From martin at easyweb.co.uk Sun Aug 3 23:01:30 2003 From: martin at easyweb.co.uk (Martin) Date: Sun, 3 Aug 2003 23:01:30 +0100 (BST) Subject: [Marketing] Donation Wall Message-ID: Jeff wrote to desdev (sorry, didn't see it until now as I'm not on desdev.) ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > From: Martin Paul Burns > > As it is, we've waited for over a month and still no > donation wall, [...] ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > waited? was someone supposed to be doing something in that time? Yep, commenting. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > or suggestions for improvements beyond your "It's all > rubbish". ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > i didn't say "it's all rubbish". i simply offered my opinion on > implementation. Which were essentially "I wouldn't do it like that" without much suggestion for how else it would be done rapidly. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > Unless anyone's got any further comments, I suggest that > we start using it. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > can we at least get a consensus on the matter? