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Hello all,<br>
<br>
Suppose "someone" did decide they wanted to help python.org by
supplying a patch, this is roughly the set of steps they would have to
go through:<br>
<br>
Go to <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://python.org">http://python.org</a><br>
Click on "Help maintain the website" in the left sidebar:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.python.org/about/website/">http://www.python.org/about/website/</a><br>
Click on website maintenance: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.python.org/dev/pydotorg/website">http://www.python.org/dev/pydotorg/website</a>
[1]<br>
<br>
The instructions here are on how to checkout the repository from the
command line with the svn tool. (
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Please note that this repository contains several hundred megabytes.)
This takes a looooooong time. :-( By default this gives you a directory
called "beta.python.org". You then open a file build/README with
instructions.<br>
<br>
The first step is to install the build system dependencies: mako,
pyyaml, and docutils.<br>
<br>
The next step is running make, which if you are on Windows requires
first installing Cygwin - another lengthy procedure.<br>
<br>
To actually make changes you need to know / learn ReStructured Text, a
custom markup from pyramid and possibly yaml.<br>
<br>
If you don't have checkin rights you'll need to generate a patch
(assuming you know how) - and then there is nowhere to post it (no
issue tracker for the website), other than perhaps emailing it to
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:webmaster@python.org">webmaster@python.org</a>.<br>
<br>
Anyone who doesn't think this constitutes a "high barrier to entry" is
nuts (tm).<br>
<br>
For what it's worth my *memory* (fallible) is of Fred Lundh's through
the web experiment attracting a great deal of interest and
contributions - that was for the Python documentation rather than the
website though. Also for those using it as a counter-example, we do get
a lot more changes / contributions to the documentation since switching
away from Latex to reStructured Text (which I am a fan of). There isn't
a flood of patches from non-contributors - but legally we aren't
permitted to take large contributions from non core developers without
a signed form anyway. We do occasional (perhaps even regular) patches
on the tracker and the core developers all find it much easier to
maintain and change. Certainly that move was a success.<br>
<br>
All the best,<br>
<br>
Michael Foord<br>
<br>
<br>
[1] The first link on the "Help maintain the website" page is to
"Report problems or suggest an improvement" (
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://wiki.python.org/moin/PythonWebsiteCreatingNewTickets">http://wiki.python.org/moin/PythonWebsiteCreatingNewTickets</a> ). This
suggests emailing <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:webmaster@python.org">webmaster@python.org</a> (not a bad move) - or making
changes on this wiki page: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://wiki.python.org/moin/SiteImprovements">http://wiki.python.org/moin/SiteImprovements</a>
A wiki page is not a substitute for an issue tracker and that wiki page
is a mess.
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.ironpythoninaction.com/">http://www.ironpythoninaction.com/</a></pre>
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