Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Felix Natter]

Svante Signell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> This is the kind of reply I was fearing, effectively shutting off the
> discussion. Please read the whole content of my message. The intent
> was NOT blinking text, images, animations, etc. It was about moving the
> best properties of the debian distribution and tools up front, also
> for newcomers to see. As written earlier, I appreciate Debian more and
> more for every day. Why not telling the Linux community (and potential
> new users) that it is one of the best distributions?

I am not sure what www.debian.org mentions, and I agree that web-update,
stability [..] should be mentioned. On the other hand I think it is a good
thing that debian is a "non-vaporware"-project and does not start out with
"advertising-expressions".

Maybe a solution would be to put information about advanced features
and advocacy on a different page (not on the start-page). Maybe
some people would share their experience with debian.

-- 
Felix Natter

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[w trillich]

Armin Wegner wrote:
> 
> It's not boring, it's functional. And that's what matters.

boring might not have been the right word: maybe "tepid"?
how about "obscure" as in 'is there a link on there that'll
show me how to upgrade from an older debian to a more
current one'?

i still think his point is valid, tho: to help debian grow, 
we should facilitate newer users and prospective users,
by implementing some of his suggestions.

[debian is arleady growing, but not because it's easy--if 
we can make it easier to get up & running in the debian
world, imagine how our ranks would swell!]

the homepage would be more functional if it had obvious
pointers at the top-left corner including
- newbie help tips (man, apropos, apt-get...)
- help us debug the next release (all about frozen & how to install)
- upgrading (apt-get/sources.config suggestions & tips)
- glossary (which explains "distribution", "slink", "potato"...)
don't assume that simply because you know the term
that everybody else should! bad dog! bad!
- platforms supported
- subscribe to the debian-user mailing list
- support debian (merchandise, investors, donations)
etc.

language needs to be primarily general-usage english
until you get to specific instructions and commands;
only then do you use the specific terminology of
the commands.

i.e.
DON'T have a link to 'apt-get' as nobody who's new
to debian would have a clue as to why he should go there.

DO have a link to 'upgrading debian' that talks about
dpkg and apt-get.

gotta cater to the audience, so that the audience will grow.

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Vitux]

 
> PS:
> On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
> kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
> even if excellent tools are available for this.
> 
> Best regards,
> Svante Signell
> 
You would definitely want to build yourself a new kernel ASAP
after installing the system. The base-install-kernel is loaded
down with lots of unnecessary stuff, because it is meant to be
as universal as possible (kind of like the winblows kernels).
Universal in this context also means single-processor, 386
-compiled, for max compatibility.
If you're running Slink, compiling a kernel also means
changing to a more recent kernel than the ailing 2.0.36 ;-)
Building a kernel is really quite easy, and gives you a really
good feeling (besides faster system and faster booting).
Regards
Vitux

-- 
"I'm not a crook"
Richard Nixon

Debian GNU/Linux
Micro$loth-free Zone

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Armin Wegner]

It's not boring, it's functional. And that's what matters.

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[w trillich]

Petr Cech wrote:
> 
> On Fri, May 19, 2000 at 11:47:36AM +0200 , Svante Signell wrote:
> > Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:
> >
> > 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
> >number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
> >attracts new users.
> > 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> > 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
> >available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> > 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
> >the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
> >you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
> >first page.
> 
> so you volunteer to do it? :)

svante--

go ahead and volunteer if you dare. i'd dare, but i'm
afraid i'd let everyone down with my limited time. i'd 
be happy to be your backup/secondary/support weenie, 
tho...! (we gotta put something back into this wonderful
debian machine sooner or later, right? why not now?)

-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
Their is five errers in this sentance.

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Josip Rodin]

On Fri, May 19, 2000 at 11:47:36AM +0200, Svante Signell wrote:
> Looking at the Debian home page, one get the impression that only the
> now very old Slink distribution, with kernel 2.0.36, old X, old libc,
> etc, released March 1999 is available.

It's the official one, still.

> The News section mentions the testing of a new distribution is ongoing.

The freeze announcements should be there somewhere, surely.

Anyway, the freeze isn't meant to be for testing by the general public, just
the clueful people. It normally behaves just like unstable, until we fix it.

> NOTHING is said about the power of apt-get and the ease of upgrading using
> the web to more recent software.  Also, nothing is mentioned about the
> availability of kernel-2.2.15, XFrre86-3.3.6, glibc-2.1.3, etc, already
> today, even BEFORE Potato has been released.

