Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Nate I love that idea. I've been having a bit of a tough time in this area (south bay) drawing enough people to make a user group meeting worthwhile. I know Joel and a couple others tried to get something going. the python meetups in the area seem to be drawing a decent crowd. It seems that the Seattle and Boston area have a good following for Plone, we haven't reached that point. It seems Django is preferred around here.. (although I'm still finding work locally for Plone, but not as much) Maybe that's the ticket, having an install-fest and taking notes, figuring out what new users are struggling with while installing Plone. I had a taste of it at my on-site training session a couple weeks ago because these were designers tasked with converting the look & feel of their corporate site for the PloneCMS. Had a Flex guru and a couple other guys who in most instances really knew what they were doing looking at me as if I'd killed their puppy because they couldn't get Plone to install.I know there is no way to plan for every possible use-case. I really like this idea, a lot. Let me ask around and see if I can find a location for a user group meeting and then install-fest. I plan on helping anyone who asks at the WPD next week to install Plone. BTW, I've tried Joomla and WebGUI (lately) and I'm still very much enamored with Plone (someone jokingly accused me of suffering from Stockholm's Syndrome ;-P) and haven't found anything comparable for my clients needs. Plone is still painful though (although improving). It's not painful from the content creators standpoint or even the core dev's standpoint, it's those of us in between who are struggling. Best Regards, Donna M Snow, Principal C Squared Enterprises illuminating your path to Open Source http://www.csquaredtech.com On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 11:47 AM, Nate Aune wrote: > On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 2:16 PM, Chris Barnes wrote: > >> Donna Snow wrote: >> >>> Why not have an "install fest" of some sort to see just how easy it is >>> for a potential user? >>> >> >> This has got to be one of the best ideas I've seen. I'd probably even >> sign up as one of your guinea pig / test subjects. :-) > > > Linux folks do this all the time, usually at the end of their user group > meetings (and sometimes accompanied by GPG key signing). I think it would be > a great idea to host regular Plone install-fests, to help people get Plone > installed on their computer, and then have a "what next" sheet or webpage of > things to try once they have got it installed. > > Nate > > -- > Nate Aune - na...@jazkarta.com > http://nateaune.com (personal blog) > http://jazkarta.com (open source technology solutions) > http://twitter.com/natea (daily updates) > > > ___ > Evangelism mailing list > Evangelism@lists.plone.org > http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism > > ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 2:16 PM, Chris Barnes wrote: > Donna Snow wrote: > >> Why not have an "install fest" of some sort to see just how easy it is for >> a potential user? >> > > This has got to be one of the best ideas I've seen. I'd probably even sign > up as one of your guinea pig / test subjects. :-) Linux folks do this all the time, usually at the end of their user group meetings (and sometimes accompanied by GPG key signing). I think it would be a great idea to host regular Plone install-fests, to help people get Plone installed on their computer, and then have a "what next" sheet or webpage of things to try once they have got it installed. Nate -- Nate Aune - na...@jazkarta.com http://nateaune.com (personal blog) http://jazkarta.com (open source technology solutions) http://twitter.com/natea (daily updates) ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Donna Snow wrote: Why not have an "install fest" of some sort to see just how easy it is for a potential user? This has got to be one of the best ideas I've seen. I'd probably even sign up as one of your guinea pig / test subjects. :-) ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
This has been an interesting thread to follow, and I'll tell you why. At the Summit in Feb 2008, I sat in front of 50 plus people and essentially said, "Plone is too hard" I'm not lazy, and I'm not stupid (my associates are not stupid either :-)) That said it doesn't matter whether I'm leading a training class online or a class in person I get the same comment. "Plone documentation does not meet our needs", that is not to say that documentation "sucks" but that it just isn't enough. Hence the online classes and my drive to train more people to use Plone. I am the first one to say, "look the documentation team volunteer their time" and "this is an Open Source project and a volunteer effort". That calms them down a bit but it's still out there. I have attempted to help with documentation but have a large family to support so I haven't been as diligent as I'd hoped I could be.We have a great documentation team but Plone is HUGE and changing every day, so how do we cope with those changes and keep the user base? I, like Chris, want to continue to use Plone, I've been using it for a long time. My baby girl was 4 years old when I started with Plone, she is now 12. Plone is a regularly uttered word in this household (sometimes accompanied with a swear word or two) and I talk about/evangelize it all the time. Plone has huge, huge, huge potential and it has come a long way since I started using it. This is why I stick around. That and I truly feel that the Plone community is the strongest most supportive Open Source community. Let's get real though. We can't force Plone and it's image to be what we "envision" it to be. We have to deal with the reality. We have to step back and let someone who has never used