Newsgroups: php.internals,php.webmaster
Path: news.php.net
Xref: news.php.net php.internals:104089 php.webmaster:27747
MIME-Version: 1.0
References: <pfS_ItQN25grEKHozVsj9-qhpDPTbBG2_qwIxYSZjiZj0ZuZ-ePufzgkAZUdg0MejZxUN8KheHIHJfBRNVQVhisQn85-LbTKijAUgyO3H5A=@protonmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <pfS_ItQN25grEKHozVsj9-qhpDPTbBG2_qwIxYSZjiZj0ZuZ-ePufzgkAZUdg0MejZxUN8KheHIHJfBRNVQVhisQn85-LbTKijAUgyO3H5A=@protonmail.com>
Date: Sun, 3 Feb 2019 18:02:52 -0700
Message-ID: <CAFMT4NqPju67D_F4gu4Ga7KhbK11BfTOUGJ5ubyO7VHHLxfi7A@mail.gmail.com>
To: azjezz <azjezz@protonmail.com>
Cc: "internals@lists.php.net" <internals@lists.php.net>, php-webmaster@lists.php.net
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] New website for the PHP project
From: levim@php.net (Levi Morrison)

On Sun, Feb 3, 2019 at 5:15 PM azjezz <azjezz@protonmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hello Internals !
>
> As @official_php suggested [1], I'm here to propose a new website for the PHP Project.
>
> In my opinion, current design looks old, outdated and bland. This sadly may reflect "badly" on the language
>
> reputation nowadays.
>
> New comers find it hard to go around the website, to write "comments", report issues or write RFCs.
>
> Even signing up for the internals mailing list wasn't an easy task [2].
>
> Since the development of PHP 8.0 has started, I think its a good idea to start working on a new website.
>
> # Global proposal
>
> The proposal here is to do a major rewrite of the PHP sites. This rewrite would includes php.net, windows.php.net,
>
> bug.php.net, wiki.php.net, qa.php.net and other official php websites.
>
> It would be done with this in mind:
>
> * No PHP framework (to avoid favoriting one)
>
> * Keep it simple: little to no changes to the database structures
>
> * This site should look modern, simple and feel welcoming.
>
> * A new home page, not a "news" page, but a page simply showing the PHP Logo, a code example maybe and
>
> the download link [3].
>
> * A new community website [4], it can be a place for people to ask questions and discuss php in general - no one uses IRC anymore.
>
> * Single account: Users should be able to use the same community account to file bugs, create a new RFC (depending on karma) and leave notes on the documentation.
>
> * Ideally all *.php.net websites would be "merged" into a single brand new website, but I'm not sure about the hosting
>
> specificities (eg, what server does what).
>
> # FrontEnd Framework
>
> We don't need that too, but we can use one ! there's some light-weight options out there.
>
> but i'm pretty sure some people in the php community have experience with front-end development and will happily contribute.
>
> see :
>
> - https://mustard-ui.com/
>
> - https://getuikit.com/
>
> - https://bulma.io/
>
> - https://picturepan2.github.io/spectre/index.html
>
> # Next steps
>
> I would really like to hear opinions about this proposal.
>
> [1] https://twitter.com/official_php/status/1091903415377108994
>
> [2] https://twitter.com/SaraMG/status/1092185205572542466
>
> [3] https://camo.githubusercontent.com/762e5d9fcaaa4ecf645343350a91929f99f452e9/68747470733a2f2f692e696d6775722e636f6d2f584477675261662e706e67
>
> [4] https://php.net/community
>
> ---
>
> Saif Eddin Gmati <https://azjezz.github.io>

I appreciate the enthusiasm. If you think the current PHP website is
old, out-dated, and bland, you must have not experienced the previous
one:

  https://i2.wp.com/www.geekgumbo.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/phpsite45.png

In any case, I hope you realize this is an ambitious project. It will
take a very long time to build a cohesive UI, and then also a very
long time to update the bugs, windows, docs, wiki, etc, websites to
use it. If you are seriously committed to this, then the next step is
to create mock-ups for every type of page across PHP.net that you can
find, and to share them on the PHP Webmasters mailing list (which I've
cc'd). Then, we'll probably give you a few more pages that needs
mocks, after which you will then have to attempt to build the mock-ups
in a few different codebases.

I did the last redesign, and I took a less rigorous approach. If I
were to do it again, I would be much more rigorous in gathering
requirements and building mock-ups. There were a lot of pages which
needed re-worked because of my design, which took even more time.
While it's okay for some pages to be re-worked content-wise to fit the
new design, you want to minimize it.