Re: GNUstep web site and marketing thoughts

[Damianos Sidiropoulos]

>
> I think having a split website is fine, it can be made clearer, we can
> have better working and better navigation. The only common part is the
> painpoint: the homepage. We used the catch-all approach for years,
> continuing to add everything so that at a glance everything is there. I
> tried to clean it up a little, but it can be done further without fear,
> being sure that you can read what you need.
> 

GNUstep as a framework has an extremely rich set of tools in addition to the classes.
If web properties were separated between a developer web site and an end user facing web site for a future desktop, there are a few benefits.

- Each website has a distinct target audience
- Each website will have it's own home page tailored to the needs of their target audience
- It eliminates end users navigating to pages that are not relevant to them
- This opens the opportunity to actually have multiple implementations down the road. NEXT style, Modern style, phone, tablet etc
- There is more than enough content to justify a dedicated GNUstep developer focused site.

Apple themselves have multiple implementations/platforms. They also have separate web sites for end users and developers. This is not by accident and likely for the same reasons I stated above.

On Thu, Jul 11, 2024 at 1:48 PM Ethan C <echaroenpitaks@gmail.com> wrote:

I had an overview of the GNUstep system at https://ethanc8.github.io/Sphinx-Documentation/Reference/index.html. It's unfortunately a bit outdated, but do you think this kind of index would be good or do we want to organize oir docs some other way?

On Thu, Jul 11, 2024, 12:35 Riccardo Mottola <riccardo.mottola@libero.it> wrote:

Hi ANdreas,

Andreas Fink wrote:
> I think the answer lays in the area of who will use the website.
>
> If a developer wants to use it, he will think of frameworks for his app
> If a end user wants to use it, he will think of a full fledged desktop
> with a lot of apps already ready to deploy.

Exactly.. also there are different kind of developers. Some just want to
port their app - they don't care much about project philosphy, GNU,
whatever. Other choose to GNUstep core because they like it and take
portability to Mac as a bonus.

Also, different kind of users, some users just look at some screenshots,
others, who like to dive into details can look a bit in the technical
side, this is why I like them to be "one menu distance" in navigation.
Distinct, but near. Like the other side of the medal.

>
> For me the developer is just someone using an SDK to use the
> frameworks to run on the desktop. So the developer is a special user case.
> If the desktop is not attractive, then the end users will not install
> it, hence developers will at some point waste their time developing
> for it (ignoring the fact temporarly that you can write single apps
> who don't care about the desktop environment and just run on any X.org
> <http://X.org> install or even without any GUI).
>
> For me, marketing a fully fledged desktop is the much more attractive
> view. However it also means we must get a working reference
> implementation into the distros. Something where when one installs XYZ
> Linux, a question would appear saying "What Desktop do you want to run
> on: GNOME, KDE, Gnustep,...?"

Yes.. but think that GTK gives GNOME and XFCE and a lot of people like
the latter (myself) and QT has KDE and Trinity... (ok, I hope we won't
have stupid revision splits like these project has, pass the comparison).


>
> Given GNUStep is kind of a  "clone" of MacOS at some point, I believe
> having a well working desktop would bring MacOS developers over to the
> platform to use GNUStep as the tool to port their Apps to supported
> GNUStep Platforms. Of course all the latest new AI and ML and Metal
> implementation stuff would be missing but there are LOTS and LOTS of
> applications out there who could be ported easily. But it all starts
> with a working environment a developer coming over from MacOS could use.
>

thank you for your thought, it is similar to mine.


I think having a split website is fine, it can be made clearer, we can
have better working and better navigation. The only common part is the
painpoint: the homepage. We used the catch-all approach for years,
continuing to add everything so that at a glance everything is there. I
tried to clean it up a little, but it can be done further without fear,
being sure that you can read what you need.

However... we lack clear material in development, how things fit
together, the structure, so that you can read. The "glue" between just
raw  class reference and tutorials. They should be there and cross-linked.

Also some diagrams like our library structure. presentation of the
different libraries beyond core.

we essentially have:
https://www.gnustep.org/developers/index.html

which contains really little. Points out some stuff to Wiki... but we
should decide that if it is stable and complete, it should be "promoted"
and integrated. E.g.

https://www.gnustep.org/developers/map.html

Sorry for not having upgraded the style of it yet - will do. But it
should have a good "text" around the images.
Also... I find it a little bit confusing- gnustep make ?


The real useful it has is a link here:
https://www.gnustep.org/developers/documentation.html


Good evening,

Riccardo