Plone try to install it (without our guidance) I know even now when I install Plone on a new server I'm met with PIL issues and gcc (linux) but I know how to get around them (mainly due to poor planning on my part, but new users will not have everything setup ahead of time). I wouldn't presume that someone who hasn't "grown" with Plone would know how to handle those issues. I had 3 different OS's at my last session and I had to help each and every one of them install Plone. I have seen a huge push to make it easier for the end-user. I'm so proud of the community for working so hard to make Plone friendlier. It already rocks, my clients love it, once I get them past the hump. It's easy to "think" that something is "easy" when you work with it day in and day out. Why not have an "install fest" of some sort to see just how easy it is for a potential user? If it is and I'm proven wrong, then terrific, if not, then let's open up the conversation to making Plone easy to install.Calvin's recent blog post is a good start. Best Regards, Donna M Snow, Principal C Squared Enterprises illuminating your path to Open Source http://www.csquaredtech.com On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 8:59 AM, Dylan Jay wrote: > On 17/04/2009, at 1:24 AM, Chris Barnes wrote: > > If you want to evangelize people into using Plone - a good start might be >> to have tutorials at WPD (rather than have it be a pep rally). >> > > I think a lot of people have given tutorials. but from some of the groups I > talked to it was mostly to existing plone users which perhaps isn't > spreading the word as intended. > > We're going to be giving a talk to students at a university who might not > have heard of Plone. We're not exactly sure yet what we're going to say that > will make them give plone a try. but I think you made a good point that > Plone is a tool and new developers are perhaps our best market for Plone and > business decision makers don't care that much (or at least care more about > sales people and size of the company providing support). So we'll be saying > something along the line that Plone is a developers CMS, if you had one > arrow in your quiver then plone would be the one you want. As Martin put it, > when other CMS's say no, plone will often say yes. > What would really help is some extreme examples of plone versatility. > Anyone got some good stories? > > > > ___ > Evangelism mailing list > Evangelism@lists.plone.org > http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism > ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On 17/04/2009, at 1:24 AM, Chris Barnes wrote: If you want to evangelize people into using Plone - a good start might be to have tutorials at WPD (rather than have it be a pep rally). I think a lot of people have given tutorials. but from some of the groups I talked to it was mostly to existing plone users which perhaps isn't spreading the word as intended. We're going to be giving a talk to students at a university who might not have heard of Plone. We're not exactly sure yet what we're going to say that will make them give plone a try. but I think you made a good point that Plone is a tool and new developers are perhaps our best market for Plone and business decision makers don't care that much (or at least care more about sales people and size of the company providing support). So we'll be saying something along the line that Plone is a developers CMS, if you had one arrow in your quiver then plone would be the one you want. As Martin put it, when other CMS's say no, plone will often say yes. What would really help is some extreme examples of plone versatility. Anyone got some good stories? ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
This might be my last reply in this thread, since I think I've said enough. Dylan Jay wrote: Further to what chris said, I sat down to write a tutorial last year called "how to host a plone site in 20min for $20". As I started writing out the steps of what was required to go from a locally installed and configured plone site to a remotely hosted one I realised it just had too many steps and too many things to learn. So instead I wrote collective.hostout with the goal being that if you can at least add a recipe to our local buildout file then it will do everything else for you to deploy and host your site. It will be released soon in alpha. When it gets to beta, can you email me directly so I can try it out? So we are trying to improve the story but I don't think it's fair to say we're there yet. also it's an excellent point to sit and watch or at try to document exactly what you have to know to do things we in the community take for granted. Besides being a compadmin, I also have a strong interest in Education Theory (both as a part of my MA degree, as well as a homeschool dad). One of the most important aspects of education is knowing about, and adapting to Learning Styles. Cliff Notes' version - there are 3 primary learning styles: Visual (learn by seeing) ~40% of people fall into this category Auditory (learn by hearing) ~45% of people fall into this category Tactile (learn by touching) ~15% of people fall into this category Yes, everyone uses multiple senses - but they rely on one of these senses are their PRIMARY way of learning. http://www.chaminade.org/INSPIRE/learnstl.htm In context of this discussion, written documentation is really only useful for those who are primarily Auditory Learners (I could get into why reading is not a Visual Learner, but that is a major thread hijack - as if this isn't already). This is why a "RTFM" answer is only going to be useful to 45% of your audience (and that is assuming you actually give them the docs, rather than pointing to docs "somewhere out in space" as Joanna did). For the rest of us (I am primarily a visual learner) can only really use written documentation as a reference for things we have already learned previously. So why did I go down this rabbit trail? If you want to evangelize people into using Plone - a good start might be to have tutorials at WPD (rather than have it be a pep rally). -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes ch...