My understanding is that the whole site has just changed hosting. A
few
broken links are to be expected. Doesn't mean no one is minding the
store-- there is a lot to be done and a few things may be discovered as
we go along.
The primary business is always developing the system-- the website that
demonstrates and documents the system is ancillary. Kind of like
chewing Linus out because kernel.org has an outage or a broken link
when
changing hosting companies. 1) It isn't his main job (maybe not even a
little bit). 2) Nothing is perfect, especially when a major change is
underway. 3) How is someone going to know unless they are told exactly
what the problem is?
Developers are mostly using svn to update, I'd bet. So a broken
download link would only be apparent to others (mostly first-time
users,
as you say). Logs might mention it, but I don't know anyone that reads
them daily, do you? Automated log analyzers might help here to report
broken links that developers don't often see. So let's view this as an
opportunity to improve ancillary parts of the system, which are also
important in that newbies see them first.
On Fri, 2010-02-05 at 13:11 -0500, Ruth Hoffman wrote:
> Hi Jacques:
> That would be really nice, but I'm not even at that stage yet.
>
> My problem is with the download web page. There has been a major
> regression here and no one has said a word (until me, right now)
about
> it. That leads me to say: "Who is minding the store?". This is the
> second or third thing anyone interested in OFBiz sees...after the
splash
> page.
>
> It's a mess of "stuff" that no one in their "right" (or "left") mind
> would bother to spend too much time trying to decipher. Worst case: A
> prospective user leaves the site (with a slight hint suggesting that
> maybe the code is as disorganized as the web page) and downloads some
> other project's code. Bye-bye prospect. Wouldn't touch it with a
10 foot
> pole.
>
> Best case: A prospect user will end up downloading the trunk code,
> because, on this web page, all roads lead to a trunk download. Then,
> well how much fun is that going to be for a new user who doesn't
have a
> clue where to start? Bye-bye prospect. I tried, but code isn't stable
> enough for my tastes.
>
> And some wonder why there isn't more OFBiz activity out there.
Well, I
> for one am pretty sure I know why.
>
> Regards,
> Ruth
>
> Jacques Le Roux wrote:
> > Some ASF projects are very sucessful yet with strong
competition, for
> > instance ServiceMix vs Mule, Geronimo, vs..., etc.
> > We may mimic some of the ways they are doing things. For instance,
> > some time ago Chris Snow asked for a better SEO, I'm not quite sure
> > but I think it'a about exporting the wiki and make Google (and
other
> > SEs) knows about it...
> >
> > Jacques
> >
> > From: "Tim Ruppert" <tim.rupp...@hotwaxmedia.com>
> > Ruth, I'm sure there's some good that could come out of your
message -
> > so against my general nature of responding to this type of
attitude,
> > I'm going to try and help you phrase this in a way that will
help us
> > help infra to try to meet what you're looking for. Here's what I
see
> > when I go to the site(s):
> >
> > http://ci.apache.org/projects/ofbiz/snapshots/ - not downloading
and
> > testing anything - just looking at what I see:
> >
> > 1. The nightly trunk seems to be updated daily.
> > 2. The 9.04 builds seem to, for some reason not be being updated on
> > this page.
> > 3. There aren't many 4.0 releases being built.
> >
> > Then I go to here -
> > http://ci.apache.org/projects/ofbiz/archive/snapshots/ - and I
see a
> > slightly different picture:
> >
> > 1. The trunk builds aren't really archives they're simply
another copy
> > after it was moved over.
> > -- The archives are there though from when HotWax was managing it.
> > 2. The 9.04 builds seem to really be the ones that we'd want on
that
> > first page.
> >
> > Now, since I know that this release and the downloads are super
> > important to you, I'm really more interested in hearing you:
> >
> > 1. Lay out the way you'd like to see these pages work.
> > 2. Even show some examples of other projects that you _do_ like
> >
> > I hope this helps Ruth - as Adrian and Jacopo mentioned, what
you've
> > sent here is just a whine, not a helpful way for anyone to improve.
> > Put in the time and help us to make it more like you like and
I'm sure
> > you'll be more pleased with the result. Btw, all of those other
> > options are not the same type of community driven projects as
the ASF,
> > so it's hard to manage the same way. When commercial interests are
> > more intertwined with the project, there are definitely benefits
(as
> > well as drawbacks), so let's at least acknowledge those.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Ruppert
> >
> > On Feb 5, 2010, at 10:23 AM, Adrian Crum wrote:
> >
> >> If there is a problem with the OFBiz site, it would be helpful to
> >> know what it is. Remarks like this are not helpful.
> >>
> >> -Adrian
> >>
> >> Ruth Hoffman wrote:
> >>> This was meant as a sarcastic, "I can't believe this kind of
thing
> >>> keeps falling through the cracks", kind of remark. No wonder new
> >>> users shy away. I mean, no wonder new users run as fast as their
> >>> browsers will take them to OpenBravo, OpenERP, Magento...
> >>> Regards,
> >>> Ruth
> >>> ----------------------------------------------------
> >>> Find me on the web at http://www.myofbiz.com or Google keyword
> >>> "myofbiz"
> >>> ruth.hoff...@myofbiz.com
> >
> >
> >
--
Matt Warnock <mwarn...@ridgecrestherbals.com>
RidgeCrest Herbals, Inc.
