[haiku-web] Re: Drupal 5 + Design considerations
- From: "Jorge G. Mare" <kokitomare@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: haiku-web@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 11 Jun 2008 21:47:03 -0700
Hi Austin,
Austin Bales wrote:
Hi Neils & Jorge,
On Wed, Jun 11, 2008 at 2:52 PM, Niels Reedijk
<niels.reedijk@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:niels.reedijk@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
No need to apologize for offering an opinion. Many of the great things
about the Haiku project once started as someone voicing an opinion. I
should be careful how I word the next section. I've grown fond of the
current website theme, nevertheless, I understand where you are coming
from with the criticism you are voicing. I read through all your
comments, and I can relate to several of them.
I'm curious how your suggestions translate to the real world. The
current website needs to balance between an entrance portal for
newbies of Haiku, as well as an interface to the vast amount of data
on Haiku for non-devs, devs, users and geeks.
Exactly. Not only that, BUT, it needs to make an impression on the
user. It needs to say, "I'm more interesting than the average
JoePublicOS — and hey, I'm a good-sized project with a lot of momentum
and a strong, friendly (and growing) community".
From the POV of our current target audience, the existing website
design/theme is serving us very well. Compared to the old website, which
was a closed system to which only very few people had access to (2 or
3), the existing Drupal-based site is community driven and enjoys the
participation of many users (we have a user base of about 2K registered
users). There is definitely room for improvement is many areas, design
being one but not the only one, but the current site has definitely met
the goals that it was set for when it was designed.
I think the biggest thing that needs to change is the overwhelmingly
textual nature of the homepage — the 1st impression.
It's reminiscent of a news page like Digg — which might work for
long-time members of the community who need to know about the server
migration or scheduled downtime, but for outsiders or potential
members, it seems as though the project is catering towards people
already in the in-crowd. The visual hierarchy after the page needs to
be defined in such a way that you are actively presenting information
(hey curious dude, grab a VMWare image!, "Hey experienced developer,
look at what we are tackling now", "Hey, graphic designers, we need
posters!" )
The front page was designed to show as much activity as possible; that
was one of the things that the admins/devs requested at the time, so it
is the way it is by design.
As with everything, though, I suppose there is always room for change
and improvement. So, if you have any specific recommendations,
preferably in the form of a mockup, then we can certainly look into the
suitability and viability of implementing whatever changes you have in mind.
There is currently no designer working on our theme, which is a pity.
based on the suggestions you have offered, I would like to challenge
you to lead us that modern, bright look. Impress us! If you are up to
it, I can give you access to the source of the current theme, and I'll
try to set up an appropriate testing environment for you.
I'm not sure that I have the time right now, which is one of the
reasons I preemptively apologized.
But if you have a current copy of Shijin, I'd love to download it —
its always good to have a couple different things to work on.
@Jorge, GMail's wonderful new update conversation feature just showed
me your message. So i'll take a moment for it too. As I said, I don't
know that I have the time to commit, but that does not invalidate (nor
does it validate) my previous e-mail.
I am not in a position to validate or invalidate people's opinions. I
was just trying to say, in an as polite and diplomatic way as possible,
that unless you can come up with the resources to realize your ideas,
they will end up being just that, ideas. :)
Something important to the design process is constructing a problem
based on parameters of need and not creating limits too early. After
the design itself is developed, implementation (Drupalizing) becomes a
task list. Saying "we need to make a good looking Drupal site" is not
as effective as "We need to make a great site that happens to have its
content generated by Drupal".
I am somewhat familiar with the design process, and I can tell you that
we are not reluctant to do it the right/effective way. We are simply
faced with the reality of a volunteer-based open source project, where
we don't necessarily always have all the skill sets that we need to do
everything the ideal way.
Saying that "Drupalizing" a design is trivial (as you make it sound)
depends on whether you have the required skill set or not. We worked
together on Shijin, and you should know how much we struggled to come up
with the existing theme.
When Haiku's site gets mention on ALA for its great design, things
will be great — let's not stop until it happens.
That would be really nice. That being said, I also share Niels' concerns
as to how your wishes and very broad generalizations translate to the
real world and, I would add, and how they relate to the current
priorities of Haiku.
Cheers,
Koki
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