Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
On Sun, 22 Jan 2006 22:43:45 -0600, Terry Hancock <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > For me, the most important function of the python.org site > is as a quick-reference to deeper documentation that I > actually need in the process of writing Python code. docs.python.org is probably the site most useful to you, then. --amk -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
Roy Smith wrote: > For the most part, I agree with Terry; I want a site that gives me the info > I need without any fluff getting in the way. But, at the same time, I > realize that there is a need for marketing to suits. I'll leave layout to others, but content-wise, I don't think this is very difficult. A "Python is"-blurb with current buzzwords, (I guess that could be autogenerated by some bot that extracts buzz- words from the net ;) a few quotes (we have that) and links to success stories. Both to http://www.pythonology.org/success and to O'Reilly's both publications: http://python.oreilly.com/news/python_success_stories.pdf and http://python.oreilly.com/news/PythonSS.pdf Adorn the O'Reilly links with images depicting the covers of those booklets. (I'm sure it's fairly simple to extract the covers from the PDF's to .png files.) In general, I think it's a good idea to avoid producing content that's already out there. Use the resources on the internet. Sure, it means that we're not quite in control, but I'm sure it's much less work to maintain some links than to create a lot of content and keep that up-to-date. It also adds credibility to show that we have such a wide support from third parties such as the publishing houses and companies like Google etc. I'm pretty sure that a lot of what's in the web site today could be in the wiki, such as the topic guides and SIG pages. For documentation, I'd put a prominent link to Amazon's page for "Books > Subjects > Computers & Internet > Programming > Languages & Tools > Python" besides the standard documentation and a wiki page were the community can maintain links to on-line tutorials etc. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
Terry Hancock wrote: > On 22 Jan 2006 14:18:18 -0800 > *I* don't want a "slick brochure" for Python as the website. > > For all the commercial value in Python (and there is plenty, > I am sure), it's not Java, and I don't want it to be. I'm > cool with suits loving it too, but I don't want to have to > put on a suit to play. Python is an absolutely top-notch > free software language for free software developers, not > least of which are the amateurs, who program for love, not > money. > > I hesitate to express this opinion, because I don't want to > seem intolerant (and I'm going to use whatever site there > is), but if the suits can get their own place and leave me > alone, I'm for that. ;-) Cool!... I think thats exactly what we are after also. Only the home page plus a handful of interior pages (in the about section) will be targeted at businessmesn, developers and users. The rest of the site will stay pretty much untouched (albeit cleaning up the html, ensuring accessibility also adding consistent navigation to aid usability) > > For me, the most important function of the python.org site > is as a quick-reference to deeper documentation that I > actually need in the process of writing Python code. > All of these functions will still be in place. > I don't really know if I'm the "market" for this site. I'm > already sold on Python, after all, I just want something > useful that I can use to stay up-to-date, and to find other > Python resources if they move, get created, or if I just > lose track of the URLs. > you shouldn't have a problem at all then. Developers are the primary marketing for the site. The home page is the only one that needs to server multiple purposes and we're trying to balance those multiple purposes between developers who come to the python site for the first time and business people who come to python for the first time. The homepage isn't very often used by people who are already developing or using python, apart from to view news and to use the navigation to find deeper content. What I'd like is to add a 'developer homepage' that includes lots of rss feeds from python related sites, cheeseshop announcements, etc, etc. Then the majority of developers can bookmark a really useful page. Tim -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
Terry Hancock <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > For all the commercial value in Python (and there is plenty, > I am sure), it's not Java, and I don't want it to be. I'm > cool with suits loving it too, but I don't want to have to > put on a suit to play. Python is an absolutely top-notch > free software language for free software developers, not > least of which are the amateurs, who program for love, not > money. I didn't have anything to do with this prototype (in fact, I didn't even know it was being built until it was announced here recently), but I was involved with some of the early discussions 3-4 years back about how to promote Python within the corporate world. For the most part, I agree with Terry; I want a site that gives me the info I need without any fluff getting in the way. But, at the same time, I realize that there is a need for marketing to suits. I've been working with Python for something like 8 years (and, depending on how you count, 3 or 4 employers). I've seen how difficult it is to get it adopted in the corporate world. Like it or not, suits run the business world, and they make the business decisions. It's one thing for me to decide to write something in Python, but to actually get something integrated into the build system, get the QA guys on board, get legal to endorse its use, etc, involves getting a lot of suits involved. That's life in the corporate world. I may think Java sucks, and you may think Java sucks, but like it or not, it's accepted in the corporate world. If you want to get paid to write Python code, it's in your best interests to get Python accepted by the suits the same way Java is now. If that means www.python.org looks like something that came out of a corporate PR department, that's a pretty small price to pay. > > I hesitate to express this opinion, because I don't want to > seem intolerant (and I'm going to use whatever site there > is), but if the suits can get their own place and leave me > alone, I'm for that. ;-) > > For me, the most important function of the python.org site > is as a quick-reference to deeper documentation that I > actually need in the process of writing Python code. > > I don't really know if I'm the "market" for this site. I'm > already sold on Python, after all, I just want something > useful that I can use to stay up-to-date, and to find other > Python resources if they move, get created, or if I just > lose track of the URLs. