Re: Moving to a new PEAR website

Hi Michael, On 01.05.2011 9:00, Michael Gauthier wrote:

I propose we replace the existing website at pear.php.net with the new site. This will accomplish several objectives: - better promote pyrus as a tool for managing pear packages - let people know there's a pear2 - let people know pear is still alive - incentivize people to add features to the new site

This will also break all links to the old site... Of course, rewrite magic you describe will work, but what's the point of breaking and fixing?

Of course the new site is missing several important features, but I think we can move over without them, provided we still make the old site available. The features we would lose are: - docbook documentation integration - phpdocumentor integration - pepr - bug tracker These can all be added to the new site later on. It currently functions quite well without them.

Maybe that's because no one uses the packages hosted there? What are the download stats for PEAR2? I can't imagine users not needing to read docs and report bugs, if such users did exist. I spent quite a bit of time myself digging around before I was able to run Pyrus on recent FreeBSD (detect_unicode problem). That being said, current PEAR website may definitely benefit from a face-lift, as having year-old "news" on the front page doesn't exactly convey the impression of a thriving project. I think We need to highlight the following on the front page: 1) PEAR is an installer. You can install packages from the following vendors: [list of top channels] 2) PEAR is a library. We have the following high quality components: [link to packages]. I also think that we need to hide unsupported packages by default in the ma list. 3) Next-generation PEAR is here: [link to PEAR2 website, description of top features] Also both PEAR2 and PEAR websites look "designed by professional programmers". PEAR2 is nicer, but that's because it has about zero navigation, when you add navigation for all features it will become as overcrowded and hard to use as PEAR one. I'd suggest finding a designer and usability specialist first and foremost.