23:57:58 #startmeeting 23:57:58 Meeting started Thu Sep 9 23:57:58 2010 UTC. The chair is jadudm. Information about MeetBot at http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot. 23:57:58 Useful Commands: #action #agreed #halp #info #idea #link #topic. 23:58:23 If I knew more about zodbot, I'd add other chairs. But, I don't. 23:58:36 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/HCD/Website_Testing_Resources 23:58:43 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/HCD/Website_Testing_Needs 23:58:49 #link https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Website_redesign_2009_requirements#Tasks 00:00:02 jadudm, i'd pull up the wiki page on the meeting bot but, the wiki is down :( 00:00:07 which might cause some problems here too 00:00:11 (all the mockups are on it :( ) 00:00:34 The wiki page came up for me. Do you mean fp.org/wiki is down? 00:00:51 yeh 00:00:56 the fpo wiki is down 00:01:00 Oops. See what you mean. 00:01:03 Perhaps it was cached. 00:01:09 MURPHY STRIKES. 00:01:24 dun dun dun 00:01:34 Well, this page is in my browser (https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Website_redesign_2009_requirements#Tasks) 00:01:36 lol 00:01:43 so the fedora wiki is in a planned outage and will be out for 2 hours 00:01:44 Should I stick it in an etherpad for us to see for the time being? 00:01:48 they just took it down 00:01:50 Awesome! 00:01:53 :-/ 00:02:08 i think smooge is going to try to bring it back up for us though 00:02:44 IN SOVIET FEDORA, WEBSITE COMES UP FOR YOU 00:02:51 heh 00:03:27 I pasted the website redesign 2009 requirements here: http://openetherpad.org/8CQ0kocfmC 00:03:49 awesome 00:04:19 I must have caught it just before it went down. So. Would you like a quick intro from who is working with you? Or, shall we take it as a given that there's a group from Allegheny here? 00:04:49 whatever works! 00:05:12 Would the Allegheny crew mind pasting in a link note with a pointer to your user pages on the rockalypse wiki? 00:05:17 sijis_vacation <= is on vacation, he is our main developer on the project, and Jef (who is normally in here as Schendje) is in the netherlands so he's probably sleeping now :) 00:05:28 * mizmo <= Máirín Duffy, fedora design team lead & Red Hat interaction designer 00:05:38 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Jadudm 00:05:40 I'm Matt. 00:05:44 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Kauffmj 00:05:48 http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Khane 00:05:49 I'm Jonathan Miller Kauffman. 00:05:51 I'm Evan 00:05:58 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Hildebe 00:06:05 I'm Eric Hildebrand 00:06:14 http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Yaworsw 00:06:14 khane: the #link tells zodbot to include it in the transcript all special-like. 00:06:24 * johnsog <- #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Johnsog 00:06:29 ah 00:06:37 I'm Genevieve Johnson 00:06:38 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Rad 00:06:46 I'm Jamie Keep: http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Keepd 00:06:53 yaworsw, where is salamanca? im from westerlo ny 00:07:05 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Yaworsw 00:07:21 mfody: just dropping pointers to our user pages on the wiki. 00:07:24 its about an hour and a half south of buffalo 00:07:27 ah okay 00:07:42 (westerlo is an hour+ south west of albany) 00:07:50 sorry my wiki page is pretty bare at this point i'll make sure to update it much more soon 00:08:03 id show you my fedora wiki page but... :-p 00:08:10 complete other side ha 00:08:42 yeh my bro went to geneseo though so ive driven out your way sort of before 00:09:11 Cool. That serves as an attendance of sorts, too. :) 00:09:17 have any of you heard of / used Fedora before? 00:09:23 haha 00:09:24 (We'll catch Matt and Sam before we're done.) 00:09:32 I have been using it for 3 years. 00:09:34 I'm here 00:09:40 wow awesome 00:09:41 i used it once 00:09:47 Sams here 00:09:47 #link http://wiki.rockalypse.org/User:Rosss 00:09:54 I have it Virtualboxed, yeah 00:09:56 mismo: i have worked with fedora last semester in a class with jadudm 00:09:56 rdcrng, i really like your user page lol 00:10:11 i only use it in the labs at school but i have ubuntu installed on my desktop... i just need a monitor for it now lol 00:10:27 Lol, thanks. Don't really know how to make intro pages. 