[Mageia-artwork] Mageia 2 Web site changes option

Tue Apr 3 17:44:15 CEST 2012

Hi there, (please followup the discussion in mageia-marketing, not in
+-artwork or -webteam)
+
+here's a peak at one possible option for Mageia 2 release Web site
+update (not full at once, but for most important pages, and driving
+other pages into that direction too).
+
+The rationale behind this update is articulated as such:
+
+ A) the home page (mageia.org/) is targetted at one-time/first
+time/casual visitors, with a single, main call to action: download
+Mageia. There are others actions, such as: contribute, get older
+version(s), learn more about the product, and the community and the
+project. But there is no other navigation. It's really a poster-like
+page, direct to a main action, with the following main channel for
+visitors:
+
+ - home => action 1: get the software
+ - download => action 1: select your download
+ - while-downloading => actions: how to use, how to contribute, learn
+more about Mageia, what feedback you could provide
+
+Pushing this page calls for updating the Downloads index page design
+as well as the post-download page.
+
+
+ B) a dedicated, community home page is for people coming back again
+and again (contributors, activ users) with three main incoming
+sources:
+   - start.mageia.org (loaded by Mageia browsers)
+   - a mageia.org/coop or another keyword.
+   - home page lower priority action (see bottom nav links "Community")
+
+Here go: news, calendar, teams, docs, and links to the various
+resources/tools on mageia.org in an organized way.
+
+
+ C) for past-home page pages, a new top navigation bar, organizing
+more of the site and making it more accessible from everywhere;
+especially, for easier embedding/deployment/update of it, the navbar
+will be available in different fashion: a dynamic Web service will
+produce the needed HTML/JS for it, and a JS snippet will allow to
+dynamically insert it into all sites (so there's little integration
+work). The top navigation bar exact content is still up to debate, but
+the very top categories should not exceed 5/6 entries at most.
+
+A, B and C are not strongly attached to each other, however they are
+part of the same proposal. There's a missing download page (and
+animation) from A page, but that's a start to go.
+
+A (home page) is http://i.imgur.com/7Vqq6.png . It's a bold move for
+us. It's heavily inspired from a Firefox page which is a nice example
+of a product landing page. From a charter point of view, it reuses the
+white/blue gradient from our original logo and site elements. It may
+benefit from a very light, thin pattern in the blue background, or not
+(not sure). Text copy may need tweaks.
+
+B (community page) is ... still pending, I'm not satisfied with what I
+have so far. We have http://www.mageia.org/contribute/ but I'm not
+sure to change this one right now. Hope to have something to roll out
+for review next week.
+
+C (global nav) is ... pending too. I will roll it out for testing
+later this week. What it needs is to refine its structure; currently
+planned is:
+
+ * Mageia (links to a special map page of the site)
+ * About Us: mageia project info/history & mageia.org organization
+info, what is under http://mageia.org/en/about/ already
+ * Downloads:
+   - Mageia 1 and 2 downloads and features pages,
+   - updates downloads info and mirrors
+   - mirrors
+   - specific software (we used to host a specific mgaonline package for)
+ * Community:
+   - news (blogs, planets, other?), calendar
+   - introduction to contributing
+   - forums, mailing-lists, IRC
+   - wiki, bugzilla, other doc resources
+   - contributors corners
+ * Support: current http://www.mageia.org/en/support/ page redispatched:
+   - users support: community and commercial vendors
+   - (security) updates info
+   - product lifecycle
+   - hardware stuff
+ * Contribute: necessary? as a short link to the contributors guide
+ * About You: not available for now, maybe moved somewhere else, but
+supported by identity and other mageia.org services, would act as a
+portal for every single user, to monitor her own activity/data.
+ * Search (over mageia.org domain)
+
+This new nav answer three concerns:
+ - /platform: allow an easier, consistent deployment of the top nav
+updates through all mageia.org; using here a javascript snippet;
+ - /layout: embed the Mageia logo in the navigation bar, so that it
+too brands the page to the project;
+ - /content: better structure the mageia.org domain into main activities/zones.
+
+I know that some may worry that some links currently in the top nav
+bar won't be available/visible anymore in all mageia.org as a first
+level item. It's a matter of context and of the very details of the
+implementation and the navigation channels.
+
+I don't have a B plan about that at this time, but it's not mandatory
+to change all things either. So it either works, or it doesn't.
+
+
+Note that (for a future/long term question), separating what is about
+the product (Features, Downloads, Support, News) from what is about
+the project/community (About Us, Community, part of Support,
+Contribute) would help a lot (different life cycles for the sites),
+but it needs to have a separate name for each too.
+