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
Aahz wrote: > The idea is that we make www.python.org even more minimal than the > current beta.python.org; it becomes a portal similar in simplicity to > google.com (with a bit more explanation). It would lead off to > subdomains such as business.python.org, tech.python.org, help.python.org, > and so on. That would make it easy for people to bookmark a specific > section that was appropriate for their needs. > +1 IMO, this is the best suggestion i've heard yet. it seems like such a simple, clean, minimalist yet fully functional solution. and it seems to elegantly solve the suits vs developer issue. for those who like fancy images on the home page, you could now have an image that clearly links to each subdomain. you could even have a search on the home page that searches all the python subdomains. bryan -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Re: Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
On 22 Jan 2006 14:18:18 -0800 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Aahz) wrote: > The idea is that we make www.python.org even more minimal > than the current beta.python.org; it becomes a portal > similar in simplicity to google.com (with a bit more > explanation). It would lead off to subdomains such as > business.python.org, tech.python.org, help.python.org, and > so on. That would make it easy for people to bookmark a > specific section that was appropriate for their needs. This is a good idea, particularly if the links are domains as you give in your example, and thus not treated like "deep links" (which too often get broken). The truth is, the comment about being offended by scrollbars made me want to vomit! There are few things more annoying to me than web sites that are designed like Powerpoint presentations. My preference is to condense information onto fewer pages, with more complete information. My expectation of web pages is that they are more like "documents" than like "slides". This is particularly relevant if you are on a slow or high-latency web connection (dialup or satellite, respectively). For me, having the document in my browser puts *me* in control of viewing it, instead of making me click repeatedly through someone else's "clever" idea of what I should read. *I* don't want a "slick brochure" for Python as the website. For all the commercial value in Python (and there is plenty, I am sure), it's not Java, and I don't want it to be. I'm cool with suits loving it too, but I don't want to have to put on a suit to play. Python is an absolutely top-notch free software language for free software developers, not least of which are the amateurs, who program for love, not money. I hesitate to express this opinion, because I don't want to seem intolerant (and I'm going to use whatever site there is), but if the suits can get their own place and leave me alone, I'm for that. ;-) For me, the most important function of the python.org site is as a quick-reference to deeper documentation that I actually need in the process of writing Python code. I don't really know if I'm the "market" for this site. I'm already sold on Python, after all, I just want something useful that I can use to stay up-to-date, and to find other Python resources if they move, get created, or if I just lose track of the URLs. -- Terry Hancock ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) Anansi Spaceworks http://www.AnansiSpaceworks.com -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
Who is www.python.org for? (was Re: New Python.org website ?)
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, JW <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >Agreed. The main page should be like a slick book cover. It should grab >you and leave you wanting more. I think the beta page does that pretty >well. > > [...] > >Of course, I'm a minimalist. I understand techy types want the details, >but I don't doubt the details will be no more than two clicks away. Which sort of gets to the heart of the argument: who is www.python.org for? I suggested one alternative a long time ago, but we never had the bandwidth to do the necessary refactor: The idea is that we make www.python.org even more minimal than the current beta.python.org; it becomes a portal similar in simplicity to google.com (with a bit more explanation). It would lead off to subdomains such as business.python.org, tech.python.org, help.python.org, and so on. That would make it easy for people to bookmark a specific section that was appropriate for their needs. If we can't do that, I think we should overall slant the focus toward the primary users of python.org: people wanting to learn Python and people doing real work in using Python. (I have mostly been keeping my mouth shut during this discussion because I'm one of the [EMAIL PROTECTED] team and therefore should be contibuting labor to make this happen -- but I haven't had the bandwidth.) -- Aahz ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) <*> http://www.pythoncraft.com/ "19. A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is not worth knowing." --Alan Perlis -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
