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Date:      Sun, 16 Oct 2005 10:04:59 +1000
From:      jonathan michaels <jlm@caamora.com.au>
To:        "Devon H. O'Dell" <devon.odell@gmail.com>
Cc:        freebsd-www@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: new web site - bring back the old one
Message-ID:  <20051016100459.25429@caamora.com.au>
In-Reply-To: <9ab217670510151542x23e1f286w@mail.gmail.com>; from Devon H. O'Dell on Sat, Oct 15, 2005 at 03:42:30PM -0700
References:  <4350D8D9.4040303@mail.ru> <200510151649.03865.danchev@spnet.net> <Pine.BSF.4.63.0510151155290.96402@manganese.bos.dyndns.org> <20051015220304.GA61284@neptune.atopia.net> <9ab217670510151542x23e1f286w@mail.gmail.com>

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first, let me apologise to all teh people who were cc'd as part of my
reply to this post, i'm engaging with mutt and slowly manageing to learn
how to mavigate .. i also i managed to kill/seriously main my
'comft\rotable and old friend' keyboard which is configured differently
and smaller than the one i've used for the last 10-13 odd years. 


On Sat, Oct 15, 2005 at 03:42:30PM -0700, Devon H. O'Dell wrote:

> > And that is a big problem. I am willing to bet some money that most
> > visitors to freebsd.org *are* current users who use the materials on
> > the site as a reference. If you make a site pleasing to people who use
> > it most, new users will follow through.
> >
> > Sites that cater to new users are fine for businesses and such with
> > marketing departments. Not for technical sites whose primary purpose
> > is to provide documentation and support for a product.
> 
> All sites undergo changes at some point or another. The new site has a
> new interface and has been reorganized. This brings up two points:
> 
> a) Current users will need to relearn how to navigate the site. The
> new layout is a progression. It is not a regression. As current users,
> we should realize that a new layout is in the best interests of the
> project for new users and should adapt to it so that we can do two
> things:
>   i) Sufficiently use the new site, and
>  ii) Cater to new users requesting support who are using the new site.
> 
> b) The old site is still available at http://www.freebsd.org/old/. If

for how long is this arrangement going to be maintained, given that teh
flaws (from my browsers and my personal disabilities) in teh new
version of www.freebsd.org ??

> you need to find something and don't have time to figure out where it
> exists on the new page, you can still go here. Thus, the request to
> bring it back is silly: it is still available via a different
> location.
> 
> I consider the latter point to be moot. The old site is deprecated and
> will eventually no longer be maintained. All the old data still exists
> even if it is in another location. Spending an extra 10 seconds to
> find that data once doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

this idea may or may not be truely relevant to all who have serious
objections to teh overal usability of teh freebsd, the way the whole
internet html herd is being driven. i have yet to be able to run the
new freebsd.org html web page code tree through a stable/reliable
"usability" verification protocol but given what i've seen of teh new
code tree i am reasonably sure that it is not going to come out as very
disabled user 'compatible', 'friendly', 'usable' pick whatever "P.C."
sourced euphamism you wish to choose.

also, given the constant drive to be standards complient does
freebsd.org have any detailed plan to include or even have as one of
teh bew sites goals to be complient with several, any of the
international complience standards that are now being expected of
multi-media authors and web based html authors in particular,
complience protocols that contain penalties for those who breach the
federal laws, as we have here in australia --- web authors now have a
legally defined "duty of care" to make sure that thier web pages are
accessible/usable to/by disabled people out in teh community at large
(this dose not mean that teh disabled are then forced to go and buy all
teh special dodads giszmos hue sccreen lcd type "tv" to be able to read
even the large-font print.

i was involved with an organisation that ran foul of teh australian
commonwealth law on this particular matter soon after it was enacted,
some time after 1996'ish if memorry still serves me reliably.

my issue with the freebsd web site, all web sites actually i am not
"targeting" freebsd i've made this arguement with many authors managers
etc over many years bot as a private individual and as the (now former)
member of an australian sort of peek body for disabled people, i was in
teh process of guiding that oranisation into the computer age before
people who thought they knew more about computers just because they
used one a few minutes a day ... well thats an old sory tale.

