words"..
>
> Here's my draft, feel free to tweak:
>
> Apache Sling is a REST-based Web framework based on a hierarchical
> content tree. It maps incoming URLs to content resources in a simple
> and powerful way, based on the request's path, extension and optional
> selectors, fostering clean and meaningful URLs. Request processing is
> based on dynamically loaded scripts or Java servlets, with convention
> over configuration making it very simple to start with generic
> processing and gradually refine it during development. The very
> modular nature of Sling means you can replace most of its
> functionality by your own variants as needed, and easily build
> specialized server instances with just what you need.
>
> Sling is used as the basis for some industrial strength content
> management systems, where the simplicity and robustness of its core
> shine.
>
> -Bertrand

I think this is a very good start. I do have a couple of remarks namely,

1. I think it is important that we mention that request processing is
based on the resource. To me, these two things: resource selection via
the url and selecting the processing based on the resource is what
makes Sling special.

2. I'm not in love with: REST-_based_ Web framework _based_ on a
hierarchical content tree. I think we should avoid the repetition of _
based_, make it clear that we are talking about applications developed
_with_ Sling have those properties (rather than Sling itself) , and
maybe somehow make this a little more catchy (and mention that the
tree is extensible).

3. It is more than 100 words :-)

Overall, I'm happy to go with it unchanged - i.e., feel free to ignore
whatever I just said. However, I did try to quickly wordsmith it a
little (and shorten it to be a "wc -w" == 100) - maybe there is
something useful in there:

Apache Sling is a framework for RESTful web-applications based on an
extensible content tree.

In a nutshell, Sling maps URL requests to resources based on the
request's path, extension and selectors. Using convention over
configuration, request processing itself is based on scripts and
servlets selected based on a given resource. Together, this enables
meaningful URLs and resource driven request processing while the
modular nature of Sling allows for specialized server instances that
include only what is needed.

Sling serves as basis for a variety of applications - ranging from
blogging engines all the way to industrial strength content management
systems.

regards,

Karl

-- 
Karl Pauls
karlpauls@gmail.com

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Robert Munteanu <ro...@apache.org>]

On Wed, 2017-10-04 at 08:34 +0200, Bertrand Delacretaz wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 12:09 PM, Carsten Ziegeler <cziegeler@apache.
> org> wrote:
> > ...This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to
> > improve
> > the introduction "Sling in 100 words"..
> 
> Here's my draft, feel free to tweak:
> 
> Apache Sling is a REST-based Web framework based on a hierarchical
> content tree. It maps incoming URLs to content resources in a simple
> and powerful way, based on the request's path, extension and optional
> selectors, fostering clean and meaningful URLs. Request processing is
> based on dynamically loaded scripts or Java servlets, with convention
> over configuration making it very simple to start with generic
> processing and gradually refine it during development. The very
> modular nature of Sling means you can replace most of its
> functionality by your own variants as needed, and easily build
> specialized server instances with just what you need.
> 
> Sling is used as the basis for some industrial strength content
> management systems, where the simplicity and robustness of its core
> shine.

Looks good to me.

Robert

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org>]

+1


Stefan Seifert wrote
> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Bertrand Delacretaz [mailto:bdelacretaz@apache.org]
>> Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2017 8:34 AM
>> To: dev
>> Subject: Re: [Site] Improving the main site
>>
>> Here's my draft, feel free to tweak:
>>
>> Apache Sling is a REST-based Web framework based on a hierarchical
>> content tree. It maps incoming URLs to content resources in a simple
>> and powerful way, based on the request's path, extension and optional
>> selectors, fostering clean and meaningful URLs. Request processing is
>> based on dynamically loaded scripts or Java servlets, with convention
>> over configuration making it very simple to start with generic
>> processing and gradually refine it during development. The very
>> modular nature of Sling means you can replace most of its
>> functionality by your own variants as needed, and easily build
>> specialized server instances with just what you need.
>>
>> Sling is used as the basis for some industrial strength content
>> management systems, where the simplicity and robustness of its core
>> shine.
> 
> like it!
> 
> stefan
> 
-- 
Carsten Ziegeler
Adobe Research Switzerland
cziegeler@apache.org

RE: [Site] Improving the main site

[Stefan Seifert <ss...@pro-vision.de>]

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Bertrand Delacretaz [mailto:bdelacretaz@apache.org]
>Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2017 8:34 AM
>To: dev
>Subject: Re: [Site] Improving the main site
>
>Here's my draft, feel free to tweak:
>
>Apache Sling is a REST-based Web framework based on a hierarchical
>content tree. It maps incoming URLs to content resources in a simple
>and powerful way, based on the request's path, extension and optional
>selectors, fostering clean and meaningful URLs. Request processing is
>based on dynamically loaded scripts or Java servlets, with convention
>over configuration making it very simple to start with generic
>processing and gradually refine it during development. The very
>modular nature of Sling means you can replace most of its
>functionality by your own variants as needed, and easily build
>specialized server instances with just what you need.
>
>Sling is used as the basis for some industrial strength content
>management systems, where the simplicity and robustness of its core
>shine.

like it!

stefan

Re: [Site] Improving the main site

[Bertrand Delacretaz <bd...@apache.org>]

Hi,

On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 12:09 PM, Carsten Ziegeler <cz...@apache.org> wrote:
> ...This would keep our main page fairly short and we just need to improve
> the introduction "Sling in 100 words"..

Here's my draft, feel free to tweak:

Apache Sling is a REST-based Web framework based on a hierarchical
content tree. It maps incoming URLs to content resources in a simple
and powerful way, based on the request's path, extension and optional
selectors, fostering clean and meaningful URLs. Request processing is
based on dynamically loaded scripts or Java servlets, with convention
over configuration making it very simple to start with generic
processing and gradually refine it during development. The very
modular nature of Sling means you can replace most of its
functionality by your own variants as needed, and easily build
specialized server instances with just what you need.

Sling is used as the basis for some industrial strength content
management systems, where the simplicity and robustness of its core
shine.

-Bertrand