@txbarnes.com (also MSN IM)Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Chris wasn't seeking help he was pointing out why Plone is less easy to install than we all assume it to be or at least claim it to be. I think it's a fair point. Just an example of what I'm talking about. After I got done reading (& responding) to this thread in the evangelism group, I dropped down to the plone.setup group to find this question: Chris Ellis wrote: > I've just installed the latest Plone on an Ubuntu server for my > school after trying out a number of wikis and being totally > frustrated by lack of documentation, bugs, obscure fixes etc. > > Now it seems I need to spend an hour or more of my life > doing something as simple as setting the correct timezone for > Plone. Why doesn't Zope just pickup the local server time? Why > can't there be a variable in Plone config (as in Moodle, Drupal > for eg) to choose default timezone? And no, an answer to Chris Ellis's question does not belong here. ;-) It seems somewhat disingenuous to claim "easy to install" as it's #2 "Top Question" with things like this. I would STRONGLY suggest removing that claim. At least for now. -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes ch...@txbarnes.com (also MSN IM)Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
JoAnna Springsteen wrote: Instead, one is left with a page that is available for the maintainers, but with nothing pointing to a site for the general public. > > You sure you're using Plone? Are you serious, or are you trying to be funny? > I think you'll find most Plone people > will disagree with you on this one. Plus this boils down to personal > aesthetics and taste. Some people love Plone's default look or love > the NuPlone skin that comes with Plone. Some don't care for it at all. > But technically speaking, both are ready out of the box for you to use > without any customization. Hmmm. I have no problem with the plone interface for the people in the group doing the content management. But the masses of people who would visit the public site wouldn't give 2 hoots to a holler what was used to create it. They want to see content ABOUT THE GROUP - and nothing else. Evidence - the site is currently being hosted by Google Apps. It's horrid from a "what tools are available" stand point. But if you visit any site using Google Apps, you'd never know it by looking at the site. Peruse the web. How many of them have the software used for the sites development splashed on the front page? Or the server software being used. Only the techno-geeks on the back end would care about that - and even among them, probably not so much. Plone - or any CMS - is a TOOL TO BE USED. The evangelism is to the people who use the tools. The general public couldn't care less. Nor should they. Having themes which can be imported in sounds good. I have not heard of ZopeSkel before - is it a part of the default install that runs automatically? If it's a 3rd party add-on, that may be nice - but it would seem to be misleading (at the least) to say that the product is "ready out of the box". I am re-quoting this because you didn't really answer the questions I asked above. There is a project called the Plone Out of the Box project. They have a ton of themes that are ready to go. Just pick one an install (yes they have directions on how to do this). Once it's installed you can tweak it as you wish. Again, this is all very well documented stuff. Documented WHERE? Plone Out of the Box sounds nice. This is the first I've heard of it (at least - as a solution this problem). Is it part of ZopeSkel? Once again, read the end user manual and some of the other documentation that's out there. Some of it you can probably skip over but there are docs in there that give you a high level overview that may fill in the gaps. Hrumph. RTFM. :-/ That's your idea of "evangelism?" It's good Dylan has been around to give good answers. Your reply would have been taken as anti-evangelism (ie. it would have run me off of the product, probably for good). Fyi - I have done WAY more than just RTFM. I even attended WPD (in Houston) last year. As I said in my reply to Dylan's post, if you can't evangelize me (someone who WANTS to use the product), I doubt you're going to convince anyone. ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
I'm answering Dylan first (before JoAnna) purposefully because he actually led me to some of my responses to her. Dylan Jay wrote: All in all, I'm not sure this discussion belongs on the Evangelism list. This list is for the evangelism team which has the strategic purpose of promoting Plone. While Chris may disagree with some of the things that are in this document, they are things we find to be true about Plone. If you are actually seeking solutions to real problems, Chris wasn't seeking help he was pointing out why Plone is less easy to install than we all assume it to be or at least claim it to be. That is mostly correct - although if help came about from it I wouldn't be the least little bit upset. ;-) I think it's a fair point. There are answers to everything out there on how to do everything with Plone and we as a community are trying to pull it all togeather and reduce the number of things you need to know to get to where you want to go but we're not there yet. An example is PloneOut... who would know from the standard Plone download page PloneOut is a good option if you want OOTB themes. I didn't know that and I've installed corporate intranets for thousands of employees. The real question here is, do we want to promote Plone