That's because it's all available in frozen, and unstable distributions, not
in the stable one. There's a significant difference between those.

> 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
>number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
>attracts new users.
> 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
>available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
>the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
>you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
>first page.

Feel free to implement any of this... the sources are in CVS, at
:pserver:[EMAIL PROTECTED]:/cvs/webwml , modules webwml/english
or whatever other language available. Submit patches to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Also any discussions about the web pages should
be held there.

> On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
> kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
> even if excellent tools are available for this.

Tell debian-boot@lists.debian.org list about it.

-- 
Digital Electronic Being Intended for Assassination and Nullification

RE: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Svante Signell]

This is the kind of reply I was fearing, effectively shutting off the
discussion. Please read the whole content of my message. The intent
was NOT blinking text, images, animations, etc. It was about moving the
best properties of the debian distribution and tools up front, also
for newcomers to see. As written earlier, I appreciate Debian more and
more for every day. Why not telling the Linux community (and potential
new users) that it is one of the best distributions?

Svante Signell 


Chris Mason writes:
 > But what's really missing is some of that ever-popular BLINKing text, some
 > large red letters on a colourful background, loads of clip art animations,
 > and some huge pictures to make the visitors wait over a minute for the first
 > page.
 > That ought to do it.
 > 
 > 
 > Chris Mason
 > Box 340, The Valley, Anguilla, British West Indies
 > Tel: 264 497 5670 Fax: 264 497 8463
 > USA Fax (561) 382-7771
 > Take a virtual tour of the island
 > http://net.ai/ The Anguilla Guide
 > Find out more about NetConcepts
 > www.netconcepts.ai
 > bwz*mq

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Svante Signell]

Couldn't agree more with Gary.

(I don't think this message was sent to any of the lists, only me. Gary, do you
mind that your reply is forwarded? If so please send me a private mail.)

Svante Signell

[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
 > Quoting Svante Signell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
 > 
 > 
 > 
 > > 
 > > Looking at the Debian home page, one get the impression that only the
 > > now very old Slink distribution, with kernel 2.0.36, old X, old libc,
 > > etc, released March 1999 is available. The News section mentions the
 > > testing of a new distribution is ongoing. NOTHING is said about the
 > > power of apt-get and the ease of upgrading using the web to more
 > > recent software.  Also, nothing is mentioned about the availability of
 > > kernel-2.2.15, XFrre86-3.3.6, glibc-2.1.3, etc, already today, even
 > > BEFORE Potato has been released.
 > > 
 >I agree with the idea. I have used debian for a number of years, and
 > am very happy with it. But if you are new to it, and go to the home page,
 > it is very difficult to decide whether you want to go thru the effort
 > to evaluate it because it at times appears to be hopelessly behind the
 > time. I did not take your proposal as asking for glitz, but rather 
 > as suggesting that basic information be there up front.
 > 
 > Gary
 > [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Stephane Bortzmeyer]

On Friday 19 May 2000, at 14 h 43, the keyboard of Dominic Blythe 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> wml? like for wap?

Of course not. The telephone moguls stole the name of an already existing free 
program, WML, Web Meta Language, , which is 
used by Debian (and several others) to make their Web pages.

RE: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Dominic Blythe]

wml? like for wap?


> From: Darren O. Benham [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 
> Speaking as a member of the webteam...  You're welcome to submit the
> rewrites.  There are instructions on the site for downloading 
> the webpages
> in source (*.wml, not *.html) form.  In particular...
> 

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Darren O. Benham]

Speaking as a member of the webteam...  You're welcome to submit the
rewrites.  There are instructions on the site for downloading the webpages
in source (*.wml, not *.html) form.  In particular...

Following changes can be a time consuming process (ask the people who do the
Debian Weekly News) and not many people have the time to do that.  So we get
some compromise... The "News" section is generated (not "written") from the
news articles in http://www.debian.org/News/  The News articles come from
postings by the press team ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) to debian-announce or
debian-news.  By having a formula like that, it's easy for someone to know
what's expected of them when they volunteer to work that section.  They have
to 1) follow the mentioned lists and 2) reformat all the posts into the
*.wml format.  It could almost be automated.  If someone has the time to
filter though everything else that's going on and be the "reporter" for the
project (and not duplicate the work of the DWN), they have not volunteered.

