Dear R users and developpers, My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : http://www.r-project.org The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw lollipop websites ... My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, who said that I shouldn't expect too many competitors. So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and then propose it to the core team. It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. What do you think ? Who would like to play ? Romain -- visit the R Graph Gallery : http://addictedtor.free.fr/graphiques mixmod 1.7 is released : http://www-math.univ-fcomte.fr/mixmod/index.php +---------------------------------------------------------------+ | Romain FRANCOIS - http://francoisromain.free.fr | | Doctorant INRIA Futurs / EDF | +---------------------------------------------------------------+
While there is nothing about the r-project site that I would consider fancy, it is pretty functional. I would be interested to hear more about what you hope to accomplish by re-doing the web site. Fancy graphics may just slow down the experience for those not on broadband. After all, the r-help list doesn't even like HTML in email, so it may not like too many fancy stuff on their website either. On 4/25/06, Romain Francois <francoisromain@free.fr> wrote:> > Dear R users and developpers, > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : > http://www.r-project.org > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw > lollipop websites ... > > My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. > But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, who said that > I shouldn't expect too many competitors. > So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and > then propose it to the core team. > It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. > > What do you think ? Who would like to play ? > > Romain > > -- > visit the R Graph Gallery : http://addictedtor.free.fr/graphiques > mixmod 1.7 is released : http://www-math.univ-fcomte.fr/mixmod/index.php > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > | Romain FRANCOIS - http://francoisromain.free.fr | > | Doctorant INRIA Futurs / EDF | > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > > ______________________________________________ > R-help@stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide! > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html >[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
On 04/25/06 18:53, Romain Francois wrote:> Dear R users and developpers, > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : http://www.r-project.org > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw > lollipop websites ...I don't think it is sad at all. It think it is one of the few sites I visit that is accessible, is quick to load, conforms to standards, uses my fonts instead of forcing me to get nose prints on the monitor, is informative, has minimal mindless glitz, and works in any browser. The only thing I might change is to replace the frames with some sort of CSS-based positioning. HOWEVER, the new version of Internet Explorer may totally destroy the usefulness of CSS, so maybe it is better to leave things as they are for now. Jon -- Jonathan Baron, Professor of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania Home page: http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~baron Editor: Judgment and Decision Making (http://journal.sjdm.org)
Hi Romain, Generally a competition is a bad way of coming up with a new design. It generally emphasises looks over function and, of course, requires people to put in a lot of effort for a small chance of gain. I'd also agree with Friedrich that few people will enter. My opinion is if that people thought it was truly important to have a better R homepage, it would be better to start a collection and hire a professional developer. Otherwise, there is a very real risk that we will end up with something worse than the current. Hadley On 4/25/06, Romain Francois <francoisromain at free.fr> wrote:> Dear R users and developpers, > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : http://www.r-project.org > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw > lollipop websites ... > > My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. > But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, who said that > I shouldn't expect too many competitors. > So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and > then propose it to the core team. > It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. > > What do you think ? Who would like to play ? > > Romain > > -- > visit the R Graph Gallery : http://addictedtor.free.fr/graphiques > mixmod 1.7 is released : http://www-math.univ-fcomte.fr/mixmod/index.php > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > | Romain FRANCOIS - http://francoisromain.free.fr | > | Doctorant INRIA Futurs / EDF | > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > > ______________________________________________ > R-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide! http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html >
Romain, The R Web site is working fine. Even if it is not relifted from a long time, it is functional. So, this is the point... and it should remain, at least, as functional as it is. One aspect that could be easily relooked is the CSS file. I would definitely be in favor of a more styled CSS. I mean, there are now new fonts around that are designed to be more readable than Times, Helvetica and Courrier on the screen, and equally fine on the printed material. With CSS, it is always possible to define several fonts for one style, so that the style "degrades" nicely in case of missing fonts. So, such kind of change is safe, even for very old computers. It would be wonderful if we could get a more actual CSS file for R doc, for the Web site, and I would use the same for the R Wiki. That way, we will got homogeneity in the presentation. So, I definitely encourage you for (microchirurgical) propositions to actualize the presentation of the R Web site, and I will follow the decision of the R Core Team on this topic to make the R Wiki looking similar. Best, Philippe Grosjean Romain Francois wrote:> Dear R users and developpers, > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : http://www.r-project.org > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw > lollipop websites ... > > My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. > But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, who said that > I shouldn't expect too many competitors. > So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and > then propose it to the core team. > It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. > > What do you think ? Who would like to play ? > > Romain >
roger bos wrote:> While there is nothing about the r-project site that I would consider fancy, > it is pretty functional. I would be interested to hear more about what you > hope to accomplish by re-doing the web site. Fancy graphics may just slow > down the experience for those not on broadband. After all, the r-help list > doesn't even like HTML in email, so it may not like too many fancy stuff on > their website either. >The frame-based nature of the CRAN pages is slightly problematic, since you click on a menu item and the URL doesn't change. Hence there's no way to send someone a URL that gives them the same view as you'd get if you go to the home page and then click on 'screenshots', for example. Sure you can send them to: http://www.r-project.org/screenshots/screenshots.html but then they dont see the menu. Frames make for simplification of page creation (the menu is in one HTML file and doesn't need to be included on every page) at the expense of usability. Template and content management systems solved this a while ago. It probably wouldn't take long to bash out a serviceable replacement using something like HTML::Mason but then you'd have to find a hosting provider that supported it (or PHP or IYFTLH[1]). I dont think it warrants a full-on CMS given the size of www.r-project.org (not including CRAN stuff). I'd just hack up some m4 scripts and 'include' the menu into a flat file. Perhaps someone could write a web site template system in R... Another option would be to make it completely web 2.0, round the corners, write some ajax, add some blog links, tag soup section....[2] Barry [1] Insert Your Favourite Template Language Here [2] Joke
