Re: Lilypond Website Work

[Urs Liska]

Am 06.12.2013 14:12, schrieb Federico Bruni:

These problems should be recorded in our tracker.
So far I've seen 2 issues/feature requests:

1. improve SEO
2. associate a different color scheme to each manual

I think although not explicitly stated as a feature request the discussion surely yields

3. Clarify first steps/new user experience.

Obviously it isn't clear enough what a new user has to expect from a text based notation program.
If I follow the trail from the front page I will read
a) "Introduction". OK, this doesn't tell me anything about how I'd have to work with LilyPond, but that's OK for that page (IMO)

b) "Features". This is problematic, I think:
- The "Elegance" box is OK, but I'm not sure why this is on a different page than "Our Goals" on "Introduction".
- "Ease of use". I have several problems with this box
  - "Text based input". Actually this says that you edit text files in an editor. But it does nothing to explain the concept who doesn't know about it already.
    " The input contains all the information, so there is no need to remember complex command sequences: simply save a file for later reference"
    I think this is simply misleading.
  - "Mix music and text" is actually a feature but doesn't have to do with "Ease of use".
  - "Extensible design" with Scheme absolutely doesn't belong to "Ease of use".

c) "Environment
- I think the "Editors" section should be first here. OK, Free Software is important, but I think at least at this point the user should finally be told what kind of tool he is suggested to download:
  - Currently the "Editors" section sounds too optional, something like: "If you want you also can try alternative editors".
    The term "Easier Editing" is suggesting this too.
    As a new user I'd probably think: "OK, I'll come back to this but first I'll give it a try with the built-in editor" :-(
So:
  - make it explicit that LilyPond itself doesn't have a GUI and will only process text files it is given.
  - make it explicit that you have to use an editor for this.
  - Say that it's part of the beauty of text based tools that you can use _any_ text editor,
    but that it is highly recommended to use one of the available dedicated GUI programs.
  - Suggest Denemo and Frescobaldi as appropriate tools (maybe giving a few hints about their characteristics)
    and say that these tools will take care of installing LilyPond too.
This can be quite short but should definitely contain a link to the "Text input" page.
This is actually very useful in our context, but again the section about "Easier Editing" isn't explicit enough.
Somehow this give the impression we're somehow ashamed of something.
In any case the message is too weak. The user _has_ to know he's going to use a compiler and needs a "programmer's editor" for that.
(Of course worded less bluntly).

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This isn't a "one should" post. I'm ready to contribute to this, as long as it is clear that changing contents on this level doesn't interfere with other current ideas of restructuring the web site.

Urs