On Fri, May 19, 2000 at 11:47:36AM +0200, Svante Signell wrote:
> Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:
> 
> 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
>number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
>attracts new users.
> 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
>available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
>the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
>you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
>first page.
> 
> PS:
> On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
> kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
> even if excellent tools are available for this.
> 
> Best regards,
> Svante Signell
> 
> 
> -- 
> To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 
> 

-- 
Please cc all mailing list replies to me, also.
* http://benham.net/index.html<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   <><  *
* Debian: Software in the Public Interest:  *
*   Project Secretary   Treasurer   *
*   Webmaster Team  *
*   BTS Team  siteROCK: *
*   Lintian TeamLinux Infrastructure Engineer   *


pgplsDm4odsfD.pgp
Description: PGP signature

RE: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Chris Mason]

But what's really missing is some of that ever-popular BLINKing text, some
large red letters on a colourful background, loads of clip art animations,
and some huge pictures to make the visitors wait over a minute for the first
page.
That ought to do it.


Chris Mason
Box 340, The Valley, Anguilla, British West Indies
Tel: 264 497 5670 Fax: 264 497 8463
USA Fax (561) 382-7771
Take a virtual tour of the island
http://net.ai/ The Anguilla Guide
Find out more about NetConcepts
www.netconcepts.ai
bwz*mq

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Tom
Pfeifer
Sent: Friday, May 19, 2000 6:37 AM
To: debian-user@lists.debian.org; debian-devel@lists.debian.org
Subject: Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?


I'm not saying that the home page couldn't be improved, but remember
that Debian is not a commercial distribution, so there is no reason to
give the appearance of trying to sell you something.

When I was a Linux newcomer a couple of years ago, it was actually the
simplicity and lack of clutter on the home page that appealed to me and
helped me get going with Debian. I wanted to know basically what Debian
was and how do I go about getting it and installing it. The answers I
needed were right there in very simple terms.

If any of Debian's advanced features had been described there, I
wouldn't have understood or appreciated them anyway at that point.

Tom

Svante Signell wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> I've been running Debian on one of my home network computer for a
> while now. Starting from slink, upgrading to potato and following
> further upgrades to unstable/woody. The combination of apt-get update
> and apt-get dist-upgrade is really excellent!! Combined with the
> power of dpkg maintaining and upgrading Linux is EASY, especially
> compared to other distributions. It took some time to get used to
> though, but the excellent mailing lists have been very helpful. By
> following mailing lists you realize a lot of things are happening
> behind the scene.
>
> On other computers I have RedHat, Mandrake and SuSE distributions. My
> first installation of Linux was RedHat 5.0 a few years ago. Since then
> I have been installing and upgrading rpm-based distributions. The
> installation of Debian was something I thought about to do for a long
> time, but wanted to wait for the Potato release -:( Since the release
> of Potato "never" happened, I finally decided to make a try with
> Slink! I don't regret taking that decision, debian is one of the best
> distributions.
>
> Now to the point:
>
> Looking at the Debian home page, one get the impression that only the
> now very old Slink distribution, with kernel 2.0.36, old X, old libc,
> etc, released March 1999 is available. The News section mentions the
> testing of a new distribution is ongoing. NOTHING is said about the
> power of apt-get and the ease of upgrading using the web to more
> recent software.  Also, nothing is mentioned about the availability of
> kernel-2.2.15, XFrre86-3.3.6, glibc-2.1.3, etc, already today, even
> BEFORE Potato has been released.
>
> Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:
>
> 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
>number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
>attracts new users.
> 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
>available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
>the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
>you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
>first page.
>
> PS:
> On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
> kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
> even if excellent tools are available for this.
>
> Best regards,
> Svante Signell
>


--
Unsubscribe?  mail -s unsubscribe [EMAIL PROTECTED] <
/dev/null

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Tom Pfeifer]

I'm not saying that the home page couldn't be improved, but remember
that Debian is not a commercial distribution, so there is no reason to
give the appearance of trying to sell you something.

When I was a Linux newcomer a couple of years ago, it was actually the
simplicity and lack of clutter on the home page that appealed to me and
helped me get going with Debian. I wanted to know basically what Debian
was and how do I go about getting it and installing it. The answers I
needed were right there in very simple terms. 

If any of Debian's advanced features had been described there, I
wouldn't have understood or appreciated them anyway at that point.