as easy to install even though some don't think so and because we want it to become so... or should we pick something more complelling that's going make someone like chris hang in there and push through. Right - which is EXACTLY why I think this discussion belongs in the evangelism group. If you can't convince someone like me - a person desperately seeking a CMS solution who likes the promise of plone - then evangelism efforts for other people are pretty much going to be for naught. Case in point is the "web designers group" here at Texas A&M. Plone is "just another one of the cms options some folks are using" - and not the one that gets recommended the most here. How much more of an audience ripe for evangelism do you want? What was it that made you settle on Plone in the first place Chris? Another fair question. To be honest, I don't exactly remember. I know I started with looking at the afore mentioned "Texas A&M web designers group" and saw that Plone was among those listed. Of those, there weren't many that were free (and free is always a good thing for a non-profit group). I did basic google search and ended up here on this mailing lists (which I happen to read via gmane's newsserver). -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes ch...@txbarnes.com (also MSN IM)Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On 16/04/2009, at 4:58 AM, JoAnna Springsteen wrote: provide a more open forum for your thoughts. This list is highly specific- it exists to promote Plone. Based on your comments, it sounds like you'd be better off posing these questions in #plone. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to shoo you off of this list...I just think your needs could be better met elsewhere. Perhaps we need a plone complaints box :) Having worked in a computer support for 12 years prior to being a system admin, I often found it useful - make that *essential* - to stand back and WATCH as someone else attempts to install/use a system. The fact is, I don't know what I don't know. All I do know is that I sat in front of the screen after installing Plone and wondered "what now?". I'm just a Further to what chris said, I sat down to write a tutorial last year called "how to host a plone site in 20min for $20". As I started writing out the steps of what was required to go from a locally installed and configured plone site to a remotely hosted one I realised it just had too many steps and too many things to learn. So instead I wrote collective.hostout with the goal being that if you can at least add a recipe to our local buildout file then it will do everything else for you to deploy and host your site. It will be released soon in alpha. So we are trying to improve the story but I don't think it's fair to say we're there yet. also it's an excellent point to sit and watch or at try to document exactly what you have to know to do things we in the community take for granted. ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On 16/04/2009, at 4:58 AM, JoAnna Springsteen wrote: All in all, I'm not sure this discussion belongs on the Evangelism list. This list is for the evangelism team which has the strategic purpose of promoting Plone. While Chris may disagree with some of the things that are in this document, they are things we find to be true about Plone. If you are actually seeking solutions to real problems, Chris wasn't seeking help he was pointing out why Plone is less easy to install than we all assume it to be or at least claim it to be. I think it's a fair point. There are answers to everything out there on how to do everything with Plone and we as a community are trying to pull it all togeather and reduce the number of things you need to know to get to where you want to go but we're not there yet. An example is PloneOut... who would know from the standard Plone download page PloneOut is a good option if you want OOTB themes. I didn't know that and I've installed corporate intranets for thousands of employees. The real question here is, do we want to promote Plone as easy to install even though some don't think so and because we want it to become so... or should we pick something more complelling that's going make someone like chris hang in there and push through. What was it that made you settle on Plone in the first place Chris? ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
> Fair question. > A decent looking website for the public to see, w/ a separate interface for > the non-html-versed content managers to update information. This is NOT > what one gets after the 'default install'. > > Instead, one is left with a page that is available for the maintainers, but > with nothing pointing to a site for the general public. You sure you're using Plone? I think you'll find most Plone people will disagree with you on this one. Plus this boils down to personal aesthetics and taste. Some people love Plone's default look or love the NuPlone skin that comes with Plone. Some don't care for it at all. But technically speaking, both are ready out of the box for you to use without any customization. > Proxy? I'm not sure I am exactly sure what a proxy is, or why I would want > to use one. You know, like Apache, nginx, IIS, and such. Sure, it's not the typical way you'd think of using Apache but it's pretty well documented on how to get it working with Plone. > Maybe it doesn't and I just don't understand then. Maybe what I need to > learn is zope? (which, btw, is still beyond my pro-bono time constraints). I too ran a Plone site for a volunteer organization for several years. Never touched a lick of Python and only a tiny bit of the ZMI. No hardcore Zope. Plone 3 has just about everything you need available through the web. > Having themes which can be imported in sounds good. I have not heard of > ZopeSkel before - is it a part of the default install that runs > automatically? If