[Mailman-Developers] Website re-org?

[Terri Oda]

On 2015-12-05 10:21 AM, Adam McGreggor wrote:
> On Sat, Dec 05, 2015 at 01:10:10AM -0800, Terri Oda wrote:
>> 3. Find out how to report a bug
>> We kind of fail on this one, except if you want to report a security
>> issue.  Again, this is more complex than it might seem since there's
>> a bunch of different components.
> Would it be easier here, to list the components, and then maybe link
> to the docs, and roadmap/issue tracker?
>
> something better presented than:
>
> | mailman 2         | stable version | docs  | bug tracker | mm-users |
> | mailman bundler   | everything     | docs  | bug tracker | mm-devs  |
> | posterious        |
> | hyperkitty        |
>
> or maybe a page linking to each item? Something like
> https://www.mysociety.org/projects/components/ (usual disclosure: I'm
> a co-founder of mySociety).
>

Yeah, my biggest concern with the table approach is actually that people 
won't know what component they're using when they want to report a bug. 
  I think we can probably do something more like the latter and then 
suggest that people submit against suite or maybe core if they're not 
sure and we'll move bugs as needed.

How does moving bugs work in gitlab?  I haven't had to do it yet.

Actually, the "what component am I using?" is a problem in a few places. 
  Maybe something more extensive on the front page explaining the 
projects and then on all the other pages we can say things like 
"HyperKitty web archiver" and link to the docs for more explanation.


>> 4. Find the docs / get help with an issue.
>>
>> The good: they're linked right there in the top bar.  The bad: is
>> someone looking at this going to know they want the docs for
>> postorius vs hyperkitty?  Will any of that make sense?  I think we
>> might need a landing page here.
>
> Maybe clarified in the above layout suggestion?

Indeed.


>> * Get Mailman
>> - Links to source code and install guides, high level description of
>> what to do.
>
> Possibly also things like packages.debian.org/mailman etc; homebrew; I
> would expect that most people will install with their package manager,
> despite what 'we' might prefer.

We've never bothered to link all the various packages for various 
distros before, but I do think we might need some explanation here if it 
turns out there's a lot of different names for the suite packages.  I 
know we have some rpms, but does anyone have those actually in a distro 
yet that we could point at?  In my experience, pointing at packages not 
in distro upstream isn't any better for many admins than PyPI is.


>> * Help and Documentation
> Link to the hot topics (dmarc, install, what ever's currently getting
> the most hits in a given period)?

Ooh, good idea.  Wonder if we can automate this from wiki hits? 
Probably fine to just choose a couple manually, though; they don't tend 
to change that rapidly.

>> * How to Contribute
>> - new contributors guide here, prefaced by the basic source/gitlab links
>
> Avoid duplication here, maybe, and just link to the Sphinx/RTD pages?
> Fairly sure I've seen a CONTRIBUTE file, somewhere. Maybe also link to
> coding standards (I think these are unified for the various
> components).

We do somewhere have a CONTRIBUTE file, but if I recall correctly, it's 
clear to experienced open source contributors but not so useful to folk 
for whom mailman is their first project who'll need more extensive links 
to resources and answers to common questions.  Since we get a lot of 
GSoC student aspirants and folk who meet one of us and think "these seem 
like nice people, maybe I'll make my first open source contribution with 
them,"  I think there's good reason to have something a bit more 
extensive than the existing CONTRIBUTE stuff.

That said, this new-contributors document might be just as well placed 
in the wiki so all community members can update it more easily.

>> Thoughts on better ways to set this up?  Other suggestions of things
>> people often want out of our website?
>
> Do ordinary folk want to find "where can i get one of these set-up for
> me" -- the vendors/hosting list, perhaps -- although maybe with some
> sort of ratings thing (and a last updated / which versions).

Yes!  We have a page on the wiki for hosting services to add themselves 
and we should link it.  I don't think we have resources to maintain 
ratings or version info, but if you're interested in doing that, I think 
people would find it useful.  I assume this should be linked in the "Get 
Mailman" section?

  Terri