i've seen it happen over and over again .. make teh web-site disabled
friendly i.e. and it becomes not just 'friendly' to all comers but
becomes far more usable to all users, it gives options to all that
allow many diferent ways of accentuaing the data delivery structures
and presentation vehicles.

also as these new lcd technologies become more and more prevalent in
teh community it will no longer become a 'hassle' to have to code for
specific font sizes or even general page layout. no i am npot carrying
on about intriducing html v4.0 or converting wholesale to xhtml v4.1
whatever, rather just advocating the using of teh language tools made
available with html v3.1 ypu that old venerable and stable print to
paper to screen to whatever ... if the technology pundits out there
driving this whole make freebsd gruvy by adopting all tehis current
madness (my idea, my descritionp) then why don't they all get serious
about thier own rantings and learn postscript, then build the nessacery
drivers, usability infrastructure into freebsd so teh the whole enduser
interface becomes hardware independant .. convert wholesale to the
postscript page description language.

postacript will make the idea of the web page, the glass tty, the
printed page, printer dirvers obselete and freebsd developers freed
from teh burden of having to worry about how thier content will
fit/look/whatever at the endusers point of consumption because
postscript takes care off of all ot that bagage.

to use one of teh euphamisms that are hurled at me by (the) uneducated
in an atempt to be insulting and to make themselves look good in thier
crowds/peers ... be part of teh solution not the problem, well the ball
in in your court, are you all going to keep it and run for teh goal
line or drop it like a hot potato and whinge that its too hard like
i've seen beeing done on so many ocassions recently and all teh way
back the ten years i've endured my life as it has been (not pointing
fingers just commenting on the struggle of staying alive with ever
decreasing resources while listening to politicians telling me and my
felow bottom dewelers how good our lives have been made by all teh
wonderful things goverernment and technology has done for us.

i've thought about that last one as we all should, because if one
cannot aford even teh basic level of technology the authers of all thes
wonderfull tools, computers. kitchen appliences, televisions,
entertainment dazzlers, bits to allow us to take our music movies even
favertite versions of war and peace in four or five of our favertie
languages complete with video comenty of teh suround country side and
traditional flok music .. several hours of same. yes if one cannot
afford teh basics of societal needs (food, clothing and shelter) then
hwo is one going be able to afford thes wonderfull gifts of technoloy,
it matters little if freebsd et al is free who cares if you do not have
to pay for the operating system if you then have to buy all teh special
gear, hardware, software, wetware to take teh freely provided data
stream and convert it into a this particular user frendly consumable
data (modified) stream.

we want freebsd to be a usable tool, yes, i surely would like to be
abl;e to do that because i know what a difference it could make in teh
lives of many many many many ... many people. life is not just teh bare
basics it is about the ability to enjoy life, to have a sence of
achievement, the ability to create, to give back some of what one has
recieved this is what makes life meaningfull worth living take that
away because its not fun to work on yesterdays video driver card or
debug a processor that not quite up to teh minute .. our education
system has turned us inot adreninilin driven c\serotonin junkies
craving teh next fun thing to do to ecxperience...life is not about fun
it is work, lots of hard demanding work and discipline something that
is not a faverouble topic in this do what you feel like society.

this is why i try toi advocate for the old freebsd website its usable
by people like me, with my kind of hardware and software tools that are
no longer fun, no longer interesting, no longer chalaneging to work on.
but, this dosent make then any less rewarding to wotk upon or to work
with.

sorry for thsi plea, this is probably the one thng that i truely care
acout, well there is one other but this is not the time or the place to
discust that issue.

i'm all fro a fi9nctionanle frebsd web site one that all people who
have a computer a web browser and a need/desire to reach out to freebsd
community can do so with the tools at thier disposal, not having to
make the desision of how many deserts/bits of meat/cups of grain they
will have to go with out to get teh hardware/software/wetware to be
able access all this FREE. NO COST information.

with my most kind regards, sincerely

jonathan 

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