The thread "Today the Hobbyist, Tommorow, The World!" seems to have drawn a group of people interested in improving the online presence of D. I read many reassuring posts and decided to create a new thread specifically for the purpose of improving the online presence of D.

Ideally D's online presence would be centralized. It would be approved and supported by Walter. Perhaps what we need is an "official" D site; one that would replace http://www.digitalmars.com/d/ (only with Walter's blessings, naturally). Walter would have the final say for what happens on this site, but the community could provide more content and present it well while freeing up Walter's time to work on the language.

I have made a template layout, and would like to donate it to the D cause. I hope I'm not being pretentious when I assume that with a little bit of polish, this layout will be good enough to represent D online.

http://hcoop.net/~natamas/d/template.html (improvements pending)


Walter, what do you think about this?


Anyone interested in helping, anyone with criticism/suggestions, etc, I would like to hear from you.

Some of the immediate questions that would need to be answered are:
 - Walter's blessing (after all, we can't be "official" without that)
 - reliable hosting
 - new wiki (wiki4d has good content, do we have permission to use it?)
 - content: wiki content, tutorials for D, library reference; a lot of
it exists but we need to bring it to one place with permission

nick wrote:
> The thread "Today the Hobbyist, Tommorow, The World!" seems to have
> drawn a group of people interested in improving the online presence of
> D. I read many reassuring posts and decided to create a new thread
> specifically for the purpose of improving the online presence of D.
> 
> Ideally D's online presence would be centralized. It would be approved
> and supported by Walter. Perhaps what we need is an "official" D site;
> one that would replace http://www.digitalmars.com/d/ (only with Walter's
> blessings, naturally).

What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?

> Walter would have the final say for what happens
> on this site, but the community could provide more content and present
> it well while freeing up Walter's time to work on the language.
> 
> I have made a template layout, and would like to donate it to the D
> cause. I hope I'm not being pretentious when I assume that with a little
> bit of polish, this layout will be good enough to represent D online.
> 
> http://hcoop.net/~natamas/d/template.html (improvements pending)

This shows a lot of promise. A couple nits:

1) is it does not adjust when the window size is changed.

2) it uses javascript to change the look when a mouse is over something, can the style sheet 'hover' thing be used instead?

> 
> Walter, what do you think about this?
> 
> 
> Anyone interested in helping, anyone with criticism/suggestions, etc, I
> would like to hear from you.
> 
> Some of the immediate questions that would need to be answered are:
>  - Walter's blessing (after all, we can't be "official" without that)
>  - reliable hosting
>  - new wiki (wiki4d has good content, do we have permission to use it?)
>  - content: wiki content, tutorials for D, library reference; a lot of
> it exists but we need to bring it to one place with permission

Walter Bright wrote:
> nick wrote:
>> The thread "Today the Hobbyist, Tommorow, The World!" seems to have
>> drawn a group of people interested in improving the online presence of
>> D. I read many reassuring posts and decided to create a new thread
>> specifically for the purpose of improving the online presence of D.
>>
>> Ideally D's online presence would be centralized. It would be approved
>> and supported by Walter. Perhaps what we need is an "official" D site;
>> one that would replace http://www.digitalmars.com/d/ (only with Walter's
>> blessings, naturally).
> 
> What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?

I think nick is concerned about D seeming like a hobby of Digital Mars rathan than a significant language in its own right. I think it's a valid point.

It looks good when a language has an official (or official-looking) website. Such as these examples for some other languages:

http://www.java.com/
http://www.php.net/
http://www.python.org/
http://www.ruby-lang.org/
http://www.perl.org/ / http://www.perl.com

-- 
jcc7

Walter Bright wrote:
> nick wrote:

> What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?
Do you mean the domain name or the site itself? I suppose the best domain name would be www.d.org but I'm sure it's taken; digitalmars.com/d is good enough as it is a top hit on google already.

The site itself looks a bit outdated(layout/style-wise); thus my effort with the new layout. In addition, it would be nice if you hosted a wiki there(there are many options here, Mediawiki isn't necessarily the best choice).

Finally, I think the front page for the official D website could borrow
some ideas from here: http://rubyonrails.org/
Specifically, I the big 4 todo items.


>> http://hcoop.net/~natamas/d/template.html (improvements pending)
> 
> This shows a lot of promise. A couple nits:
> 
> 1) is it does not adjust when the window size is changed.
I will create a stylesheet that resizes the layout with window size.

At the moment, the width is locked on purpose. It prevents people from making the site too wide and resulting in a difficult read (the ideal width for reading is 60-80 characters/line). You can change the size of the site by changing the font size(Ctrl-wheel or Ctrl-0/-/+ in firefox).

> 2) it uses javascript to change the look when a mouse is over something, can the style sheet 'hover' thing be used instead?
It doesn't, actually. It uses hover to change the appearance. It uses javascript to disable an outline that firefox draws around the tabs when you click on them. It is somewhat of a hack, which can easily be removed.

