Re: [Firebird-website] A few thoughts about (new) site structure, and some good news...

[Pavel C. <pc...@ib...>]

Carlos H. Cantu napsal(a):
> PC> As the main page is the key, it needs extensive care and polishment. I
> PC> would like have it very very simple, with minimal text and more
> PC> graphics. Look at www.mozilla.org or www.opensuse.org for examples.
> 
> I partially agree with you. Yes, I love Mozilla site design, but they
> are not database guys, so I doubt we can be that simple :) Some years
> ago I was able to find who did the Mozilla design, maybe this info
> will be useful for us now.

The mozilla.org was given as an example of desired page layout, not
style. Its style is too "stylish" for our needs. I'd prefer something
lighter in colours (soft tones, more based on lines than coloured surfaces).

> PC> The main visual focus should be targeted on new users, i.e. downloads
> PC> (latest stable release) + everything you need to get started (single
> PC> page, more about that later). It should be based on graphics with
> PC> minimal text.
> 
> I agree about making "major interesting stuff" very visible for new
> users, but I would like to see a balance about clean/technical and
> simple design.

They're more synonyms than opposites, don't you think?

> [.... a lot of quote cutted here ....]
> 
> I will not comment all the items you replied, because many of them are
> related to design, and I think this need to be handled by outside
> people (professional web designers). They should suggest what colors to
> use, or if there should be button or link, etc etc. We need just to
> approve or reject ;)

Nope. Designers don't have ultimate freedom in design. It's like an
architecture. Architect can be free to express his imagination in his
design, but still must follow the basics, whether he designs school,
museum or business center, how it would be used, in what surrounding it
would be etc. So we should clearly articulate our goal (what building
we'd like get), how we'll use it and what impression we'd like make with
it (which dictates style), then designer would sketch some ideas that
they think would express it.

About buttons and links, it's related to site structure and content,
which is not something that designers should decide.

> PC> About the Firebird logo... I think that we should come with new one at
> PC> our tenth anniversary. The current one is not very good, we just use it
> PC> because we didn't have a better one and didn't replaced it long time ago
> PC> because this was used on various materials, t-shirts etc. But tenth
> PC> anniversary is a good occasion to make a switch. I think that we need
> PC> simple, distinctive one that uses only one colour. Maybe an isometric
> PC> bird head (in a circle?) with some graphical resemblance of fire (head
> PC> feathers)? It should be created from few slick lines instead of surfaces
> PC> like current one. PG and MySQL logos are good examples what I mean.
> 
> Not sure if we need new logo, or even if it would be good to change to
> a new one after so many people are used to the currently one. Maybe it
> just need a facelift. Anyway, again, I think it is not our business
> to tell how it should looks like. We need professionals for this job

The logo is bad, we always knew that. It's not completely awful (but
it's definitely not beautiful). The most important is that it's designed
poorly, so it's very hard to work with it (make appealing buttons,
banners, t-shirts, icons etc.). And believe me, it's almost impossible
to design an appealing web page with this logo, many people tried hard
many times and failed. Because the logo looks like amateur's attempt to
make a logo (which it is), it makes all layouts look amateurish.
Facelift would help either, as all attempts failed. You *may* come with
some mixed and rendered image that wouldn't look completely awful (like
firebirdnews button), but that will not fix the logo itself. Logo must
look good even in two-colour (i.e. printed) flat mode.

We use it only because we haven't anything better to replace it at the
time, and the sole reason we still use it is pure inertia. The 10th
anniversary is our best chance to overcome this inertia and get
something better we could live with to the very end. Otherwise we'll be
stuck with this nightmare to our 25th anniversary.

I agree that we need a professional logo designer for this task, however
we have to clearly specify its *parameters*. We definitely want a bird
in it. Flames would be a bonus (we doesn't have them now). Because we
need to use it on icons, it must look good when down-scaled. There are
many "phoenixes" in the wild used as logos, and only one really
appealing phoenix logo was for Phoenix Pictures movie production company
(see http://www.phoenixpictures.com/). All others look from awful to
mediocre, especially when portrayed as full birds, and that was in "full
size", down-sized it's even worse. The "just head" suggestion is based
on down-scale factor.

