Re: Site, apps and CMS (Was: Re: StepTalk blog)

[Thom Cherryhomes]

Just to give everybody a heads-up on status...

I have been talking to various members of the GNUstep community,
one-on-one, and I will be talking to more of you, as time
permits...but here is what I have done so far:

I have put together a basic TYPO3 installation which I am going to
disclose the URL to soon, but I want to get more into place.. for now
I am using the current design on gnustep.org, which can be changed out
at any given time.... I will be experimenting with other designs, once
more content has been put into place.

I have on this site:

* A working news engine, with the ability for news articles a la
slashdot, as well as links to internal pages within the CMS and
external pages to other sites. The news articles currently feature:
     * Teaser text
     * Category picture
     * article text, with pictures
     * Related News Articles
     * Related URLs
     * downloadable attachment files.
     * realtime export into RSS/Atom feeds.

* A mailing list archive system, which I am currently pulling down ALL
posts from all lists, past and present, this mailing list archive
system also has the ability to pull mailing list posts, and turn them
into Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) entries.

* A replacement for the GNUstep Applications database, which also
includes a special section for featured applications.

* is split into three sections, WWW (for users), Apps (The apps
database), and Developer.. I am also experimenting with
blogs.gnustep.org, which will be a place for either RSS Atom feeds
from other blogs (for developers that already have their own place),
or for locally hosted developer blogs. All sections of the site are
maintainable in ONE PLACE! with proper access controls. I am also
experimenting with importing Wiki data from the current GNUstep Wiki
into a wiki subdomain.

* has a rating system for pages, so that we can gauge usefulness of
any page on the site.

* polling system, for similar things, but where we need to get more
specific feedback.

* tip a friend - e-mail another person a link to a useful page

* a Shockwave Flash media player for playing the vnc2swf presentations
that are now popping up, this will REALLY come into play not only from
the user perspective (showing off specific areas of the GNUstep way of
doing things), but also for various developer tutorials, as Nicolas
Roard has pointed out so well.

How can you help with this section? I encourage each and every one of
you to go to http://www.typo3.org/ to read more about this content
management system, and more importantly, to go to the TYPO3 extension
repository, to get a glimpse of just how extensible this whole system
really is... The TYPO3 extension repository is here:
http://typo3.org/extensions/  ... please look through it.

The last thing I want to talk about now, is a proposed new layout for
the site... I have the following goals in mind:

(1) Attract new Users, why should they use GNUstep? Make the initial
website very approachable, making it as easy to download and set up
GNUstep as possible.

(2) Attract new Developers, this is crucial, and as such, I am
proposing in the page structure below, a Getting Started section for
new developers, which will provide a step by step, and precisely
aggregated section for each of the aforementioned developers below....
After talking with Riccardo on this subject, I have mulled (2) down
into:
(2a) I am a Windows Developer interested in GNUstep
(2b) I am a UNIX developer interested in GNUstep (coming from say, GNOME or KDE)
(2c) I am a Mac OS X developer interested in porting my apps to GNUstep.

there are others, but those three are the big whoppers we should
concentrate our efforts on, IN THAT ORDER.

as such, this is the first draft of the page structure I propose:

gnustep.org
        WWW
                What is GNUstep?
                Getting Started
                FAQ
                Download GNUstep
                Applications (link to Apps)
        Apps
                How to install Applications
                Featured Apps
                        GNUMail (app description, rating, download)
                                Manual
                                Tips/Tricks
                        GWorkspace...
                        TalkSoup
                        Cynthiune
                Application Directory
                        Application categories (Productivity, etc..)
                                Application Lists under each
                                        Single View
                                        (app name)
                                        (app description)
                                        (app screenshots)
                                        (app homepage)
                                        (linkage to various package URLs)
                                        (Rate this application)
                                        (vote to make this app a featured app)
        Developer
                Getting Started
                        I am a Windows Develloper
                                ProjectCenter for Visual C++ People
                                Basics of Objective-C (Tutorials)
                                Building a simple GNUstep Application: Currency 
Converter
                                Wrapping GNUstep applications for deployment on 
Windows
                        I am a GNOME/KDE Developer
                                Building a GNUstep Development Environment
                                        Making sure you have Objective-C 
installed
                                        WindowMaker
                                        gnustep-startup
                                        GWorkspace
                                        ProjectCenter
                                        GORM
                                ProjectCenter Basics
                                        Creating a New Application Project
                                        Setting Information about an Application
                                        Working with files
                                                Adding
                                                Editing
                                                Saving
                                        The Compile panel
                                        The Run Panel
                                        Saving a project.
                                Basics of Objective-C (Tutorials)
                                        Additions to C
                                        A Quick run-through for C++ people
                                        A Quick run-through for people who 
already understand OO
                                        Introduction to Object Oriented Design
                                        The Interface (.h)
                                        The Methods (.m)
                                        Categories
                                        Protocols
                                Building a simple GNUstep application: Currency 
Converter
                                        Creating the Project in ProjectCenter
                                        Creating the UI in Gorm
                                        Creating the Controller Code
                                        Compiling / Running
                                        Installing the Application
                        I am a Mac OS X Developer
                                        ProjectCenter for XCode people
                                        Differences between Cocoa and GNUstep
                                        Building my app  to run on both GNUstep 
and Cocoa
                                                UI Differences, creating NIBs 
for both.
                                                Maintaining Project Files for 
OS X and GNUstep
                                                using #ifdefs for platform 
senstiive code
                                                NO CARBON!
                                        Packaging my application.
                Tutorials
                        Basics of Objective-C
                        Building a simple GNUstep tool, fileCopy
                        Building a simple GNUstep Application: Currency 
Converter
                        Building a simple GNUstep Application using Steptalk 
and GORM (Calculator)
                Reference Materials
                        Core Technologies
                                Foundation (-base)
                                AppKit (-gui)
                                EnterpriseObjects (GDL2)
                                WebObjects (GNUStepWeb)
                        Third Party Frameworks
                                (these can be added here as documentation 
starts to crop up)
                Mailing List Archives (with FAQ)
                        Announce
                        Discuss
                        Info
                Developer Application Manuals
                        ProjectCenter
                        GORM

I am placing an RTF version of this page tree for everyone here:
http://www.unit-e.cc/~thom/wgo-notes.tar.gz

What can you do to help in this section? please look into the above
mentioned file... if you wish to make changes, send me a copy at
thom.cherryhomes@gmail.com, with a suitable subject line..and make
changes in RED, so I can see them easily.

That is all that I have for now, I am working on this bit by bit in my
spare time, and I propose this to be a 1 year project, to get all the
necessary content aggregated together..but to do this, I am asking for
EVERYONE'S help to make this a reality.

Thank you,
-Thom Cherryhomes