Olaf Hannemann wrote:

I think, we shouldn't change the Layout completely, but for the use of Interwiki Links and things like that it would be fine if the German http://de.opensuse.org/Dokumentation looks like the English master wiki http://en.opensuse.org/Documentation.

I'm not so sure of that. we must take account of the fact that the en wiki is the older one, and this mean it's in great part obsolete or made of superposed planes, and it's the more difficult to fix. the download page is so a mess I could not accept to keep it like it is. I myself revamped quite heavily this part, see http://fr.opensuse.org/Téléchargement Of course, if a real discussion arise and the english page get a clear and wondefull aspect, I will follow it. as long as this is not the case I would be glad to see ideas in the others wikis

Another aspect is, that the user can easily switch between the languages and find everything in the place he is used to.

few users really switch langages. an anglish reading user is free to use the en page if he find it better.

...

Months ago I suggested to redesign the frontpage, to allow users to find help more easily: http://de.opensuse.org/Startseite http://de.opensuse.org/Benutzerdokumentation_anders Looks really nice, but I think such capital changes should be made in the master wiki first.

Front page is an other thing. We already discussed this here, with very few people involved in the discussion and so little value. I personnally think than simplicity must be the key and that the front page must be simpler than whats it is now. I have made my page a bit simpler (mostly sidebar) and added a picture of the new 10.1 box. Users consulted (french forum) approved the chage. here one desagree, others agreed, most don't care. However I doubt unengaged people notice the differences http://fr.opensuse.org/Bienvenue_sur_openSUSE.org here also, if a clear consensus arise, I will follow it. anyway localized wikis have in my opinion a quite different goal from the english one. Fort example, I do not translate the developpement version page. It's not entirely a choice, I only choiced not to make them a priority. anyway, people interested in this have to read english. jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/galerie_photo_web/expo/index.html http://lucien.dodin.net http://fr.susewiki.org/index.php?title=Gérer_ses_photos

Moin! Am Samstag, 13. Mai 2006 22:19 schrieb Olaf Hannemann:

In this case I think the German page is the older one. (the English one changed some time ago, but the German doesn't follow) I would like to have a page where links are easy to find. and not clicking Dokumentation -> Benutzer Dokumentation -> Start für neue Benutzer ....and so on. Clicking Dokumentation must show up the main topics. I don't want to worry about questions like "is it a Novell, a SUSE, a User or something else documentation". I want to find the topic I was looking for. So even the FAQs and things like these must be easy to find.

So there are at least two of us. :) Although I still think the "help" is a better term for the start-page then "documentation". The problem is that with the current layout you will get a very long list, which I think is not very helpful. (http://en.opensuse.org/Howtos) so one would have to have at least two columns to have better use of the available space, if one wants to arrange topics with only a sentence as decription. This is also the reason I put the help-topics on the start-page for my proposal. Just compare http://en.opensuse.org/Hardware and http://en.opensuse.org/Howtos. I think it is clear which one is clearer. Another thing I so not like are the current topics on http://en.opensuse.org/Documentation. - Installation - Articles covering all aspects of the installation of SUSE Linux. Why is the topic "installation" just bound to installing Linux, why not make installing Linux the top item of that category that handles software installation in a more general way. - Configuration - System and application configuration articles. These articles describe how to configure, e.g. a web-server, so they are mostly howtos, are they not? Hardware - Supported platforms, hardware compatibility lists, tweaking, optimizing, and troubleshooting. There are hardly any articles in there, so there is not much to say. Howtos - Howto Guides on a wide variety of topic So there is a page with all kinds of howtos, which on the other hand can slo be configuration-articles, or trouble-shooting howtos, or installation-howtos. What about taking the another approach, i.e. having topic-relevant hardware-comptibility list, config and howtos in the wlan-section, instead of having wlan spread all over config, hardware and howtos?

Didn't want to say we must do every thing like in the en wiki but I think the main pages like Front page, Documentation page ..etc should look something simular. Changing this should be a general discussion. The content may be different.

That discussion was started several times and always ended very quickly without any "approved" changes to the wiki. Sven

Hello! Am Sonntag, 14. Mai 2006 15:03 schrieb Peter Flodin:

I would like to discuss this further, as I agree with your overall assesment. Even though the wiki is not yet a year old, it is easy to get boxed in with existing content and structure. Some of the existing structure is from when there were practically no articles last August.

So in your proposed approach, what do you see on the Documentation page? We also need to incorporate the SDB, as it just sits on the outside at the moment.