Justin C Calvarese wrote:
> Walter Bright wrote:
>> What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?
> 
> I think nick is concerned about D seeming like a hobby of Digital Mars rathan than a significant language in its own right. I think it's a valid point.
> 
> It looks good when a language has an official (or official-looking) website. Such as these examples for some other languages:
> 
> http://www.java.com/
> http://www.php.net/
> http://www.python.org/
> http://www.ruby-lang.org/
> http://www.perl.org/ / http://www.perl.com

www.d.com is already taken :-(

nick wrote:
> Walter Bright wrote:
>> What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?
> Do you mean the domain name or the site itself?

The name. I poked around with some other names, but they're either already taken or just aren't that good.

> I suppose the best
> domain name would be www.d.org but I'm sure it's taken;
> digitalmars.com/d is good enough as it is a top hit on google already.
> 
> The site itself looks a bit outdated(layout/style-wise); thus my effort
> with the new layout.

I understand, and I agree it can be improved. But I do like the spare, utilitarian look & feel.

> In addition, it would be nice if you hosted a wiki
> there(there are many options here, Mediawiki isn't necessarily the best
> choice).

I haven't done so already because of the numerous existing D wiki's.

> Finally, I think the front page for the official D website could borrow
> some ideas from here: http://rubyonrails.org/
> Specifically, I the big 4 todo items.

Some ideas, ok, but I don't like the look & feel of it. Too much whitespace, too little content, doesn't adjust to the screen size. Your template is much better.


>>> http://hcoop.net/~natamas/d/template.html (improvements pending)
>> This shows a lot of promise. A couple nits:
>>
>> 1) is it does not adjust when the window size is changed.
> I will create a stylesheet that resizes the layout with window size.
> 
> At the moment, the width is locked on purpose. It prevents people from
> making the site too wide and resulting in a difficult read (the ideal
> width for reading is 60-80 characters/line).

It's a lot harder to read when one has to use the scroll bar to read every line. Some readers don't have the option of setting the ideal width, and some readers might want the D reference manual in a smaller window so they have room for their code. The user should control the width, not the site designer.

> You can change the size of
> the site by changing the font size(Ctrl-wheel or Ctrl-0/-/+ in firefox).

True, but this is asking too much. People are used to controlling the size by dragging the window border, not the font.

>> 2) it uses javascript to change the look when a mouse is over something,
>> can the style sheet 'hover' thing be used instead?
> It doesn't, actually. It uses hover to change the appearance. It uses
> javascript to disable an outline that firefox draws around the tabs when
> you click on them. It is somewhat of a hack, which can easily be removed.

Ok, I just think that the use of javascript should be minimized, because many have js disabled for security reasons. Yes, I know the current pages use a bit of js for the search box and the google ads.

Walter Bright wrote:

> Justin C Calvarese wrote:
>> Walter Bright wrote:
>>> What's wrong with www.digitalmars.com/d/ as an official site?
>> 
>> I think nick is concerned about D seeming like a hobby of Digital Mars rathan than a significant language in its own right. I think it's a valid point.
>> 
>> It looks good when a language has an official (or official-looking) website. Such as these examples for some other languages:
>> 
>> http://www.java.com/
>> http://www.php.net/
>> http://www.python.org/
>> http://www.ruby-lang.org/
>> http://www.perl.org/ / http://www.perl.com
> 
> www.d.com is already taken :-(

Not taken, reserved I think. Together with all other letters it seems.

-- 
Lars Ivar Igesund
blog at http://larsivi.net
DSource & #D: larsivi

Lars Ivar Igesund wrote:
> Walter Bright wrote:
>> www.d.com is already taken :-(
> 
> Not taken, reserved I think. Together with all other letters it seems.

It's a squatter with a "make offer".

nick wrote:
> I suppose the best
> domain name would be www.d.org but I'm sure it's taken;

Actually, one-letter domain names aren't valid, except for those that got grandfather-claused in like x.org.

 - Gregor Richards

Walter Bright wrote:

> 1) is it does not adjust when the window size is changed.
Is this better?
http://hcoop.net/~natamas/d/template.html

> Ok, I just think that the use of javascript should be minimized, because many have js disabled for security reasons.
So, I am leaving the tab-outline-hack in since it doesn't affect functionality. Is that ok? It really doesn't affect appearance that much either. Some readers earlier asked for it and then went and looked up the hack for me =).

Regarding wikis:
> I haven't done so already because of the numerous existing D wiki's.
I understand that there are lots out there. Having an official wiki promotes the idea that D is a language that means business. It also makes it easy for newcomers to dive right in. I think it would be great if we just moved the content of wiki4d to your hosting w/ my new layout and a new wiki engine. Ideally, the wiki would be integrated with the official D site fairly seamlessly. I can read up on different wiki engines and create a template that uses my layout. Then, all you'd have to do is install that same wiki engine on your site and use my template.

Thoughts?