> The R Web site is working fine. Even if it is not relifted from a long > time, it is functional. So, this is the point... and it should remain, > at least, as functional as it is.As an experienced user of the R website, this probably is true for you. However, there are a number of confusing problems for new users of the site: * how do you download R? * how do you bookmark a specific page? * what is that giant graphic on the home page? Hadley
I agree it would be worthwhile to make some cosmetic changes to r-project.org (nothing fancy though - no javascript, Flash etc). The general public may not be fully aware of how R compares to other statistical software, and I doubt that a web site which looks like it was put together 10 years ago helps bend the perceptions in the right direction. (Also, can someone finally change the graph on the first page??)> -----Original Message----- > From: r-help-bounces at stat.math.ethz.ch > [mailto:r-help-bounces at stat.math.ethz.ch] On Behalf Of roger bos > Sent: Tuesday, April 25, 2006 1:09 PM > To: Romain Francois > Cc: RHELP > Subject: Re: [R] www.r-project.org > > While there is nothing about the r-project site that I would > consider fancy, > it is pretty functional. I would be interested to hear more > about what you > hope to accomplish by re-doing the web site. Fancy graphics > may just slow > down the experience for those not on broadband. After all, > the r-help list > doesn't even like HTML in email, so it may not like too many > fancy stuff on > their website either. > > > > > On 4/25/06, Romain Francois <francoisromain at free.fr> wrote: > > > > Dear R users and developpers, > > > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help > to post it. > > > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : > > http://www.r-project.org > > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web > designers to draw > > lollipop websites ... > > > > My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. > > But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, > who said that > > I shouldn't expect too many competitors. > > So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and > > then propose it to the core team. > > It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. > > > > What do you think ? Who would like to play ? > > > > Romain > > > > -- > > visit the R Graph Gallery : http://addictedtor.free.fr/graphiques > > mixmod 1.7 is released : > http://www-math.univ-fcomte.fr/mixmod/index.php > > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > > | Romain FRANCOIS - http://francoisromain.free.fr | > > | Doctorant INRIA Futurs / EDF | > > +---------------------------------------------------------------+ > > > > ______________________________________________ > > R-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list > > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > > PLEASE do read the posting guide! > > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html > > > > [[alternative HTML version deleted]] > > ______________________________________________ > R-help at stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help > PLEASE do read the posting guide! > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html >
Hi, To sum up : * yes, the R website is operationnal. There is no reason whatsoever to change its content. * no javascript, no flash, no chartjunk !! * rework the style, start wih the css file(s) * stop with those frames, and use css to place some kind of fake frames * maybe store the name of your CRAN in a cookie What about - place somewhere a div called 'Focus on a package' where we could have a short presentation of a package, etc ... or for a CRAN task view (to do that, php would be great, but we can do I don't know perl scripts to generate static html pages) - a direct link to download R, which will redirect to the appropriate CRAN thanks to cookies - Propose the Table of Contents of the last volume of R news. - reduce the ratio (size of the head page graphic) / (information directly accesible) - move search, task views, and documentation from cran to www Romain From roger bos :> After all, the r-help list doesn't even like HTML in email, so it may > not like too many fancy stuff on their website either.html in email is evil. html in a website is normal. From Jon Baron :> The only thing I might change is to replace the frames with some > sort of CSS-based positioning. HOWEVER, the new version of > Internet Explorer may totally destroy the usefulness of CSS, so > maybe it is better to leave things as they are for now.What ! IE is not the only browser, and so not the better. Despite is dominant position, i don't think all website will abandon doing css because microsoft is not able to make its browser understand it. -- visit the R Graph Gallery : http://addictedtor.free.fr/graphiques mixmod 1.7 is released : http://www-math.univ-fcomte.fr/mixmod/index.php +---------------------------------------------------------------+ | Romain FRANCOIS - http://francoisromain.free.fr | | Doctorant INRIA Futurs / EDF | +---------------------------------------------------------------+
Romain Francois wrote:> Dear R users and developpers, > > My question is adressed to both of you, so I choose R-help to post it. > > Are there any plans to jazz up the main R website : http://www.r-project.org > The look it have now is the same for a long time and kind of sad > compared to other statistical package's website. Of course, the > comparison is not fair, since companies are paying web designers to draw > lollipop websites ...There have been various suggestions along these lines (check the archives), but there are a number of constraints that make the problem difficult: - there are two web sites, www.r-project.org and cran.r-project.org with different needs. In particular, CRAN must be very low tech because it is mirrored on very diverse sites (including local copies, e.g. on a CDROM). - There are a lot of busy people who need to edit these pages occasionally, so a stable, standard, simple setup is extremely desirable. That means simple HTML to be edited in a text editor, no special CMS. These requirements are quite hard to meet, so expect changes to the web sites to be very time consuming, and possibly rejected en masse in the end. Duncan Murdoch> > My first idea was to organize some kind of web designing contest. > But, I had a small talk with Friedrich Leisch about that, who said that > I shouldn't expect too many competitors. > So, what about creating a small team, create a home page project and > then propose it to the core team. > It goes without saying it : The core team has the final word. > > What do you think ? Who would like to play ? > > Romain >
what about improving the "Links" page, with for instance a list of links - such as thoses in task views - grouped by theme, instead of modifying r-project site ? -- ------------------------------------------------------------------- Jacques.Veslot at good.ibl.fr CNRS UMR 8090 - http://www-good.ibl.fr G?nomique et physiologie mol?culaire des maladies m?taboliques I.B.L 2eme etage - 1 rue du Pr Calmette, B.P.245, 59019 Lille Cedex Tel : 33 (0)3.20.87.10.44 Fax : 33 (0)3.20.87.10.31