it's a 3rd party add-on, that may be nice - but it would > seem to be misleading (at the least) to say that the product is "ready out > of the box". There is a project called the Plone Out of the Box project. They have a ton of themes that are ready to go. Just pick one an install (yes they have directions on how to do this). Once it's installed you can tweak it as you wish. Again, this is all very well documented stuff. > The fact is, I don't know what I don't know. All I do know is that I sat > in front of the screen after installing Plone and wondered "what now?". > I'm just a frustrated user. I have neither a vested interest in "making > plone #1" nor "pushing something else". I simply want to find a product > that fits my needs. If it's Plone - and I was lead to believe it was - then > great. If it's not, then my search to find out what will fit my needs > continues. Once again, read the end user manual and some of the other documentation that's out there. Some of it you can probably skip over but there are docs in there that give you a high level overview that may fill in the gaps. All in all, I'm not sure this discussion belongs on the Evangelism list. This list is for the evangelism team which has the strategic purpose of promoting Plone. While Chris may disagree with some of the things that are in this document, they are things we find to be true about Plone. If you are actually seeking solutions to real problems, the Plone Users or #plone are better places, Chris. These resources will help alleviate some of the frustration you are feeling and provide a more open forum for your thoughts. This list is highly specific- it exists to promote Plone. Based on your comments, it sounds like you'd be better off posing these questions in #plone. Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to shoo you off of this list...I just think your needs could be better met elsewhere. JoAnna. ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Calvin Hendryx-Parker wrote: What constitutes up and running for you? The default install will leave you with a site you can place up live behind a proxy. Fair question. A decent looking website for the public to see, w/ a separate interface for the non-html-versed content managers to update information. This is NOT what one gets after the 'default install'. Instead, one is left with a page that is available for the maintainers, but with nothing pointing to a site for the general public. Proxy? I'm not sure I am exactly sure what a proxy is, or why I would want to use one. Why does deploying a Plone site mean you need to learn Python? There are many people out there creating great looking sites and they don't know a lick of Python to to it. They are using a combination of third party add-ons (which are easy to install with buildout) and a theme product that you can generate from ZopeSkel. Maybe it doesn't and I just don't understand then. Maybe what I need to learn is zope? (which, btw, is still beyond my pro-bono time constraints). Having themes which can be imported in sounds good. I have not heard of ZopeSkel before - is it a part of the default install that runs automatically? If it's a 3rd party add-on, that may be nice - but it would seem to be misleading (at the least) to say that the product is "ready out of the box". What part of our install story is lacking in your mind so we an address it. I think it would be helpful feedback to get from you. Having worked in a computer support for 12 years prior to being a system admin, I often found it useful - make that *essential* - to stand back and WATCH as someone else attempts to install/use a system. The fact is, I don't know what I don't know. All I do know is that I sat in front of the screen after installing Plone and wondered "what now?". I'm just a frustrated user. I have neither a vested interest in "making plone #1" nor "pushing something else". I simply want to find a product that fits my needs. If it's Plone - and I was lead to believe it was - then great. If it's not, then my search to find out what will fit my needs continues. -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes ch...@txbarnes.com (also MSN IM)Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Apr 15, 2009, at 10:45 AM, Chris Barnes wrote: Alexander Limi wrote: The thing is, Plone *is* easy to install, and you get a very sophisticated setup even when using the base installers. It's just a bit challenging to develop for at the moment, something that we're working hard on fixing. SAP is hard to install *and* hard to develop for. Or maybe just expensive, depending on how you look at it. ;) I hate to sound like Bill Clinton, but it depends on what you mean by "install". As I said in my previous note, yes, the program itself installs with relative ease. But few people would consider that to be the end of the installation. The "real installation" isn't finished until there is a working product up and running. What constitutes up and running for you? The default install will leave you with a site you can place up live behind a proxy. In my case, I have a small non-profit group where I run a ubuntu server to host their domain (mailman, apache website, vBulletin, etc). The people in the group are the ones that need to be able to maintain the content of the website, but they are not web literate. Otoh, just because I can do system admin, and can do *some* webpage stuff, it doesn't mean I'm versed in python (or really any other programming language). I do this pro-bono in my spare time. Which means I really don't have the inclination to learn an entire language. Why does deploying a Plone site mean you need to learn Python? There are many people out there creating great looking sites and they don't know a lick of Python to to it. They are using a combination of third party add-ons (which are easy to install with buildout) and a theme product that you can generate from ZopeSkel. What part of our install story is lacking in your mind so we an address it. I think it would be helpful feedback to get from you. Cheers, Cal -- S i x F e e t U p , I n c . | http://www.sixfeetup.com Phone: +1 (317) 861-5948 x602 cal...