00:11:17 We have a pretty savvy bunch overall, in one form or another. 00:11:26 And here's my life story kind of pages aren't my favorite. 00:11:39 I'm not 100% sure how best to run the meeting, but we'll learn. 00:12:06 I guess I can say that we're keen to do our first round of learning on usability testing on the Fedora website, and I think we've got a fairly high degree of overlap between our observations and your top ten list. 00:12:15 oooh the wiki is back up i think 00:12:19 oh okay great 00:12:25 * jadudm does a wiki jig 00:12:28 well can you walk me through your process so far? 00:12:34 could you post the like the link to the wiki where we put our notes from yesterdays class? 00:12:45 I think I did at the top. I'll repeat them: 00:12:51 #http://wiki.rockalypse.org/HCD/Website_Testing_Needs 00:12:59 Ah, thanks. 00:13:02 ah that was before i got here 00:13:19 And the top ten from mizmo: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Website_redesign_2009_requirements#Tasks 00:13:28 I think we missed focusing on that in our conversation. 00:13:56 Anyone want to take a stab at our process so far? 00:14:59 it looks like you started with a whiteboard discussion - http://wiki.rockalypse.org/HCD/Website_Testing_Resources 00:15:06 we all pretty much agreed on no 1 from mizmo's list, that was a big part of our discussion 00:15:33 and did you look at the existing www.fedoraproject.org? 00:15:42 Right. Our process was first to identify resources that would help us with doing testing, and that morphed into discussion of the fp.o site. 00:15:48 the redesign looks much better imo 00:15:55 BTW, I threw a late and slightly random insight-driven email on the related thread on the mailing list: 00:16:02 #link http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/websites/2010-September/008564.html 00:16:04 Our next step was to discuss with you needs/directions/focus. 00:16:16 * quaid leaves that for later and returns to le lurk 00:17:05 Our next step will then be to immerse ourselves in literature regarding testing, and start cutting our teeth. 00:17:15 okay cool 00:17:34 We can easily divide into groups of 3/3/4, having 10 people. 00:17:50 each group tests a chunk of the redesign? 00:17:54 Exactly. 00:17:57 okay cool 00:18:04 (btw, team: dive in wherever/whenever.) 00:18:10 jadudm: coincidentally, we need some of that "about testing" material for the "Practical OSS Exploration" textbook - I'd like a feed of your reading/research list as it becomes available. 00:18:15 *dives 00:18:23 it's irc, it's supposed to be funny & chatty lol 00:18:29 well, what are 3 areas that you feel need the most work? 00:18:44 * quaid hides mizmo's PSP 00:18:45 khane, in the redesigns? 00:18:50 yea 00:18:57 hmm let me think 00:19:14 so i know the download pages still need a lot of work 00:19:26 we have some folks who are .... picky.... and quite particular 00:19:31 haha 00:19:40 well, hopefully we won't dissapoint 00:19:42 * jadudm looks at rdcrng 00:19:48 Yeah no kidding, we *almost* had a heated debate about it already. 00:19:50 so we did a big redesign of the download pages in our current template - it was released last may 00:20:07 and i literally got hate mail over the bittorrent link being hard to find :-p 00:20:08 whoops 00:20:13 we looked at the mockup pretty in-depth 00:20:20 i know there are some cases like that we're probably missing still 00:20:28 i did a blog post on it but haven't revisited those pages yet 00:20:40 do you consider download to be a space where you're happy with the design, or would you like us to put it through the paces? 