Felix web site improvements (Was: Re: Current Roadmap)

["Richard S. Hall" <he...@ungoverned.org>]

J Aaron Farr wrote:
> Okay, I hear the message about the wiki. :-) I'm going to first review
> all the current documentation again and then I'll ping the mailing
> list before I make any changes.
>   

Following up on the topic of improving the web page...

I just finished moving some tutorials to the Felix wiki...the one thing 
that strikes me is that the Wiki pages with their formating look much 
better than our statically generated. Would it be difficult to simply 
make our generated web pages look largely identical to our wiki pages.

I, for one, like how the wiki formats code blocks (with syntax 
highlighting, etc.) and with more color. Our generated static pages look 
cute boring and mundane by comparison.

I think this could be the first step in updating our web page... Is it 
possible?

-> richard

> "Richard S. Hall" <he...@ungoverned.org> writes:
>
>   
>> Ultimately, I agree with everything you had to say about the web site,
>> except for the recommendation not to use a wiki. I don't have a love
>> affair with wikis and I agree that often they do not look good, but
>> the number one reason why I want to use a wiki is that I hate to do
>> documentation, but wikis make it reasonably easy for me to create
>> documentation or to make quick edits when I become aware of a
>> mistake. Thus, I find that I maintain wiki documentation more since it
>> has a lower barrier. I think this is important.
>>
>> For example, on another thread today someone mentioned something about
>> the 'Launching and Embedding Felix' document, so I quickly jumped over
>> to the wiki page and tried to add a few sentence to the page to make a
>> specific issue more clear. It is nice to have this ease of
>> editing/deployment.
>>
>> We just have to strive to have our statically generated pages not look
>> ugly...they perhaps need some work in this area now... :-)
>>
>> -> richard
>>
>> J Aaron Farr wrote:
>>     
>>> "Richard S. Hall" <he...@ungoverned.org> writes:
>>>
>>>   
>>>       
>>>> Matthias Luebken wrote:
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>>>> I suggest that you update the website felix.apache.org so that the
>>>>> ongoing improvements are reflected on the website. If you don't look
>>>>> into the Jira Issue Tracker, you don't have the impression that there
>>>>> is much progress at Felix.
>>>>>       
>>>>>           
>>>> Agreed.
>>>>
>>>>     
>>>>         
>>> I've mentioned more than once that I'd like to help on this front.
>>> The website is real weakness for Felix, IMHO.  Here are my thoughts on
>>> a good website:
>>>
>>>  - Very organized, quickly addresses the audience and helps them find
>>>    the rights spot (ie- who are you?  a developer of felix?  a user of
>>>    a plugin?  a user of some other software that happens to use felix?
>>>    interested in OSGI?...)
>>>
>>>  - VERSIONED documentation.  That is, the documents for Felix 0.8, 0.9
>>>    and 1.0 are all available and not erased.  This includes javadocs.
>>>
>>>  - Available with the downloads and if possible, in a printer friendly
>>>    format.
>>>
>>>  - Include more "how to use the software" documents than "how it works
>>>    internally" documents.  This means at least one decent tutorial.
>>>    Screencasts are even better.
>>>
>>> All of this is difficult, though possible, with a wiki.  I think
>>> wiki's are great for community created documentation but they must be
>>> well maintained, including pruning and re-organization.  A website
>>> should have a flow to it, and wiki's often don't.
>>>
>>> My personal preference is to author the documentation in some XML
>>> format and reserve the wiki for FAQ entries, quick whiteboarding of
>>> ideas, and soliciting community documentation.  Good articles from the
>>> wiki can then be pulled into the main, static site.
>>>
>>>
>>> That's my thoughts.  I'd like to contribute to Felix and the best way
>>> I could do that right now is with the website, but I'd like some
>>> feedback from the community before I either start hacking through the
>>> wiki or writing up huge amounts of docbook or xdoc.
>>>
>>> Thoughts?
>>>
>>>   
>>>       
>
>   

Re: Felix web site improvements (Was: Re: Current Roadmap)

["Richard S. Hall" <he...@ungoverned.org>]

On Jun 15, 2007, at 7:51 PM, Marcel Offermans wrote:

> On Jun 15, 2007, at 21:37 , Richard S. Hall wrote:
>
>> I, for one, like how the wiki formats code blocks (with syntax  
>> highlighting, etc.) and with more color. Our generated static  
>> pages look cute boring and mundane by comparison.
>>
>> I think this could be the first step in updating our web page...  
>> Is it possible?
>
> Yes, this is all done by using a CSS. The current generated site  
> uses a very simple CSS that has no styling for any of the more  
> advanced Confluence features yet. It's easy to add though.
>
> But this is not only a question of simply copying the Confluence  
> styling. I think we should seriously consider involving a graphics  
> designer to come up with a design for our site (this probably  
> includes things like a logo). Developers are notoriously bad at  
> stuff like that. :)

Agreed, but I don't think that this is an argument for doing nothing  
in the meantime...even a little facelift could help.

-> richard

Re: Felix web site improvements (Was: Re: Current Roadmap)

[Marcel Offermans <ma...@luminis.nl>]

On Jun 15, 2007, at 21:37 , Richard S. Hall wrote:

> I, for one, like how the wiki formats code blocks (with syntax  
> highlighting, etc.) and with more color. Our generated static pages  
> look cute boring and mundane by comparison.
>
> I think this could be the first step in updating our web page... Is  
> it possible?

Yes, this is all done by using a CSS. The current generated site uses  
a very simple CSS that has no styling for any of the more advanced  
Confluence features yet. It's easy to add though.

But this is not only a question of simply copying the Confluence  
styling. I think we should seriously consider involving a graphics  
designer to come up with a design for our site (this probably  
includes things like a logo). Developers are notoriously bad at stuff  
like that. :)

Greetings, Marcel