offtop (sort of..) - About rockbox.org

[L[0ne]R]

Discovered Rockbox just yesterday, but after I installed it, I was totally amazed. This is a GREAT job. Keep it up.

Ok, now about what I actually wanted to say.
It doesn't have much to do with the RockBox itself but the website, which needs to be completely reorganized. When I first got onto this website, I would have never find where to download themes, patches, plug-ins, find the documentation I need, etc. if I got all the necessary links from someone's signature in some forum. Considering that RockBox is a completely new firmware with theme and plug-in support for mp3-players, then how come the link to actual themes and plug-ins is in some "wiki" section lost somewhere in the middle of a long list of various links? IMHO it HAS to be on the front page in bold font and maybe even in a different color, as well as links to plug-ins, patches etc. If it stays the way it is - I doubt that many people will even know what rockbox is, if they can't even find the description among pages and pages of text and links. (Sorry if I'm sounding rude, I'm just trying to show the reality of the situation)
It would be great if you'd work at least a little bit on this. I know you have lots of other things to do, so I might help with that, I do a lot of organizing. Maybe I could even help with the design of the website, if I have time.  


A little bit of re-organizing in Rockbox itself would also be good.
for example, here's my variant of main menu:

Recent Bookmarks
---divider---
Browse plug-ins
Browse themes
---divider---
Playlist options
Settings - sound
Settings - General
Manage settings
Info

or just add symbols in the beginning of menu. Something like this:

[Recent Bookmarks]
^ Browse plug-ins
^ Browse themes
= Playlist options
*Settings - sound
*Settings - General
*Manage settings
? Info

P.S. Sorry for my english.
P.P.S. Good Luck.

[Febs]

When I first got onto this website, I would have never find where to download themes, patches, plug-ins, find the documentation I need, etc. if I got all the necessary links from someone's signature in some forum.

I really, really, really find this hard to believe.  Look at the navigation panel on the rockbox.org main page.  The word "documentation" is displayed prominently, and highlighted.  The first thing under that is "manual," which contains a comprehensive description of, among other things, plug-ins, themes, etc.  How could it possibly be any easier to find the manual?

[the_winch]

I really, really, really find this hard to believe.

Why would the op make such a post if it wasn't true? It's a lot of typing for no real reason if it isn't.

Perhaps the hompage would be better with different information on it. News items and CVS history are useful but I don't think it would be a problem if they where moved to another page.
The main area of the page where people look when the page loads would then be free for a more detailed description of what rockbox is and a few more documentation links.

[Febs]

I really, really, really find this hard to believe.

Why would the op make such a post if it wasn't true? It's a lot of typing for no real reason if it isn't.

I'm not questioning his motivation for the post.  What I am questioning is how it is possible that people have trouble finding the documentation, which there is a link on the front page (and on every page, for that matter, since it is in the navigation frame) to "documentation."  I literally do not know how we could possibly make it any more clear than this.

Now, if the problem is that the manual is lacking with respect to a particular piece of information, that is a different story.  In that case, however, the appropriate thing to do would be to submit a patch, not just to say, "I don't like it, but YOU fix it."

[saratoga]

[Llorean]

Classy post, Saratoga.

[LinusN]

A little bit of re-organizing in Rockbox itself would also be good.
for example, here's my variant of main menu:

Recent Bookmarks
---divider---
Browse plug-ins
Browse themes
---divider---
Playlist options
Settings - sound
Settings - General
Manage settings
Info

Since Rockbox is a firmware for playing music, I think it's a bad idea to put the sound settings and playlist options below the plugin and theme options.

[Llorean]

It does seem odd that "Plugins" and "Themes" would get a higher priority than the actual playback related settings.

[L]

Less IT savy users would have a hard time understanding the purpose of a WIKI even though Wikipedia has made Wiki sites very popular. So it wouldn't dawn on them to click there for Plugins and WPS themes. They'd expect it under downloads.

It's really only a first-time problem, after that you pretty much know where everything is.

[lowlight]

But the plugins and themes already come bundled with rockbox.

[Llorean]

Well, not *all* the themes by a longshot, but all the plugins do. Maybe "Themes" should be added as a link to the front page.