00:20:52 oh please put it through the paces 00:20:59 we must be missing things 00:21:05 we were pretty aggressive in simplifying it 00:21:20 we ended up doing a patch a couple days after release for bittorrent 00:21:30 i think there are other things folks are sitll a bit ornery about in those pages 00:21:47 so 00:21:54 #1 is the download pages, i think they can still use work 00:21:58 #2 i would say is the visual design 00:22:16 the more that i look at the features + screenshots page the more i feel like there is an overloading amount of information being thrown at the user 00:22:21 i think some of the issues with the visual design - well, i'm trying to appeal to fedora's (rather recently defined) target user 00:22:39 yaworsw, (that was going to be my #3 ) :) 00:22:42 https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User_base 00:22:42 i like that it gives options to read more for everything but there sure are an aweful lot of options 00:22:46 thats the target user definition 00:22:55 #link https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/User_base 00:23:15 i think for our purposes we're going to try and see if we can simplify as much as possible 00:23:16 #info target user base for the website redesign 00:23:45 some folks have given me feedback such that maybe this design is too corporate 00:23:46 khane: or, more specifically, see what kinds of revisions come out of a testing process 00:24:09 (oh ps, for #1, here's the link to the blog post going over the problems with get.fpo) 00:24:10 Hi. site should be working better 00:24:15 thanks smooge !! 00:24:17 smooge: that's awesome. thank you! 00:24:35 smooge: our timing for this meeting was Murphy-inspired w.r.t. downtime. Thanks for the help. 00:24:50 i did a blog post really recently about how older versions of the front page's visual design were seen as being too 'corporate' 00:24:56 We discussed the idea of the design being too corporate and we were curious what exactly that meant. Is that a bad thing?? 00:24:56 http://mairin.wordpress.com/2010/09/03/fedoraproject-org-redesign-update/ <= you can see the old vs. the new there 00:25:02 well 00:25:12 let me show you something 00:25:25 :) it's going to be funny but maybe slightly inappropriate so i apologize in advance 00:25:32 http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=55201 00:25:49 this is some discussion on the latest design (the attempt at being less corporate) from the debian user forums 00:26:06 they are kinda bashing it :) 00:26:16 but keep in mind, look at debian.org to see where they are coming from too 00:26:22 there's a concern i think for authenticity 00:26:28 if the site looks too corporate, there are a few problem 00:26:53 #1 - people might assume fedora is not free (actually if you look at ubuntu.com they have a big ad either on the front or on the download page saying yes, yes it's really free) 00:26:54 Wow. 00:27:09 Do you own fireproof clothing? 00:27:20 hehe 00:27:27 i thought the mockup was hilarious though.... 00:27:33 theres a unicorn man or somehting 00:28:22 #2 - if the fedora site looks too corporate, we might lose some of our authenticity - you how indie bands sometimes make it big then they 'sell out' and their music isn't as good either, it's kind of watered down. i think there's a big concern about fedora being perceived that way 00:28:28 well i think that getting the message out that it is free could be done in the same way ubuntu does it 00:28:37 say it's free in big bold text 00:28:41 Well, think that one of the problems of communities like Debian's is that they are almost impregnable by anyone who doesn't consider themselves a computer expert / geek. 00:28:46 #3 - we want people to realize they can dive in and help too. if things look too polished, people might think there's no place for them 00:29:05 Truth is most people put themselves into the "computer challenged" category 00:29:11 * quaid notes that the word "free" is overly loaded in this context. 00:29:12 wow, just like paper prototyping!!! 00:29:14 i dont know if you folks have heard of this, but i've seen it in action and it's true - if you try usability testing using pencil sketches vs polished mockups, people are less willing to be candid about the more polished design 00:29:21 how about, "Yes, zero cost!"? 