Re: [archhurd-devel] Website change ideas

[Alexander Preisinger <alexander.preisinger@gmail.com>]

>  * Design change (not sure what just yet, give me time to think about
> it and try a few things)
>     - Should include possible ad-space, maybe a square advert in the header.
>     - Current design doesn't have any indication on *getting* Arch
> Hurd, users have to turn to the wiki. This must be remedied.
>  * Replace news with a blog:
>     - Pros:
>         * Allows comments - community involvement ftw
>         * Allows categories - could have a non-news category, such
> as mini tutorials, for example. Not sure whether this is a good idea
>         * Allows pages - thus, the main website could be entirely
> under the control of a CMS, making adding and changing content
> trivial.
>     - Cons:
>         * Would introduce another control panel (ie: the blog one)
> and so remove power from dev.archhurd.org
>  * Slim down forum until it grows to a point where we need more
> boards - this would make the forum look busier and so perhaps invite
> more activity:
>     - Could merge "Hurd Discussion" and "Off Topic" into one
> "General Discussion" board
>     - Could merge "Community Contributions" and "Artwork and
> Screenshots" into "Community Showcase"

+1, especially the blog. I like to read blogs :), and the comments,
which shows what the community thinks about the news and how involved
the community is in a project like archhurd. The germany archlinux
site ( http://www.archlinux.de ), includes a link to the bbs and a bot
creates the same frontpage news as a bbs topic (, I think).

I also like the Idea about a „Community Showcase“, sounds fun, but
could also prevent people from a Contribution. I am a programmer
(mostly python, but learning C now), and I am not very interested in
artwork and also some people could be confused about the merge.

About „Getting Arch“, I think a the current state It should link to
the Wiki site and from the Wiki site to the download site, because
without a documentation a successfull hurd install is very unlikely.

And also merging „Hurd Discussion“ and „Offtopic“ can result in only
having an offtopic one.

>  * Make a matching layout for lists.archhurd.org and projects.archhurd.org
>  * Move from using gitweb to cgit for projects.archhurd.org, perhaps?
>  * Financing:
>     - Perhaps add a donators list - the existence of such a list on
> archlinux.org played a role (albeit small) in my decision to donate.
Never heard about a donartors list, but sounds interesting.

>     - Add Flattr to try and get smaller donations which will,
> hopefully, add up to big (or even reasonable) donations.

I wanted to donate too, but I don't have a CC and I alread read
something about Flattr, so +1. Well, I have to check If I can donate
with Flattr.

>     - Advertising on archhurd.org (unless anyone is greatly opposed)
•_•

>  * Community:
>     - Facebook page (I've started on this, will finish it later)
>     - identi.ca group (do we have one? I can't remember)
>     - Push news updates to identi.ca and the facebook group, perhaps
> also to the IRC channel
>

I don't use any of them, but +1. It will spread the word about hurd
and especially arch hurd.

> Does anyone have any more ideas, or objections or suggestions for my
> ideas? I think the website is one of the things holding Arch Hurd back
> a bit (in addition to the slow and sparse updates in the past few
> months), so I want to make it much nicer and, above all, make people
> want to investigate further.
>

Since I started my holiday work I don't really have much time but I
while think about one or two Ideas.

yay