Updating arrow website for 1.0 release

[Neal Richardson <ne...@gmail.com>]

Hi all,
To accompany our 1.0 release, we should update our website to reflect where
the Arrow project currently stands and to orient it at a broader audience.
I've started a PR at https://github.com/apache/arrow-site/pull/63, and I'd
appreciate feedback and contributions. Feel free to push directly to my
branch, or just comment/make suggestions on the PR, whichever you prefer.

See the PR description for details of what I've been working on, as well as
a link to a preview version of the site. Among the things I could use input
on right now are the "use cases" and "getting started" guides--I'm pretty
familiar with some parts of the project but much less so with others, so if
there are examples and resources from your areas that should be made
visible, please add them.

As will surely be clear when you look at it, I am not a web designer
(though based on what I see on the site currently, none of you are either
;). I will try to get actual web design help before we go live, so please
don't be distracted (yet) by purely design choices that you don't like.

Thanks,
Neal

Re: Updating arrow website for 1.0 release

[Neal Richardson <ne...@gmail.com>]

Hi all,
Some updates and calls to action here. See the preview site here:
https://enpiar.com/arrow-site/ as well as the PR referenced in the previous
email.

All of the pages I'm planning to add exist in some form, though a few are
still bare. Some places I need input, especially from folks who work on
different parts of the project:

* https://enpiar.com/arrow-site/getting_started/ is intended to be a
top-level place where new-user guides are linked, the idea being that
someone interested in trying Arrow could go to arrow.apache.org, click
"getting started", and see how to download and start using the library in
whatever language. As you can see, the page is mostly empty: I've sketched
something for C++ and R so you can get the idea, but that's it so far. For
those of you who work on other languages in Arrow, could you please add the
appropriate content/links? If it turns out that this content already exists
somewhere else, great, just link to it. If you have other ideas entirely
for how to meet this "getting started" need, I'm open to them as well.
* Relatedly, now is a great time to review the docs for your parts of the
project as if you're new to Arrow and make sure it's clear what to do as a
user. I think a lot of our documentation is oriented toward Arrow
developers, which is useful but can be hard for newcomers to follow.
* https://enpiar.com/arrow-site/use_cases/ is a great opportunity for you
to show off places where you've used Arrow successfully, preferably with
code examples but not necessarily. I've put some there and have linked to
our blog posts but I know there are more out there.

General feedback and edits welcomed--feel free to commit directly to the
branch, or just comment on the PR.

On the visual design, I've been discussing with a designer and hope to get
something soon that will make the site look a bit more polished, so again,
please don't let purely aesthetic quirks distract you, though if you see
something off about the information/layout (e.g. something's missing or
misplaced in the menu bar), definitely call it out.

The goal is to have this ready by the end of next week so that we're able
to go live with the new site when the 1.0 release happens, so please do
take a look now and help make the site better.

Thanks,
Neal

On Wed, Jun 10, 2020 at 4:34 PM Neal Richardson <ne...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hi all,
> To accompany our 1.0 release, we should update our website to reflect
> where the Arrow project currently stands and to orient it at a broader
> audience. I've started a PR at
> https://github.com/apache/arrow-site/pull/63, and I'd appreciate feedback
> and contributions. Feel free to push directly to my branch, or just
> comment/make suggestions on the PR, whichever you prefer.
>
> See the PR description for details of what I've been working on, as well
> as a link to a preview version of the site. Among the things I could use
> input on right now are the "use cases" and "getting started" guides--I'm
> pretty familiar with some parts of the project but much less so with
> others, so if there are examples and resources from your areas that should
> be made visible, please add them.
>
> As will surely be clear when you look at it, I am not a web designer
> (though based on what I see on the site currently, none of you are either
> ;). I will try to get actual web design help before we go live, so please
> don't be distracted (yet) by purely design choices that you don't like.
>
> Thanks,
> Neal
>