@sixfeetup.com ANNOUNCING the first Plone Immersive Training Experience | Sept. 10-11-12, 2009 http://sixfeetup.com/immerse ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Alexander Limi wrote: The thing is, Plone *is* easy to install, and you get a very sophisticated setup even when using the base installers. It's just a bit challenging to develop for at the moment, something that we're working hard on fixing. SAP is hard to install *and* hard to develop for. Or maybe just expensive, depending on how you look at it. ;) I hate to sound like Bill Clinton, but it depends on what you mean by "install". As I said in my previous note, yes, the program itself installs with relative ease. But few people would consider that to be the end of the installation. The "real installation" isn't finished until there is a working product up and running. In my case, I have a small non-profit group where I run a ubuntu server to host their domain (mailman, apache website, vBulletin, etc). The people in the group are the ones that need to be able to maintain the content of the website, but they are not web literate. Otoh, just because I can do system admin, and can do *some* webpage stuff, it doesn't mean I'm versed in python (or really any other programming language). I do this pro-bono in my spare time. Which means I really don't have the inclination to learn an entire language. So I still need a CMS system for this group. I am convinced that it is "the right choice". But from the looks of what I have experienced, it doesn't seem that Plone is the right choice for me. What I don't know is if *any* CMS system will do what I'm looking for... -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes ch...@txbarnes.com (also MSN IM)Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Apr 10, 2009, at 2:20 PM, Jan Ulrich Hasecke wrote: Hi, great work. I am just trying to translate the 15 questions into German and discovered the following. GHP: Please make sure to update the translation with the recent changes as this is still a work in progress. There are repeats in the first two section, concerning the fact that CMS/Plone enable people to create, maintain etc. content only using a browser. GHP: The whole document is meant to be a reference document, and not something you read from start to finish, therefore it is ok for content to repeat. Then in this text and on the website you write that the Plone Foundation is a "501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization". 501 in my memory is a Levis jeans, ;-) I mean outside the USA nobody knows what 501 means. I would skip it from the text and make perhaps a footnote GHP: I have updated the text based on Alex's recommendations. Thank you, Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker CEO -- S i x F e e t U p , I n c . | http://www.sixfeetup.com Phone: +1 (317) 861-5948 x601 gabrie...@sixfeetup.com ANNOUNCING the first Plone Immersive Training Experience | Sept. 10-11-12, 2009 http://www.sixfeetup.com/immerse ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Apr 11, 2009, at 7:26 AM, Alexander Limi wrote: #4: "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with investments in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their Plone site in their existing infrastructure for more robust scalability, clustering and failover." This implies that the ZODB doesn't scale, and that you choose Oracle to do so — neither of which are true. ;) I would drop the scalability argument, the main reason why people use it is the "existing infrastructure/standards" and tool support for failover/backup/clustering. So, something like: "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with investments in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their Plone site in their existing infrastructure to be able to make use of familiar tools, clustering and failover solutions." GHP: I have updated the doct accordingly. #5: Maybe mention something like "As an example, plone.org is one of the few web sites in the world that has a 9 out of 10 PageRank in Google, the same as major sites like those of IBM and Microsoft." GHP: I have added this to the "Top 15 Questions" doct too. ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Mon, 13 Apr 2009 20:23:14 +0200, Chris Barnes wrote: In fact, this is my main complaint with Plone in general. It might very well be easy to use for the end users - but to run the entire system requires a person who is well versed in Zope/python. To run it — I'd say no. To customize it, absolutely. There's "use" as in "end user", and "use" as in develop for / customize. We are very much aware that the current approach where Plone straddles multiple large pieces of infrastructure (Zope 2, Zope 3 and the CMF), is not ideal. The other option would be to dump our current user base and restart development in pure Zope 3 (or something else), which was an option that was deemed too risky. I'm a computer administrator by profession - and *I* haven't been able to get a Plone site up and running yet. What does that say for the "average user"? Iow, the kb needed to run & maintain a Plone system is WAY under stated. With the latest advancements in configuration and setup tools (buildout being among the major changes here), the core part of this problem will be in much better shape than it was a year ago. The main problem as I see it at the moment is that not all documentation is current, but the team is working on updating the documentation to the current state of the art. I have to be honest - I am close to giving up on Plone. That's