Tom

Svante Signell wrote:
> 
> Hello,
> 
> I've been running Debian on one of my home network computer for a
> while now. Starting from slink, upgrading to potato and following
> further upgrades to unstable/woody. The combination of apt-get update
> and apt-get dist-upgrade is really excellent!! Combined with the
> power of dpkg maintaining and upgrading Linux is EASY, especially
> compared to other distributions. It took some time to get used to
> though, but the excellent mailing lists have been very helpful. By
> following mailing lists you realize a lot of things are happening
> behind the scene.
> 
> On other computers I have RedHat, Mandrake and SuSE distributions. My
> first installation of Linux was RedHat 5.0 a few years ago. Since then
> I have been installing and upgrading rpm-based distributions. The
> installation of Debian was something I thought about to do for a long
> time, but wanted to wait for the Potato release -:( Since the release
> of Potato "never" happened, I finally decided to make a try with
> Slink! I don't regret taking that decision, debian is one of the best
> distributions.
> 
> Now to the point:
> 
> Looking at the Debian home page, one get the impression that only the
> now very old Slink distribution, with kernel 2.0.36, old X, old libc,
> etc, released March 1999 is available. The News section mentions the
> testing of a new distribution is ongoing. NOTHING is said about the
> power of apt-get and the ease of upgrading using the web to more
> recent software.  Also, nothing is mentioned about the availability of
> kernel-2.2.15, XFrre86-3.3.6, glibc-2.1.3, etc, already today, even
> BEFORE Potato has been released.
> 
> Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:
> 
> 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
>number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
>attracts new users.
> 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
>available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
>the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
>you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
>first page.
> 
> PS:
> On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
> kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
> even if excellent tools are available for this.
> 
> Best regards,
> Svante Signell
>

Re: Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Petr Cech]

On Fri, May 19, 2000 at 11:47:36AM +0200 , Svante Signell wrote:
> Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:
> 
> 1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
>number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
>attracts new users.
> 2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
> 3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
>available, with highlights, updated frequently.
> 4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
>the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
>you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
>first page.

so you volunteer to do it? :)

Petr Cech
-- 
Debian GNU/Linux maintainer - www.debian.{org,cz}
   [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Obviously the only rational solution to your problem is suicide.

Why is the Debian home page so boring?

[Svante Signell]

Hello,

I've been running Debian on one of my home network computer for a
while now. Starting from slink, upgrading to potato and following
further upgrades to unstable/woody. The combination of apt-get update
and apt-get dist-upgrade is really excellent!! Combined with the
power of dpkg maintaining and upgrading Linux is EASY, especially
compared to other distributions. It took some time to get used to
though, but the excellent mailing lists have been very helpful. By
following mailing lists you realize a lot of things are happening
behind the scene.

On other computers I have RedHat, Mandrake and SuSE distributions. My
first installation of Linux was RedHat 5.0 a few years ago. Since then
I have been installing and upgrading rpm-based distributions. The
installation of Debian was something I thought about to do for a long
time, but wanted to wait for the Potato release -:( Since the release
of Potato "never" happened, I finally decided to make a try with
Slink! I don't regret taking that decision, debian is one of the best
distributions.


Now to the point:

Looking at the Debian home page, one get the impression that only the
now very old Slink distribution, with kernel 2.0.36, old X, old libc,
etc, released March 1999 is available. The News section mentions the
testing of a new distribution is ongoing. NOTHING is said about the
power of apt-get and the ease of upgrading using the web to more
recent software.  Also, nothing is mentioned about the availability of
kernel-2.2.15, XFrre86-3.3.6, glibc-2.1.3, etc, already today, even
BEFORE Potato has been released.


Following is a proposal on what to emphasize on the FIRST page:

1. Rewrite the Getting Started section, e.g. inform about the large
   number of architectures and packages supported. This surely
   attracts new users.
2. Something on apt-get, and upgrading from the web.
3. Rewrite the News section, e.g. add links to recent packages
   available, with highlights, updated frequently.
4. In addition to the Weekly News link, add more frequent updates to
   the News section. Surely, by following the excellent mailing lists,
   you realize much more is happening than what is reported on the
   first page.

PS:
On the wish list for the distribution I would like to add an smp
kernel. Other distributions have. Today this has to be made manually,
even if excellent tools are available for this.

Best regards,
Svante Signell