# The following was supposedly scribed by # Randy W. Sims # on Saturday 24 July 2004 03:06 pm:
>[Did I not reply to list in my previous message?] no. sorry if I failed to mention it. >I think one of the best ways to raise awareness is to add the ratings to >the search results from Search. I'm still not sure that I agree about >putting it on the documentation page, but I have added it to the >outline. Compactness is important here. I don't think that much more than a horizontal inch of screen-space should be absorbed. Just something large enough for a link to cpanratings and a very terse summary of what you would find by following that link. >If it does get added, does it get added to all the >documentation pages or just the main documentation page? Could you give an example of what is 'main'? I mean the page with the rendered version of the pod. On my tour, I clicked the bigger-bolder link above the search-result entry (http://search.cpan.org/~lds/CGI.pm-3.05/CGI.pm) not the smaller-seemingly-less-important one below it (http://search.cpan.org/~lds/CGI.pm-3.05/). To me, the former contains information which will let me make an informed decision about the module (e.g. the programmer's reference to the API which it provides) while the latter gives lots of links, ratings, test results, and related stuff, but only tells me this about the module in question: "Simple Common Gateway Interface Class" and I have already seen that exact information in the search-result entry. >> I would also like to see a simple yes/no count in addition to the >> rating/reviews. If you have a list of "35 people use this::module" and >> "700 said 'use this::other::module instead'", that helps raise awareness >> about the other module, and allows you to make a decision more quickly >> based on the experiences of others. > >Are you referring to the amazon.com-ish "N persons recommend X instead >of (or in addition to) Y" type recommendations? I'm not sure CPAN is >worth the added complexity. I don't think the target audience is big >enough to justify a lot of "extra" features; the ratings should be >enough, but I could be wrong... For one, search.cpan.org would not be the keeper of this content. It would have to be provided by cpanratings. (as an aside, http://search.cpan.org/~lds/CGI.pm-3.05/CGI.pm does not (IMO) need to contain the 'search' bar. If I'm looking at this page, I've probably got a previous browser window/tab with the original search results (http://search.cpan.org/search?query=CGI&mode=all) in it. If not (e.g. I stumbled in from google), a 'home' link would be enough to get me there.) I'm not sure right now how useful it would be or how many others would find it useful, but yes the N,X,Y is along the lines of what I mean. The reason that I mention it is simply that I had the idea that it might be useful in selecting modules (yes, it's a popularity contest and should be ignored in favor of an informed decision based on reading the manpage, but we can't ignore information that isn't there.) I'm sort of groping for something to 'season' the average-rating. Since I am suggesting that the average rating be displayed at the top of the manpage, I thought I should provide an idea which would allow it to mean more than 5/5 (e.g. one person rated it 5/5: 'big whoop'.) I think '600 people said "it's useful"' may be more helpful than one mediocre review. 60 raving reviews would tend to bend your decision more, but it's easier to get 600 people to say 'ok' than it is to get 60 to say 'this-is-great-and-here-is-why'. --Eric -- "One of the serious obstacles to the improvement of our race is indiscriminate charity." --Andrew Carnegie
