[drupal-docs] Update on About section

[Charlie Lowe]

bryan kennedy wrote:
> On May 14, 2005, at 12:48 AM, Kieran Lal wrote:
> 
> 
>>Do you want to update us on your efforts with the about sections?
> 
> 
> Why sure.  I am still working away at the about section, based on  
> this structure outline that people seemed pleased with when I posted  
> here before:
> 
> http://mysteryexperience.com/drupal/handbook_v2_drupal.html
> 
> There has been some discussion that the Features and the Why Drupal  
> sections need to be better written to focus on the audience we want  
> to attract.  Great!  Go to it.  Or if you have <em>specific</em>  
> suggestions/edits please post them here.  My goal was to get some of  
> the structure in place and then let people edit it.

-1 for editing now. I don't personally think we are ready to edit:

1) Since you eliminated the general information about Drupal that 
functioned as the introduction for Drupal to a general audience, that 
changes how this entire section might need to be structured and written. 
What's in the general information about Drupal since it's the first 
thing people read determines to some extent what should appear next.

2) As is apparent from the other thread this weekend, we have to first 
define that audience more clearly and define how to target that audience.
> 
> I thought "Why Drupal" could be a place for Djun's pages he wrote  
> here (http://drupal.org/node/20350) that seem to focus on the larger  
> picture of Drupal.

-1

Djun's pages provide no specifics about what Drupal is. It also seems 
very developer-centric and would not be appropriate for an introduction. 
It's written for a different rhetorical purpose: i.e., the original 
title for the section is "Rolling your own system vs. using Drupal." It 
mentions "programming language" in the "fun" section, something that 
many Drupal users would not find fun. The code in the "Drupal is 
flexible" page.

I think the point in all this about the "About" section is as Boris 
mentioned in a previous thread. This section is not documentation. It's 
a collection of documents that act as a resource for learning about 
Drupal that also functions as a marketing tool. It's a much more complex 
section of the handbook to revise for this reason. One of the things I 
like to point out about the term "revision" is that it often means 
"re-visioning." Creating that vision in much more detail is the first 
step, IMHO.

> 
> I just posted the "Gallery" section.  This was in response to  
> discussions on drupal.org, the infrastructure list, and here.  I have  
> pulled together various sites and made screenshots (Thanks for the  
> great suggestions Dries and Charlie).  This is by no means a  
> comprehensive list of "kick ass" Drupal sites.  We need to reconcile  
> this section with the information at :  http://drupal.org/cases

Cool! Lots of good eye-candy. Also, nice balance of English and 
non-English sites, emphasizing the international appeal of Drupal.

I wonder though if we want text there other than the titles? Perhaps 
just a short caption or not at all? Also, personally, I'm not sure I 
like the borders around the div's. Perhaps a light border around the 
pictures (1px #ccc or #ddd) so that the screenshots that have a lot 
white in them don't bleed into the page. Otherwise, use of spacing might 
do more to bring out the visual elements whereas the boxes sort of 
detract a little.

> 
> So I was thinking it would eventually look like this:
> Gallery (broken up by the header level elements on the old case  
> studies page (http://drupal.org/cases))
>      --Case Studies (Intro to more in depth stories about why people  
> switched to Drupal, use drupal, built with drupal)
>          --Contraire.com
>          --Linux Journal
>          --etc....

Not sure exactly what you plan.
> 
> Coming soon, the "Goals" section.  If anyone is interested in working  
> (not endlessly discussing) with me on other parts of the About  
> section I would welcome input/aid.

Not sure what this is.