sad to hear. Let us know if there are specific things we can help with. There are lots of things we want to make better about Plone — the good news is that the team is acutely aware of these issues, and everyone is pulling in the same direction to get them fixed. It just takes a bit of time, as everything does in a project with a large installed user base, where you need to care about upgrades and compatibility. -- Alexander Limi · http://limi.net ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On 14/04/2009, at 4:23 AM, Chris Barnes wrote: Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker wrote: Please provide feedback by Monday, April 13th so we can move forward with the formatting of the document as a nice Quick Ref Card for integration in conference kits. Just remember, you did ask... "#2 - What is Plone? - FINAL Plone is a powerful and flexible, enterprise-level content management solution that is easy to install, get started with, and use." I take exception with this. It gives the impression that running a complete Plone system is "easy to use and get started with" for *everyone*. This is especially in light of the fact that #1 above it says "without requiring a high level of technical skill or tools other than a web browser". #6 - geez, I'm not sure what to say about this. Sure, it's easy to download and the installation goes fairly straight forward. THEN WHAT? In fact, this is my main complaint with Plone in general. It might very well be easy to use for the end users - but to run the entire system requires a person who is well versed in Zope/python. I'm a computer administrator by profession - and *I* haven't been able to get a Plone site up and running yet. What does that say for the "average user"? Iow, the kb needed to run & maintain a Plone system is WAY under stated. I very much agree with you Chirs, and I install Plone for a living. We'd all really like Plone to be easy to configure into a working system and are working hard to make that happen but... a) it's not currently the case b) it's not one of plones competitive advantages c) it sets a dangerously high expectation that can lead to disappointment and resentment. IMHO we're much better selling plone on it's enterprise grade power. The fact thats its both a web CMS and document management system. And set the expectation that Plone being Enterprise grade combined with consultants produces a fantastic fit to your business needs. No one expects SAP to be easy to install do they? --- Dylan Jay, Plone Solutions Manager www.pretaweb.com tel:+61299552830 mob:+61421477460 skype:dylan_jay ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker wrote: Please provide feedback by Monday, April 13th so we can move forward with the formatting of the document as a nice Quick Ref Card for integration in conference kits. Just remember, you did ask... "#2 - What is Plone? - FINAL Plone is a powerful and flexible, enterprise-level content management solution that is easy to install, get started with, and use." I take exception with this. It gives the impression that running a complete Plone system is "easy to use and get started with" for *everyone*. This is especially in light of the fact that #1 above it says "without requiring a high level of technical skill or tools other than a web browser". #6 - geez, I'm not sure what to say about this. Sure, it's easy to download and the installation goes fairly straight forward. THEN WHAT? In fact, this is my main complaint with Plone in general. It might very well be easy to use for the end users - but to run the entire system requires a person who is well versed in Zope/python. I'm a computer administrator by profession - and *I* haven't been able to get a Plone site up and running yet. What does that say for the "average user"? Iow, the kb needed to run & maintain a Plone system is WAY under stated. I have to be honest - I am close to giving up on Plone. -- Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes chris-bar...@tamu.eduYahoo IM: chrisnbarnes Computer Systems Manager MSN IM: ch...@txbarnes.com Department of Physics ph: 979-845-7801 Texas A&M University fax: 979-845-2590 ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Thank you so much for working on this document. I missed last Friday's Plone Tune-up, I had a training session and I didn't hear about Thursday's "session" until the day after ( I would have attended). I realize that was a technical (email) issue and unavoidable. Everything looks fantastic and I'm looking forward to using this at any events where I'll be helping to host a booth. Great work evangelism team! Best Regards, Donna M Snow, Principal C Squared Enterprises illuminating your path to Open Source http://www.csquaredtech.com On Sat, Apr 11, 2009 at 4:26 AM, Alexander Limi wrote: > On Fri, 10 Apr 2009 05:38:26 +0200, Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker < > gabrie...@sixfeetup.com> wrote: > > Thanks to all of you who participated in this effort, we now have a final >> draft ready for the "Top 15 Questions About Plone" at: >> >> http://www.openplans.org/projects/plone-marketing/top-ten-questions-about-plone >> > > Thanks for doing this! > > Comments/suggestions below: > > #4: "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with > investments in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their > Plone site in their existing infrastructure for more robust scalability, > clustering and failover." > > This implies that the ZODB doesn't scale, and that you choose Oracle to do > so — neither of which are true. ;) > > I would drop the scalability argument, the main reason why people use it is > the "existing infrastructure/standards" and tool support for > failover/backup/clustering. So, something like: > > "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with investments > in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their Plone site > in their existing infrastructure to be able to make use of familiar tools, > clustering and failover solutions." > > Not perfect, but you get the idea, and I'm sure you can make it better. :) > > > > #5: Maybe mention something like "As an example, plone.org is one of the > few web sites in the world that has a 9 out of 10 PageRank in Google, the > same as major sites like those of IBM and Microsoft." > > It's a nice soundbite that people remember, and it's true. :) > > > The document looks great! > > > -- > Alexander Limi · http://limi.net > > > ___ > Evangelism mailing list > Evangelism@lists.plone.org > http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism > ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