[L[0ne]R]

The word "documentation" is displayed prominently, and highlighted.  The first thing under that is "manual," which contains a comprehensive description of, among other things, plug-ins, themes, etc.  How could it possibly be any easier to find the manual?

I'm not talking about the "Documentation" section itself, but about specific documents. Word "manual" is very clear and I had no problem with finding the installation instructions. But "wiki" and "index" don't tell me anything about what I'll find on this pages.

Now, if the problem is that the manual is lacking with respect to a particular piece of information, that is a different story.  In that case, however, the appropriate thing to do would be to submit a patch, not just to say, "I don't like it, but YOU fix it."

No, it's not that. The topics are just all messed up, there is a lot of documentations which are just don't belong to the sections they are in, and a lot of unnecessary links (I found about 3 links to the installation manual, why to waste space putting the link onto both "wiki" and "index"?) I find the manuals quite clear and organized, by the way, and have almost no complaints about lack of information. And like I said, I can offer.. no, i'm willing to help (i'm just being egoistic and doing it for myself so it would be easier for ME to browse through your website ). I already print out these two documentation pages and will do some reorganizing, and will post it here when I'll have something more-or-less appropriate

Since Rockbox is a firmware for playing music, I think it's a bad idea to put the sound settings and playlist options below the plugin and theme options.

I'm not saying it has to be exactly this way. I first change the settings so they would suit me, and then forget about them, but I change themes and use plugins pretty often, so for me personally it's better this way, though I'm not saying this is how it has to be. Playlist options could be put under "Bookmarks". Maybe it would be a good idea to make a poll or a post about these high and low priorities. I hope you understand what I mean.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ok, back to organizing.

If a person has a question - he will look for the answer, but there are too many questions and answers, so we need to divide them into sections.
Here is my example of what side bar should look like (again, I'm not saying it has to be exactly this way):

[News] ~ (news, relating to project, new and upcoming releases, etc.)

[Downloads]
 -builds
 Â    Final Releases
 Â    Daily Builds
 Â    CVS Builds
 -extras
 Â    Themes
 Â    Plug-Ins
 Â    Other (patches, fonts, sounds, etc.)
 Â    *Tools (programs for editing)

[Community]
 -Forum
 -Links (Links to related websites)

[Documentation]
 -FAQ
 -Manuals (Installation manuals, help etc. Everything relating to usage, repairs and instalation)
 -Tutorials (Everything about changing RockBox in your own way - creating themes, plug-ins, etc. Nothing that relates to installation, usage or repairs)
 -Technical specifications (all the information about the way RockBox works, its features etc.)
 -Other information

[Contact Us]
 -IRC, e-mail
 -Bug Reports
 -Feature requests (Not sure about this - I didn't find a way to request features. Is it just what are you going to work on?)

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Something like that.




Now a little bit on "wiki page".

Documentation
 -BlindUsersIndex ~ (Not sure where to put it. Maybe in "other info" or "manuals". And why no spaces?)
 -DocsIndex - Documentation Index (There is already link on side bar, isn't it? :/)
 -Major changes ~ (Not sure yet, but it should be in a separate section (News section? Maybe a little space on title page with links related to release info?))
 -PluginIndex ~ (Should be in "Downloads" section, and reorganized)
 -ReleaseTodo ~ ("Releases" section)
 -ReportingBuds ~ ("Contact Us" section)
 -RockboxFAQ ~ (Under "Documentation" on side bar)

Ports
 ... ~ (Isn't all this in the manual? Again, unnecessary links - links to themes galleries in iPodports.)

Manual
 -RockBox manual ~ (You already have link in sidebar)

Misc
 -ArticlesAboutRockbox ~ (Belongs in the "Community" section in "links")
 -OldPluginIndex ~ (Link should be on the same page where other plug-ins are)
 -WebHomeKr ~ (Community/links)
 -WpsGallery ~ (= "Themes" in "Downloads" section (or better - link to http://www.rockbox-themes.org))

10 most recent changes: ~ (In "releases")

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'm going to work on "Index" later, because there is too much for me now and I really hope it will worth it.

[Llorean]

Did you miss the point where there are NO PLUGIN DOWNLOADS. The plugins all come with Rockbox. In fact, if you read the actual user manual it should be fairly apparent that all plugins are included.

