I’m a bit confused since it now appears to me that the getting started page has always been linked to from some locations on the website. But @joreg, thanks a lot for looking into it! That’s awesome and a great start.
While analysing the structure of the website I realise it might be a good idea to restructure some of the content to highlight some content hidden in subpages other more prominent places one level up in the sitemap. But that’s a more extended conversation. I’m happy to help, but can’t spend this much time right now. I feel Dominik Koller (can’t figure out his forum name) of the vvvv academy could also be a good help with all of this here as well.
Anyway here are some thoughts for improvements:
First of all, I think the guide could be more obvious on the website:
- add a link on the landing page
- move the one on the download page up straight to the top. All info there is mostly interesting for beginners everyone else is familiar with most of the info on that page anyway.
- make the link to the guide on the documentation page stand out more. I’ve not recognised it before. Maybe give it a separate highly inviting paragraph, ideally, with an introductory video (perhaps from vvvv academy). Some of this (the video) might also have a better spot in the guide itself.
Regarding its content and incomplete list in no particular order:
- add link to the glossary: about the glossary | vvvv
- add link to the how to find help page: HowTo Find Help | vvvv
- add link to troubleshooting: TroubleShooting | vvvv
- add link to documentation: https://vvvv.org/documentation/documentation
- add link to learning section of the documentation page
- explain how the community works: e.g. asking lots of questions is the way to go.
- encourage people to become part of the community and help improve vvvv, e.g. by writing/updating documentation and creating help patches at the end of the document.
- create a short about section on the top. This should include the link to the propaganda page with a sentence like: “Is vvvv the right tool for you? Get an overview of vvvvs main capabilities and features.”
- The guide should relate to the new users rather then vvvv itself. We should ask ourselves what kind of questions new users are having (maybe by talking to vvvv teachers) and answer them in the guides. One example: “Do you have experience in other frameworks or textual coding? Check out this page to learn about the differences and how to make the transition into the beautiful world of vvvv” (not sure if this page exists already somewhere)
- add text or link to a separate page(s) about how the community works and encourage to become part of the community by getting involved in the forum or improving the documentation
- Add a warning about how vvvv is different to some other software, how it might be confusing in the beginning, but how much cooler it’s going to be later, once you quickly learned and understood. Encourage people to stick to vvvv!
- Change the “before you ask” into a separate “What do I need to work with vvvv?” section and add a three-button mouse to the list.
I’m afraid. I always avoided the website in the past, because I was soo hard to find answers to my questions. I talked to people who were more experienced than me instead. Great to hear about all those improvements though.
If there is not enough money to pay someone for this, maybe the community could help with this? Especially teachers would profit from this quite a bit, but everyone else too of course. I feel like the, e.g. Processing community is onto it when it comes to improving documentation. So maybe outreaching to the vvvv community with a dedicated blog post and adding a page about how to help to improve the website could help with it?
Good on you and great to hear! I can definitely feel how responsive you are at this conversation and highly appreciate it.
I spent some time today reading the whole Girlpower folder thread. It was great to get an image of the different opinions and attitudes within the community. It showed me, that there are a lot of open-minded people caring about beginners. But also the opposite is present which confirms some of my earlier thoughts on why and how vvvv is hard to access for beginners.
Again, to make sure no one even get’s some of those negative impressions I had, I think it would help to write some kind of mission statement / code of conduct / manifesto or guideline (my English is probably not good enough to nail the terminology, but I hope you get the idea). Having a clear vision of what vvvv is supposed to be, how decisions are made, what its strengths are and where it sucks, what the social environment of the community should look like and what everyone can expect from each other (devvvvs, community, contributors, …) can really help to have meaningful discussions and make quick decisions while always referring back to those documents.
Writing these documents can be a tedious process and is hard to realise or can even put some people off. I think it’s well worth it though. I reckon start with only a few sentences everyone you know can agree with and then extend it to something bigger over time.
I feel I sound like the schoolmaster while still being a newbie. I’m sorry if I come across arrogant while not understanding the big picture. Really just want to help and understand better.
One good example is the Vuo.
They have a pretty transparent way of letting the community vote for new requests which will be included later:
They have (by the looks of it) a fair and unbiased comparison to similar software (including vvvv): How does Vuo compare to other creative coding environments? | Vuo
The way they are presenting the system is more clear and straightforward compared to vvvv in my opinion.
Thank you. :) I’m gonna contact you when I’m in Berlin.