[Catalyst] Re: Catalyst site design drafts feedback thread

[Tobias Kremer]

On 12.06.2008, at 20:22, Simon Wilcox wrote:
> Matt S Trout wrote:
>> I was thinking about yours but can I get away with asking for all of the
>> above? Given myself and kieren both find most of the other sites
>> objectionable it'd be nice to see why you prefer them.

I like the 60s/70s style of the cakephp.org site - it's a refreshingly different
approach for a website dedicated to something as technical as an MVC framework.
Maybe it's just because I'm fond of that style in general :)

IMHO the djangoproject.com site has great content delivered the right way.
Everything relevant is linked where you'd expect it. I admit that it's a little
too greenish on the front page but subsequent pages have a much larger white
area which makes them easier on the eye - and they're all seemlessly integrated
into the style.

After having had a second look at the symfony-project.org site I must say that I
don't find it that great anymore. It's a little bit too simple.

As I said, this is all highly emotional ...

> I think you're not the target audience that those sites are trying to reach.
> As someone else pointed out, those sites are designed to appeal to the bosses
> who sign off on the decisions as much, if not not more so, than the developers
> who work with the framework.

And that's exactly the point where Perl in general is lacking. We have awesome
tools that are presented in a completely unemotional and uninspired way.

> You, or this list, needs to decide who the audience for the catalyst site is.
> If it's trying to persuade developers and management to switch to Catalyst
> then it needs to appeal to those people. By your very position you are in
> neither of those two groups so perhaps not in a good position to decide what
> would appeal to them :-)

simon++

To my mind the website should be directed first and foremost at users who don't
know about Catalyst. You have to make a great first impression. Once you're
familiar with Catalyst you will most likely know where to go to find the cure
for occuring problems, thus the site is not THAT important to you anymore but
should of course have some sort of handy reference/howto/documentation which
can be structured in a completely logical way without any of that emotional
stuff getting in the way :)

> obias's design is good if somewhat shamelessly derivative. That's a complement
> really as he's trying to speak the visual language that many people will
> expect to see.

... that was exactly my intention :)

--Tobias