The point is that the user manual (available in PDF as well as HTML) should contain all information the standard user needs, with the exception of themes, in most cases. I don't understand why you have a download link for "other" listed as "patches, fonts, sounds, etc". Patches are on the tracker for very specific reasons. Primarily that it allows discussion and updating, but also because it allows us to track and easily close tasks when they're done. Patches are not for "users" but "testers" and "developers" and having them in the normal download links will likely confuse the lay user. On to "fonts". There is one font download. One. It is a single archive available on the download page. You download it once. Sounds: What sounds? I don't even know what you're talking about.

On to tools: The official tools are all part of the source archive. Again, why should they have a separate section for a single download?

I'm getting a strong feeling that you haven't investigated things very thoroughly before making suggestions to how the layout should change, as your suggested changes imply that you don't have a very thorough knowledge of what materials and information actually exists.

I also don't understand why it's a *bad* think that some pages are linked to from multiple locations.

[L[0ne]R]

Did you miss the point where there are NO PLUGIN DOWNLOADS. The plugins all come with Rockbox. In fact, if you read the actual user manual it should be fairly apparent that all plugins are included.

Aren't new plug-ins coming out? Maybe some time later there would be much more plugins made by different people. As for now - I know that all the plug-ins are already included

I don't understand why you have a download link for "other" listed as "patches, fonts, sounds, etc". Patches are on the tracker for very specific reasons. Primarily that it allows discussion and updating, but also because it allows us to track and easily close tasks when they're done. Patches are not for "users" but "testers" and "developers" and having them in the normal download links will likely confuse the lay user. On to "fonts". There is one font download. One. It is a single archive available on the download page. You download it once.

I found a link somewhere where are new and old releases of fonts, I wasn't sure what are they for. And you're not supposed to get angry. Im not saying that everything sucks, do this and do that. I'm just suggesting what in my opinion should be improved, but if you react this way, maybe you should make post saying "We dont need your help, go away"?

Sounds: What sounds? I don't even know what you're talking about.

Well, they're also called voices, as far as I know, but I don't know much about it 'cause I never used it.

On to tools: The official tools are all part of the source archive. Again, why should they have a separate section for a single download?

I'm not sure what you mean by "Source archive", but I had to download these programs separately.

I'm getting a strong feeling that you haven't investigated things very thoroughly before making suggestions to how the layout should change, as your suggested changes imply that you don't have a very thorough knowledge of what materials and information actually exists.

I admit, I don't have enough knowledge about the materials on this website, but I don't have to have it, because even this way I clearly see that information is hard to find. To you it might seem easy, because you go over this website very often, but the fact is that I have no idea where is what, and I don't think I'm that special that it's only me who can't find anything. When a user gets on this website, he should already know, where he can find what he needs.
If there noone who experienced that problem - then I'll admit that I'm just dumb.

I also don't understand why it's a *bad* think that some pages are linked to from multiple locations.

Nothing bad is about it. The bad thing is that these links are not where they belong. When browsing the list of documents, user should see only what is related to what he is searching. There is no need to put the same links on several pages if it doesn't relate to the topic.

[Llorean]

New official plugins will always be included with the newest version of Rockbox. They also will very likely not work if you're using an older version of Rockbox, in many cases, so there's not much reason to have a separate download.

The "old" font page is just that, old and out of date. That page should be removed.

The voices follow from the BlindUserIndex because their intent and purpose is to allow blind navigation of the user interface.

I can only assume you mean the few tools that are used for installing Rockbox for certain players, such as fwpatcher.exe or ipodpatcher.exe. In the case of these, again, the source code is included in the official source package. URLs for acquiring the binaries should be in the manual, so I don't understand how these can be at all "hard to find." As well, Rockbox has NOT been released yet for these platforms. On the platforms it IS released for, it is possible to download the release and have all necessary files included. If I'm misunderstanding what tools you mean, please clarify, but there shouldn't be any necessary tools that aren't explicitly pointed to by the manual.


To clarify: I am not angry. I just find your post lacking clarity because you seem to not be very clear on what data should or shouldn't be needed by most users, or why we have the additional data set up as a wiki, or even what files could even reasonably have their own download link.