Hello, I think I should explain the mockup I made in more detail:
http://www.math.umd.edu/~dcarrera/openoffice/website/HomePage/tryout01.html I think that people are focusing on totally the wrong things, like colours, and not enough on the things I really changed. First, let me start by laying out objectives. What do we want from the website? I'll divide the main tasks into 3 groups, one is specific, two are broad: (a) Download the software. (b) Community/people (for lack of a better term). I'm referring to people wanting to learn how to use the software, or become part of the community, or the like. Specifically, I'm referring to mailing lists, forums, documentation, and all the native-lang communities. Since I don't have a good name for this group, I'll just call it "(b)". (c) About OOo. Another broad category, but less broad than (b). I'm referring to decision makers, journalists, and people wanting to learn about the organization, about open source, etc. We start by figuring out what our priorities for the home page are. I layed them out like this: 1. Download the software. 2. Everything in category (b). 3. Everything in category (c). Now, before discussing the specific changes, I want to list some general points about usability. * Don't rely on fore-knowledge of the project's internal structure. * A logical organization is good for usability. * Don't ask "are grahics good?", that's asking the wrong question. Graphics are neither inherently good, or inherently bad. A graphic that draws the user away from the important content is bad. A grpahic that draws the user towards important content is good. * Same for colours. Colour is not inherently good or bad. But you have to pay attention to how you use it, so that the user can access the important things. Some general tips: - Draw the user towards the most important things. - Contrast. A significant portion of the population struggle with contrast. - Daltonics. Don't mix red and green unless it's in a way that does not carry part of the information you need to convey. A good test is to see the page in grayscale and see if you lose anything important. * Short term memmory. When you read a sentence, your brain stores each word in short term memmory, and assembles them into a coherent meaning when you reach a period. Words are parsed similarly. So are colours, boxes, and everything that the human brain identifies as distinct objects. Short term memmory is finite, and actually quite small. It is a precious resource, and should be spared as much as possible. The basic ways to do that are: - Reduce the number of elements on the page. - Rely more on the user's already existing long-term memmory (e.g. use familiar terms, instead of terms which the user has to figure out). With these things in mind, let's move on to the mockup. Please open a window with the current OOo site, and another with the mockup: http://www.math.umd.edu/~dcarrera/openoffice/website/HomePage/tryout01.html 1) The first thing I did was give the download link the most prominent position on the page. This was done through a box. I made the text for the "unstable" link shorter, so as to focus more on the stable link. I added an image on the right, but inside the box, to make the box as a whole more significant. Since an image had to be chosen, I figured that showing our logo was a reasonable choice. The exact image is not crucial to this effect, as long as it has some measure of relevance. 2) I then made the Native-lang section more dominant, but not more than the download. I added an explanation (the only time I did this on this site) so emphasize "community". I also added an icon that re-inforces the community aspect while adding prominence to it. 3) Now take a look at the left panel. I removed several links that were redundant, and rephrased others to make the clearer: - To Do's should be inside the Contributing page. How that's done is not at issue, but one way would be to replace the "Programming" link. - Donating Funds are also in the Contributing page. - Likewise I removed Project Guidelines and Licenses. They should be elsewhere on the site. - I changed "Bugs & Issues" by "Report a bug", which is more comprehensible. - I replaced "Articles, Blogs and Newsletter" by "What's new at OOo". This phrase is short enough to fit on one line, which helps give it only as much prominence as other links. - I added a "For the Press" link. This link could link to the licenses for example (though the licenses should also be behind the About OOo link). - I replaced "About us" by "About OpenOffice.org" to help reinforce the name, and also so that the "what's new at OOo" make more sense. 4) I removed the login link above. This causes endless confusion at the users list (CPH already described this). 5) Now let's move on to the right panel. Most changes are in the "community resources" box. I removed Product Information (should be behind Press), screenshots, awards, roadmap and statistics. Of those, the only one that is really a "community resource" is statistics, which is hardly front-page news. The others can be put elsewhere (the About OOo and For the Press links are good places). The only thing I kept was "OOoForum", which I replaced by "Web Forums", hence relying more on long term memmory instead of STM. With the newly oppened space I migrated the "Mailing list" link from the left panel to "community resouces", where it really belongs. And I added a Documentation link. Since the links were all self explanatory, I removed the right sub-column with the explanations, reducing the number of items on the page. 6) Now move down to Upcomming Events. First, I rewrote all the dates from the American format to a format that everyone who knows some English will understand. This format also takes up less space, incidentally. I also removed the location, but I admit that this is a fuzzy point. We need to decide if there's a real reason to have that information on the *front* page. Maybe if we just included the country... 7) Next box down. I replaced "The Press" by "OOo on the Press", which is clearer, and easier to distinguish from "For the Press". I also removed all the dates. 8) Yes, I did change the colours. But there's nothing special about the particular shades of blue I chose. All I was looking for was to: - Reduce the total number of distinct colours. - Improve contrast. - Not divert attention away from the download box. Any colour scheme that achieves thos goals would be just as good. 9) Alexandro pointed out that the Mission Statement is not front page news either. I agree with him, that should be in the About OOo page and/or the For the Press page. I hope that this email helps people focus on the things I'm really trying to propose, which centre on usability, and not on the colours and graphics, which is not my area anyways. Cheers, -- Daniel Carrera | I know everything, I just can't remember Join OOoAuthors today! | it all at once. http://www.oooauthors.org | :-) --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
