proposal for kdevelop.org new website design

[Sam S.]

On Mon, May 10, 2010 at 12:57 AM, Amilcar do Carmo Lucas
<amilcar at kdevelop.org> wrote:
> [...]
>>    4. *(Possibly) switch from the current absolutely-positioned
>> columnslayout to a fluid
>>    columns layout...*
> Not a good idea if that requires changing the order of the html.
> The current order was especially conceived for slow connections and search
> engines.
> It should be kept unchanged whenever possible.

Hm, didn't think of that. I totally agree though, the current order
really does make sense.


>>    2. *Quick-access boxes for horizontal links within page classes*
> Sorry this one I did not understood yet.
> What is wrong with the layout of the "other versions" boxes ?

You're right, the "other versions" and "other years" boxes already
pretty much provide all that.
However, they don't make it very intuitive and easily accessible.

Due to being at placed at the end of each page, many visitors won't
even see those sections, as they might not scroll down so far.
Also, since they look just like any other normal page section, it's
not immediately obvious that these these boxes are actually reliable,
well-defined navigation-menu-like objects.

It took me quite some time till I first "understood" that some pages
at kdevelop.org are actually part of page classes that have one
instance for every KDevelop version, and that the "other version"
section at the end of those pages provides a reliable way to switch
between those versions.

I think having it presented like in my "News page" mockup
(http://sam.megabyet.net/kdevelop-website-design/) will make this
"horizontal navigation" within the kdevelop.org page structure much
easier for visitors. (Especially when combined with the breadcrumbs
bar, which embodies the "vertical" page structure.)

>>    1. *Cleaning up the top links*
>>
>>    --> only Download, Features, Screenshots
>>    (Niko has already done this on the test site.)
> I used info from real the navigation patterns of kdevelop.org users to create
> those links. The ones currently online are really the most visited pages on
> the website.
> I still think that all of them belong in there.

And I still hope I can convince you otherwise :-D ...

As you mentioned already, 'Sitemap' has a new place now. Also, 'Home'
can be reached by clicking the big title logo, and will additionally
appear at the beginning of the breadcrumbs bar once that's
implemented, so it will make no sense to keep it in the top menu.

Now the remaining links are:
  - 'Download, Features, Screenshots' (which corresponds to what I propose), and
  - 'Tutorials', 'F.A.Q.'

a) Why I think 'Download, Features, Screenshots' should be there:

These are the three "standard" links any website for a free software
application should have.
Together, they *advertise* and *provide* the application to the world.

Note that they're not just a bunch of "arbitrary" links taken from
various places in the main navigation menu which happened to make it
to the top ten most visited pages: They don't really fit in anywhere
in the left menu at all. That's because they form a complete category
of their own - if they were moved to the left menu, they'd most likely
have their own box, which might be called "the application", "discover
"KDevelop"or just "KDevelop". However, the design sets them apart from
the rest of the navigation menu by putting them in a top menu of their
own.

b) Why I think *only* those three should be there, if possible:

While those three links are undoubtedly among the top most visited
pages, they're much more than that, as I tried to explain above.
Now if that top menu is filled up with additional pages of "random",
unrelated topics, it would be a pretty collection of popular pages,
but it would loose it's "special" appeal as a concise, self-contained
set of links which fulfill the special purpose of "advertising and
providing the application to the world".

Note that this is not merely of theoretical interest: Visitors who
come to kdevelop.org with the intention to "get to know/potentially
try out KDevelop" will instinctively recognize a top menu consisting
of those three links as a helpful "guide" or "anchor" for doing just
that. If on the other hand they just see a bunch of unrelated links
there, they'll recognize it as just that: a bunch of unrelated link.

In General, I think links should not be be placed in prominent places
of a website merely based on dry, uninterpreted statistics. The basis
should always be a well-founded logical decision that fits in well
with the whole navigation concept of the page.
Of course, statistics are still useful: Placements of links should
*also* be *backed-up* by those statistics. (It might for example make
sense to move or remove a link when it turns out that it is *not* used
by visitors very often.)

b) Why I think that specifically 'Tutorials' and 'F.A.Q.' *don't* need
to be there:

Tutorials (and, depending on what kind of questions they cover, also
FAQ's) are very specific "documentation" resources mainly useful to
actual *users* of KDevelop looking to get a greater understanding of
the application or certain workflows of using it.
The overall "navigation concept" of the website (well, of my proposal,
anyways) provides a shiny, green, easy-to-spot box called
"Documentation" at the very top of the main navigation menu for links
to that kind of resources, so that's where the 'Tutorials' link should
be. (In my mockups, that's where it is). Placing the 'Tutorials' link
there in it's "natural habitat" helps visitors comprehend and
appreciate the overall website structure better, thereby reassuring
them/making them feel less frustrated while visiting the website, and
helping them find stuff faster.

Regarding the FAQ:
If that link is among the top visited links, I actually *don't*
believe this means that the FAQ is so great and needs to be advertised
even more, but rather it might show that users aren't successful in
finding information the "proper way" (i.e. by using the thematically
grouped navigation menu and other resources), until at some point
they're desperate enough to go start reading the FAQ, hoping to
finally find answers there (which in many cases, they won't, leaving
them disappointed). The "real" solution is to provide better
information in the proper places (i.e. the various topic-specific
informational pages) and to make the navigation menu that directly or
indirectly links to those pages more accessible and easier to
comprehend (which is what I tried to achieve with my mockups, both
visually and in terms of restructuring the links, and including the
new quick-access boxes on the front page).

Btw., may I point out that neither 'Tutorials' nor 'F.A.Q.' currently
contains any information relevant to KDevelop 4.

>>    2. *Cleaning up and restructuring of the navigation menu links (left
>>    column)** for KDev4.x*
>>    [...]
>>    In addition to that, I've made various other changes to that menu in my
>>    mockups compared to the current state of the website. These changes can
>> be seen as suggestions for a cleaner and more easily-accessible navigation
>> menu. What do you think?
> Sorry where are those changes, can you repost a link.

With "changes" I just meant how I made it appear in my Inkscape
mockups, compared to how the menu is actually structured in the
current website.
The PNG's of the two mockups ("front page" and "news page") are at the
top of http://sam.megabyet.net/kdevelop-website-design/

>>    3. *Rephrasing the "What is KDevelop and KDevPlatform" text on the front
>>    page*

By that, I also meant the text that you see in the respective mockup picture.
(Maybe others have further ideas for improvement... After all, this is
the first thing many people will read about KDevelop...)

>>    4. *A dedicated 'About' page*
> I kind of already have such pages, take a look at 3.5/kdevelop.html
>>    [...]
> But yes your version has the advantage of being version agnostic.

Yes, that's what I meant: a general "about KDevelop" page (where
"KDevelop" equals both "KDevelop the application" and "KDevelop the
open sorce project"), not something specific to version X (for that,
there are the "release announcement" and "new features" pages and the
above mentioned "main page for version X.X")