Lyndon Griffin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes on 10 September 1999 at 13:53:56 -0700
> Maybe it's subjective, but I disagree - I don't feel that the site is well
> organized. Yes, there are sections of seemingly related material, which I
> guess is what you deem to be well organized. I do agree with you that this
> may no longer be the forum for this discussion. As you all can probably
> gather, I'm anxious to continue this discussion, however.
Well, if Russell wants to announce that he doesn't care to hear our
opinions, I could be convinced to cease offering them. I'm hoping,
however, that a polite and detailed discussion of the site design may
help come up with some suggestions that would significantly improve
it, and if we do and since people seem to be willing to help, perhaps
could actually be implemented.
And nearly everything *is* subjective, I'm certainly with you there.
Let me start with a big *thank you* to Russell Nelson for creating the
site, and keeping it pretty current. I've gone there a number of
times looking for specific things like the big dns patch, and I've
always found them.
Point 1: I find the categories things are grouped into somewhat
arbitrary. In particular, I think somebody new to qmail would find
them very confusing.
[addons]
Big -- and yet there are at least two or three others that are just
breakouts from here.
[author's software]
I think I see why these have a separate category -- BUT they're
essentially addons.
[qmail book]
[commercial support]
These two categories are clear and to the point.
[checkpassword]
This is a particular class of addon, which newbies won't understand
the purpose of. It's not even really for qmail as such.
[ezmlm]
I guess it makes sense to break out this author-written addon into its
own section....
[maildir]
This is mostly glue for interfacing other things to maildir; so the
section title is reasonably appropriate.
[tips]
These are pretty useful; but are actually rather different from the
other sections it seems to me.
[user software]
These are essentially addons too.
[user documentation]
[high-volume servers]
Another useful specialized category, I guess.
I wonder if what's really needed is a hierarchy more than 1 level
deep? And maybe with some cross-referencing?
Also, there isn't much editorial content. I can certainly see reasons
why, but what people really need is *advice* about how to proceed with
qmail, rather than a menu of everything that's available.
Point 2: I think it would be nice if the front page had *less*
technical stuff, and in particular if it looked less like a large
collection of enhancements and fixes for things. It presents the
appearance of a product that's in some disarray, which I think is an
unfortunate impression to make on a newcomer.
Point 3: I think I know why qmail.org is avoiding this role (time),
but it would be *really nice* if qmail.org laid out several paths into
qmail, with some discussion as to which path is appropriate for what
situation. I suppose it's also possible that Russell just doesn't
want to take the abuse the putting specific recommended paths on
qmail.org is likely to generate (from a small minority). (I don't
even know who is likely to object; it's just that I'm pretty sure
standing up is likely to get one shot at, as a general rule). I'm
thinking of paths like "personal fully-connected server" and
"intermittently connected personal system" and "high-volume mail
sender" and "large POP user community" and "internal node in big
organization that uses qmail overall". They wouldn't claim to be the
*only* or even *best* way -- but they'd describe a path and some of
the tradeoffs made. This sort of thing would help new users *a lot* I
think. I guess this is back to the "advice" concept I mentioned under
point 1.
--
David Dyer-Bennet ***NOTE ADDRESS CHANGES*** [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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