On Fri, 10 Apr 2009 05:38:26 +0200, Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker wrote: Thanks to all of you who participated in this effort, we now have a final draft ready for the "Top 15 Questions About Plone" at: http://www.openplans.org/projects/plone-marketing/top-ten-questions-about-plone Thanks for doing this! Comments/suggestions below: #4: "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with investments in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their Plone site in their existing infrastructure for more robust scalability, clustering and failover." This implies that the ZODB doesn't scale, and that you choose Oracle to do so — neither of which are true. ;) I would drop the scalability argument, the main reason why people use it is the "existing infrastructure/standards" and tool support for failover/backup/clustering. So, something like: "A free Plone add-on, RelStorage, also allows enterprises with investments in Oracle, MySQL and PostgreSQL to store the data driving their Plone site in their existing infrastructure to be able to make use of familiar tools, clustering and failover solutions." Not perfect, but you get the idea, and I'm sure you can make it better. :) #5: Maybe mention something like "As an example, plone.org is one of the few web sites in the world that has a 9 out of 10 PageRank in Google, the same as major sites like those of IBM and Microsoft." It's a nice soundbite that people remember, and it's true. :) The document looks great! -- Alexander Limi · http://limi.net ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
Re: [Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Hi, great work. I am just trying to translate the 15 questions into German and discovered the following. There are repeats in the first two section, concerning the fact that CMS/Plone enable people to create, maintain etc. content only using a browser. Then in this text and on the website you write that the Plone Foundation is a "501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization". 501 in my memory is a Levis jeans, ;-) I mean outside the USA nobody knows what 501 means. I would skip it from the text and make perhaps a footnote. Only the first impressions. Maybe more to come. juh ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Am Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:28:19 + schrieb Jens W. Klein: > Am Thu, 09 Apr 2009 23:38:26 -0400 schrieb Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker: > >> Hi All! >> >> Thanks to all of you who participated in this effort, we now have a >> final draft ready for the "Top 15 Questions About Plone" at: >> http://www.openplans.org/projects/plone-marketing/top-ten-questions- > about-plone >> >> Please provide feedback by Monday, April 13th so we can move forward >> with the formatting of the document as a nice Quick Ref Card for >> integration in conference kits. >> >> > Thanks for the excellent work! > > Just a little comment on > > #10 - How do I edit/upload my content using Plone? - FINAL > [...]Additional interfaces (Flash Uploader, FTP and WebDAV) are > available[...] > > I would remove "Flash Uploader" here. ZIP-Upload works, but our > FlashUpload requires Flash 8. Its broken since Flash 9. Lovely, author > of the original flash in flashupload stopped supporting it, they wrote > their own solution which is not published. Also there are better > opensource projects around waiting for integration: I'd like to see an > integration of http://swfupload.org/ - but afaik there isnt any. > eeeks, posted to fast (remark to self: first do research on new evolutions, then write) meanwhile theres a RC with swfupload, ok, keep it. :-) Jens -- Jens W. Klein - Klein & Partner KEG - BlueDynamics Alliance ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
[Evangelism] Re: "Top 15 Questions..." Final Draft
Am Thu, 09 Apr 2009 23:38:26 -0400 schrieb Gabrielle Hendryx-Parker: > Hi All! > > Thanks to all of you who participated in this effort, we now have a > final draft ready for the "Top 15 Questions About Plone" at: > http://www.openplans.org/projects/plone-marketing/top-ten-questions- about-plone > > Please provide feedback by Monday, April 13th so we can move forward > with the formatting of the document as a nice Quick Ref Card for > integration in conference kits. > Thanks for the excellent work! Just a little comment on #10 - How do I edit/upload my content using Plone? - FINAL [...]Additional interfaces (Flash Uploader, FTP and WebDAV) are available[...] I would remove "Flash Uploader" here. ZIP-Upload works, but our FlashUpload requires Flash 8. Its broken since Flash 9. Lovely, author of the original flash in flashupload stopped supporting it, they wrote their own solution which is not published. Also there are better opensource projects around waiting for integration: I'd like to see an integration of http://swfupload.org/ - but afaik there isnt any. regards Jens -- Jens W. Klein - Klein & Partner KEG - BlueDynamics Alliance ___ Evangelism mailing list Evangelism@lists.plone.org http://lists.plone.org/mailman/listinfo/evangelism