> About the downloads and docs, I'm not sure if creating subdomains are
> good idea. Yes, we have a lot of items, but the best thing to do would
> be to find a way to present this in a simple way to the user.
> Spreading the same thing (contextually speaking) in different places is
> one of the faults of the currently site, imho.

1. It's not currently spread around the site (see Download and
Documentation). Yes, there are sub menus, but without them it would be
even worse, just take a look at Firebird Documentation Index page and
imagine it would has it *all*, the same for Download when you'd look at
Engine downloads.

2. My proposal contains both approaches: "all in one place" (focus on
area and then drill down and down and down...) and "by context" (much
shorter navigation path). It would come for almost the same money. I've
just emphasized the preference for shortest path over central repository
as part of initial user experience, but both is still there.

> Maybe a good approach is to first list the "most
> interesting/desirable" things, that would satisfy 90% of the visitors,
> and a second level with extra stuff for people wanting more. Also,
> some of the docs can be combined into single "books" to reduce the
> numbers of available items.

We do prioritize by potential user interest, but there are simply too
many items so it would always look cluttered. The only one way how to
make it more clean is to "select by context" as part of pageflow, plus
provide the central repository for "librarians".

> PC> Hmm, that would be probably Helen and me (with feedback from other
> PC> project members), as we have the most experience with it and others have
> PC> more important things to do than spend hours and hours on this. However,
> PC> this task would go far beyond our "available time", so I have to check
> PC> first whether we could ever make time for it. So no promises, but we'll
> PC> do what we can.
> 
> Pavel, you and Helen already handles the site. If the "group" will be
> you and Helen, we don't need it at all, since you are already in the
> control, so what would change??? If you both weren't able to make the
> necessary changes in the past months, do you think you would be able
> to do it now?

1. I'm sure that Helen would gladly leave this task from hell to
somebody else. But almost nobody in the project is capable to handle the
content, as almost everybody has english as second language. Helen
handles our materials (release notes, announcements, PR, web page
content, everything) for us from the beginning, and she does an
excellent job. Only candidate(s) that could potentially handle it is
someone from Documentation project (Paul?), so ask him/them if they're
interested to take this responsibility. Good luck fishing.

2. I would gladly relieve myself and pass over the website control if
there would be anyone trustworthy for project admins to pass it to.
Anybody has a chance in past nine years to approach us and work his/her
way up on website and then eventually take full responsibility for it.
But guess what, nobody did. Nobody cared enough about our website to get
over pure clamouring about our "crappy work" and actually do something
with it. Everybody was just happy that somebody else handles it. What's
interesting is that all criticism to our work come only from outside the
project, and nobody from project members (i.e. people who actually work
on something in the project) was ever harsh on us about it.

So that's about the control, now about the "change". Yes, it would
change. We didn't made it one or two years ago because we knew it
wouldn't be shining. It would be a lot of work and at the end we would
probably have more usable site, but not more appealing. So we postponed
this task until we could actually do it better (i.e. with help from
professional graphic and web designer). Now it seems we would have it,
and the 10th anniversary is a good motivation to pass through this dark
valley.

> For now, I'm just throwing ideas to try to make this task to move
> forward. For sure there are capable people here that can help with the
> job, and I'm sure that you (with your currently experience) can be of
> a great help for them.

Ideas are good, but even the best ones are just that - ideas. They don't
magically materialize into something, someone has to make them in the
reality. We have enough good ideas for the eternity, but we're
short-handed. So the best way to "move this task forward" is to help
materialize them. There are plenty things that one can help with.

> I thank you and Helen for what you have done with the site. We needed
> a site, and you did it! Great! But now, we need to move on. You
> and Helen already have other important tasks in the project to care
> about.

Does it mean that you're volunteering to take the full responsibility
for the site? If you're not, there is no honourable way out for us.

best regards
Pavel Cisar