The problem I see is that if the current categories on the site remain, the user might have to visit several of them, if s/he wants to find something. As an example: A user comes to the wiki and wants to find something about getting his WLAN-card to work. There might be some articles in installation, since network-card-setup is part of the installation. Yet it can also be part of the category configuration, since it must be configured. Then again, it can be part of Hardware, since the HCL sometimes contains hints for certain devices and a device certainly is a piece of hardware. Last but not least, there could be a HOWTO about how to set-up a WLAN-card. So there is the start-page, searching for help and support, guessing that documentation means help and support, click, first category, back, second, back... If there was a category "Devices and Drivers: Setting up and configuring devices such as network-cards, printers, graphics-borad etc." on the start-page, the user would not have to search for help or "documentation". There would be a category with direct relevance to the question s/he has, which could offer everything concerning a device. In the Category "Devices and Drivers" one would have sub-categories, i.e. network-devices, graphics, printers and so on. If the user chooses network-devices, s/he gets all the info needed, i.e. installing, settings-up, configuring, HOWTOs, troubleshooting and the network-devices-HCL, novell-docs etc. I think we should come up with the questions users ask and see what categories offer them a direct connection to their question. Questions I thought about are: How do I set-up my printer, wlan-card, graphics-board, scanner, digicam etc.? -> Devices and Drivers How can I get help? -> Getting help, rerporting bugs. How do I install package xyz, how do I install a tar.gz, where can I find packages for xyz, how do I update KDE? -> Installation and Software-Package-Management How do I create a letter, a spreadsheet, which software can I use to organise my finances, how do I create PDFs? -> Office In windows I used to do xyz to install an app, how do I do that in Linux? -> First steps How do I set-up my email-app, which apps are available, how do I set-up IRC, which apps are available, how do I set-up file-sharing or an ftp-server, how can I share my desktop, how do I set-up SSH? -> Local-Network and Internet How do I play mp3s, how do I watch divx or DVD, how can I encode audio/video, how do I edit my photos? -> Multimedia and Graphics. Other categories would be: Development Sys-Admin Games Desktop Environments IMHO these categories should be available with no click, i.e. on the startpage with a one-sentence-description. After clicking on a category there should be the sub-categories: Devices and Drivers: - Network-devices - Graphics-devices - Keyboard and Mouse - Printers and Scanners - Notebooks - Monitors - Soundcards As a result, the user does not have to search for a page that offers the categoris, but sees them right away when coming to opensuse.org. And only one click is needed to access the page with the sub-categories and the links to the articles. Another thing I was thinking about, what term is written on the little books that come with a MP3-player and one has a look at, if one wants to know how that thingy works, is it documentation, or something like instructions or guide? Sven

So there are at least two of us. :) Yes there are :) Although I still think the "help" is a better term for the start-page then "documentation". The problem is that with the current layout you will get a very long list, which I think is not very helpful. (http://en.opensuse.org/Howtos) so one would have to have at least two columns to have better use of the available space, if one wants to arrange topics with only a sentence as decription. I really like the help-topics on your start page especially things like "interaktive Hilfe" How about making a step in between and putting it on the Dokumentation site. Is better than having nothing at all. I think it would be really nice to have a more separated documentation section in the left navigation bar (maybe something named help as own topic) and

Am Sonntag, 14. Mai 2006 08:21 schrieb Sven Burmeister: Hi! linked to the main headlines inside the wiki but this must be done by someone else.

Just compare http://en.opensuse.org/Hardware and http://en.opensuse.org/Howtos. I think it is clear which one is clearer. Ack. But if you take only the 10 headlines and link on another page for each topic the howto page will be human readable.

Another thing I so not like are the current topics on http://en.opensuse.org/Documentation. Me to. for example i don't like the "start here" section at all. most of the articles in there are also in the "User Documentation". So what is what and where to go first? In the end it's the same.

- Installation - Articles covering all aspects of the installation of SUSE Linux.

Why is the topic "installation" just bound to installing Linux, why not make installing Linux the top item of that category that handles software installation in a more general way. +1

- Configuration - System and application configuration articles.

These articles describe how to configure, e.g. a web-server, so they are mostly howtos, are they not? +1

Hardware - Supported platforms, hardware compatibility lists, tweaking, optimizing, and troubleshooting.

There are hardly any articles in there, so there is not much to say. I think Hardware compatibility list should be in front. Most of the users are searching for that. PPC also in front. Think we are going with more then only one article on this topic. (or is it a howto?) The rest splits in the other categories.

Howtos - Howto Guides on a wide variety of topic

So there is a page with all kinds of howtos, which on the other hand can slo be configuration-articles, or trouble-shooting howtos, or installation-howtos.

What about taking the another approach, i.e. having topic-relevant hardware-comptibility list, config and howtos in the wlan-section, instead of having wlan spread all over config, hardware and howtos? Just another another way round. In think howtos and faq are names users are used to all over the internet. If someone is looking for help, he is looking for this topics. Don't take them away. But.... *grübel..* isn't nearly everyting a howto in the one or the other way? Don't know a solution for that by now. You may be quit right. How about having a howto section and linking from the other categories also to the howtos? May be a mess with a lot of broken links. I don't know.

...

Didn't want to say we must do every thing like in the en wiki but I think the main pages like Front page, Documentation page ..etc should look something simular. Changing this should be a general discussion. The content may be different.

That discussion was started several times and always ended very quickly without any "approved" changes to the wiki. Hhmmm..... Just wanted to do something, because I see a real lack of German documentation. I know some not English reading users and it is really hard for them to find some help outside the official Novell documentation. So I think doing something that may be changed in the near future and I don't see as the best solution, is better than doing nothing at all.

By the way I fully agree with the words of Peter Flodin answering to your mail:

"I see we really only need three or four of us to agree on a structure and then just do it.

The thing not to forget is that with the wiki you don't need community consensus to do anything and it is self-repairing. The more people you annoy with an edit the more people take an interest and voice their opinion on what they think. It is nearly always a win-win situation"

Regards, Olaf