IA for zope.org (was Re: [ZWeb] A forest of Zope communities)

[seb bacon]

Hi everyone,

I've added Paul's links to the resources page on the Reorg Wiki.  I've
also uploaded my report.  I'd hoped to refine it but I figured it's
better to get it out there in a raw state then wait two more weeks until
I can manage to put more time into it.

  http://www.zope.org/Resources/ZOST/ZopeOrgReorg/AssetsAndResources

I'm also of the opinion that an information architecture (and a
functional specification) need to be considered next.  First, it might
be a good idea to distill the survey findings into a small number of
statements and goals.  I'd like to do this following any discussion that
my survey throws up.

The way I'd like to push the project on after this is to take a
kicking-other-people-up-the-backside role.  Lots of you have said you
are willing to commit time to this project, now I'm going to start
holding you all to it :-)

I'm going to maintain the Wiki mentioned above and act as a
community-side dictator.  No-one's raised any objections to this before,
so I'm assuming everyone's OK with that.

So now I'm asking people to stick their necks out and volunteer to steer
the next parts, information architecture and functional spec.  I'd like
to see some written artifacts explaining the goals and rationale for any
decisions, so that the community can discuss them with clarity.

Paul has taken a lead on IA, would anyone else from the community like
to collaborate with him?  I know MaxM expressed an interest in helping
out on this part of the project (sorry max ;-).  Any takers?

We also need a volunteer for the functional spec.  This would cover
ratings systems, better catalogs, etc.  It should consider what's
realistically achievable within a timescale of a few months.  My feeling
is that although we'd all like a lot of new functions, we should
concentrate on one or two things, and put the rest of our energy into
getting the content into order.

The one thing I'd like to dicatate at this stage is to hold off on
graphic design issues for a while.  Otherwise things may get a bit
noisy. 

Is that OK?

seb


On Fri, 2002-03-01 at 12:39, Paul Everitt wrote:
> 
> On a different, but related note...
> 
> When Seb's survey comes out, one of the biggest things it will point to 
> is the need for, as Alan Runyan keeps saying, an information 
> architecture (IA) for zope.org.  People simply can't find anything, and 
> thus they use the search (which also is a sore point).
> 
> Over the last couple of weeks, I jotted down some questions that the 
> structure of zope.org should answer.  Things like "Who uses Zope?", 
> "What is Zope?", etc.
> 
> I've implemented some of this with a new home page for zope.org.  The 
> home page introduces two ideas that, if we made decisions on them, would 
> greatly (IMO) improve the organization of the site:
> 
> 1) Sections.  We need to find some way to organize the enormous blob of 
> content into separate piles.  It will matter less if the separate piles 
> are disorganized.  At least people will intuitively find the right piles.
> 
> A section is simply a page that provides links and visibility on some 
> stuff pertaining to that section.  The section might or might not be a 
> placeful organizational concept (meaning, it might not be a folder with 
> all items in the section under that folder).
> 
> However, a section *should* have section owners that do the gardening. 
> This would be a key aspect to making the section idea work.
> 
> 2) Site map.  IMO, a site map would really force us to put the 100 or so 
> most important items into a coherent place.
> 
> Seb's survey also seems to emphasize that there are two classes of 
> visitor: those that don't know anything about Zope (and thus didn't fill 
> out the survey), and "developers that want zope.org to help them develop".
> 
> For these two classes of users, I have a series of bullets in a sidebar 
> for the home page.  This can be seen at my mockup page:
> 
>    http://www.zope.org/Members/paul/newzopeorg/index.html
> 
> I've spent some time working on a cleaner look than the existing 
> new.zope.org, but more important are the answers it has to some of the 
> IA questions.
> 
> If each of the links in the sidebar led to a very well written and 
> maintained page which provided the next level of links, then we'd be in 
> *much* better shape than existing zope.org.  Same for the site map.
> 
> If we also spent extra time with the three or four big ticket items 
> (packages, how-tos, case studies, etc.) then we'd be in good shape.
> 
> To wrap up, I'm interested in feedback:
> 
> 1) Does anyone agree that the next step is IA?
> 
> 2) If so, does everyone agree that sections and a sitemap are two good 
> first steps towards an IA?
> 
> 3) If so, does anyone have a suggestion for the major sections?
> 
> Finally, I'd like to add that Lalo has converted those mockups to Plone:
> 
>    http://www.zope.org/Members/lalo/temp/mockup-zorg-1.html
>    http://www.zope.org/Members/lalo/temp/mockup-zorg-2.html
>    http://www.zope.org/Members/lalo/temp/mockup-zorg-3.html
>    http://www.zope.org/Members/lalo/temp/mockup-zorg-4.html
> 
> If Alan or Alex are interested in participating in new.zope.org, I'm 
> interested in using Plone.