[osol-mktg] Re: [website-discuss] top-right jumble and other concerns

[Bonnie Corwin]

Hi Dan -

Are you suggesting a newsletter to replace the monthly newsletter being
sent out now?  Or changes/additions to the current monthly newsletter?

Thanks.

Bonnie

Dan Price wrote On 12/20/05 02:56,:
> On Mon 19 Dec 2005 at 09:44AM, Laura Ramsey wrote:
> 
>>I would say, Yes  and it would also be cool to have one of the
>>chicklets in the right hand column devoted to "WHAT'S NEW" because I
>>get alot of inquiries that go;"I hit your site today and couldn't find
>>anything new."  Now, if these were lazy people I'd say, GO-on!  But
>>they are people who drive significant visibility to our community and
>>cause. (Berlind, McMillan, Shankland, Vance, Coffee, Gardner...)  I
>>tell them to read the announcements section, but that doesn't always
>>say what's new in the individual communities. 
> 
> 
> Well, I guess I've never heard them called chicklets :).  But the
> fundamental problem is a technology one-- not one of web design.  Think
> of the current website design like a government form.  Each page is the
> same, with only a little room to actually fill in content.  There is not
> much ability to source in dynamic content-- RSS feeds, database queries,
> etc.  The way we get dynamic content onto the front page at all is
> basically a hack-- think of it as gluing a piece of paper with the
> dynamic content onto the bottom of the form.
> 
> We have long imagined a site with dynamic content everywhere, through
> the use of something like Apache Jakarta "Velocity" macros (see
> http://jakarta.apache.org), which is what Roller (the blogs.sun.com
> software) uses as its engine.  However, we don't have the capability
> today.  I know that Stephen and his team are aware that this problem is
> acute (we've known this for 12 months), and that remedies are being
> researched.
> 
> In the event that the website team can't suggest something in the
> short term, I suggest a non-technology remedy: someone with good writing
> and technical skills should post an OpenSolaris newsletter once a
> week/fortnight/month by blog, web and email summarizing what has
> happened in the community in that interval.  Perhaps the newsletter
> should go to the -announce alias.  Then the marketing team can work to
> make sure that various thought leaders are signed up to receive that
> push of information...
> 
>         -dp
>