00:29:24 so if you have a more polished website - maybe folks think you don't need help or people to join 00:29:45 quaid, the problem with zero cost is folks who don't want the 'software freedom' message to be lost get a bit upset 00:29:50 Free refers not only to cost 00:29:53 "a bit" upset 00:29:56 rdcrng, that's 100% true. 00:30:18 mizmo: I mean, in reference to the costing confusion 00:30:19 Free as in liberation from corporate hold over software 00:30:32 that you said Ubuntu solved by saying, "yes, it's really free" (iirc) 00:30:34 quaid, oh i know. but that's why it's not a simple solution to do 00:30:48 quaid, they probably care less about that kind of flak than we do 00:30:52 well i bet the website would lose a lot of it's corporate feel if we simply removed some of the gloss 00:31:03 agree 00:31:14 well, if we say, "It's 100% free. What does that really mean?!?" and link out to the 2 explanations, that might work :P 00:31:15 the old website has the simplicity 00:31:27 just needs some navigational improvement 00:31:34 mizmo, what is your absolute favorite part of the website? 00:31:42 but the current website it also doesnt really explain what fedora is, rdcrng 00:31:45 yaworsw: good question. 00:31:52 yaworsw, the current site or the redesign? 00:31:58 redesign 00:32:01 hmm 00:32:43 i suppose you can say your favorite part of the current site too, that wouldn't hurt haha 00:32:52 i think probably my favorite part of the redesign is the slideshow on the front page 00:33:05 right now we don't have a space like that to really highlight the awesome things we do 00:33:23 theres some wiki pages, but i think wikis are a bit intimidating for folks just wanting to learn the basics about waht fedora is and what makes it cool 00:33:46 so i think the slideshow is a good opportunity to get lots of great content out there - in a scoped-out, limited space so it doesn't overrun the website or overcrowd it either 00:34:14 ahh there is a website i know of that does a slideshow thing that looks really nice but i can't think of the url 00:34:23 what are the subjects of the other slides? 00:34:33 my favorite part of the current website - well, it's nice that it's slim in size and fast-loading, but that's been a constraint that's caused it to kind of suck in a lot of other ways 00:34:51 hildebe, we haven't fleshed them all out yet, but we have some samples, one sec 00:34:51 we'll all have fiber soon, so speed won't be an issue. 00:35:08 hildebe, http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Website_redesign/Mockups/Www.fpo#Slideshow_Banners 00:35:16 hildebe, those sample slides use an earlier template 00:35:41 anyway where i was going with that question is i read a book on creativity professor jadud gave me, in the book there was a portion about a web designer. he said whenever he would get stuck designing a website we would remove his favorite part of the website and then try to move forward from there 00:35:44 but we were thinking maybe 5-6 slides: 1 to explain what fedora is, 1 to talk about our community, and 3 or 4 to highlight some interesting features 00:35:57 yaworsw, heh thats an intriguing idea 00:36:22 is matt R here? 00:36:30 He had a meeting that he was afraid would run into the chat. 00:36:33 hard to accept idea :D 00:36:40 he might not be. 00:37:00 ah, he had some comments about the slideshow 00:37:10 I really think the slideshow is a great idea considering the target user, I don't think i could get behind the suggestion of removing it... 00:37:11 so, I'm going to bring us back around to our question. 00:37:24 rdcrng, i get where its coming from though. eg when i was designing the newer features mockup (i think the one in the wiki is a bit old at this point), i actually lost my source file and had to start from scratch for most of it, and i think it came out better for it 00:37:34 which is: what are the aspects of the site we're going to begin by testing. 00:37:51 it sounds like download is clearly an issue, and one of our teams should focus on that. 00:38:00 i say features as well 00:38:15 (we might try and cycle quickly through a couple of things, so we may hit more than 3 things... we're all experimenting with this process here) 00:38:20 khane: say a bit more? 00:38:20 * keepd Points that the Fedora Wiki down 00:38:22 well 00:38:22 it may not need as much work, but its important that we see what needs to be done 00:38:24 hildebe: i agree but perhaps if we consider removing it we can find a better way to include that information. if we decide to remove it that does not mean that we can't decide to put it back 00:38:27 if i had to pick three things to test 00:38:31 that'd be most helpful at this point 00:38:38 i think probably they'd be 00:38:46 1) the front page