Subject: Re: replace training blurb with upcoming pug meetings?
From: Simon Riggs <simon@2ndquadrant.com>
To: Magnus Hagander <magnus@hagander.net>
Cc: "Joshua D. Drake" <jd@commandprompt.com>,
	Chander Ganesan <chander@otg-nc.com>,
	Robert Treat <xzilla@users.sourceforge.net>, pgsql-www@postgresql.org
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	<200805282110.54958.xzilla@users.sourceforge.net>
	<4845B34A.2040909@otg-nc.com> <1212528389.12052.211.camel@jd-laptop>
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Date: Wed, 04 Jun 2008 09:07:23 +0100
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On Wed, 2008-06-04 at 09:09 +0200, Magnus Hagander wrote:
> Joshua D. Drake wrote:
> > 
> > 
> > On Tue, 2008-06-03 at 17:10 -0400, Chander Ganesan wrote:
> > 
> > > 
> > > I think a single link to training in a spot of its very own would
> > > provide a bit more visibility than being cluttered with some text
> > > and a link.  Perhaps we can have some list of the number of events
> > > as well?  Want training (22 events coming up!)?
> > 
> > 
> > One option would be to remove events, news, training, and planet
> > listings and instead have larger and nicer representation for direct
> > links:
> > 
> > Find a User group!
> > Get Training!
> > Latest News!
> > Our community Blogs!
> > 
> > Each of those would be direct links respectively. This would
> > significantly reduce the noise on the page.
> 
> Or we just remove the frontpage completely? ;-)
> 
> IMHO this would significantly reduce the value of the information
> there. If anything should be removed, it's IMHO the shortcuts and
> "support us" sections. Second to that is training. All the others are
> IMHO much more important than the usergroup listings (which doesn't say
> that the usergroup listings aren't important, of course).

Hmmm. I think its hard to say which are the more popular links.

Many people would never click on training, but if there was a training
course they wanted they would go. But how would they ever know? Same
with user groups. Many people wouldn't be interested, but open a user
group in their local area and suddenly they care? But how would they
ever know?

So I suggest two things:

* move the suggested topics to detail pages. Give prominence to what
turns out to be most popular. Look at hits, don't speculate or argue.

* have a way of bubbling up information from details to front page. Do
this fairly randomly, so the front page is fresh and exciting each time
you visit.

I think people are interested in new and interesting things, however we
categorise them. Running the same course title monthly for a year is not
news, but then neither is the 5th meeting this year of the Pugtown PUG.
Nor is writing multiple blog entries on the same day.

We just need a way for proactive and/or innovative people to get
attention for their activities, without being swamped by bulk marketing
activities by the overzealous. Cool blogs, new courses, new PUGs etc are
what people want to know about.

Can we review again the reasons for keeping all on one page? Why not
allow the screen to scroll down?

-- 
 Simon Riggs           www.2ndQuadrant.com
 PostgreSQL Training, Services and Support