On Thu, Oct 2, 2008 at 12:09 PM, Christoph Budzinski < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Better make the manual into the #1 resource for any information about > Shoes. You could add sidenodes into the manual with answers to common > questions that are usually not shown but can be displayed by clicking a > link, something like that. The thing with manuals and documentation is that > a lot of people don't read them, they are boring and there is just too much > too read. And that's also true for electronic manuals. That's why > screencasts became so popular I think. If you go and make an electronic > version out of a dead paper manual, why not use the possibilities the new > medium gives you? The Shoes manual already does this, for example by > integrating directly executable code snippets into the manual. This is > really, really cool. I don't know if that has been said before, but snippets > that run with a click of the button directly from the manual, is beyond > great. So, thumbs up. Why not build more upon that idea? Make the whole > manual as interactive as possible. It would be really cool if the manual for > example would have an interactive tutorial like the Hackety Hack tutorial. > Tutorial text at the top and at the bottom you write and test your code. I > know HacketyHack was meant for kids, but I loved it and I'm 25. I don't see > why just kids should get something like this. > > You could also add something like Yahoo Answers. Everyone has a number of > starting points, then you can use some of your points to ask a question and > other people answer you. By answering they can make points if their answer > is choosen as the best solution to the problem. It would be cool to have > this in the manual, but it would be okay to put it on the shoes website too. > It would have to be on the website anyhow, the Shoes manual would just be a > client to use it over a REST API or something. There was something like this > for Ruby on Rails and it was really great, I think it was called Rails > Weenie. No too stupid questions that you could answer yourself after having > looked at the documentation because your points where limited but very > helpful answers because people wanted points to ask new questions. Yahoo > Answers gives you 100 starting points, way too much. The rails version gave > you 5, asking a new question did cost 2 points if I remember correctly, so > you spent the points wisely. > > And if you add that, add the Shoes IRC chatroom to the manual too. A tiny > IRC client that connects only to the shoes channel. Much more people would > use the channel then I think. Most people just aren't comfortable with using > IRC. Who uses IRC anymore today? Linux people, true. But who uses Linux? > Well, I do. But I don't count. > > This is a stupid idea if it isn't implemented right. But if it is done > right, this would be awesome. You'd also have two new source code samples > for Shoes. How to write a front end client for a webservice and how to make > your own IRC client with Shoes ^^ > > Oh and also, add screencasts right into the manual. I'm sure if you do them > _Why, we'd see something like the "Duck and cover" training video in case of > a nuclear bomb attack. Something that's so funny that you'd even want to > watch it if you weren't interested in the material it covers. No long half > hour videos. Just tiny, one to two minute video clips in every section of > the manual that provide you with some handy information. They did that in > the game "Bioshock". Everywhere in the game are this hilarious 1960's video > clips and posters that give you some hints for playing the game, all in the > style of this "Duck and cover" video. Shoes already supports playing videos, > so you could just add small video clips here and there whenever you have one > ready. > > It's too late to add all this to v1.0 of the manual, but maybe you'll keep > this ideas in your head for later. But feel free to just ignore them if you > think they are stupid :) > > Thanks for listening, > Chris out. Wait for it... Okay I'm out. > > 2008/10/2 _why <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Updated the built-in manual and added a table of contents. >> >> <http://help.shoooes.net/> >> >> I still need to finish the manual, give it an index, and expand the >> tutorial. Do we need a FAQ? Or is that just another link to loose >> people on? >> >> _why >> > > @Christoph BudzinskiU know what i loved ur ideas specially the irc one. It wouldn't be hard to do i guess. Also i was thinking of integrating something related to shoebox its the killer center of the tiny apps aint it. IRC is used by many as i see it (if we count the people we are actually going to use the shoes kit,ie programmers). -- <b>I believe in beautiful ideas, Most of my ideas are of girls.</b>
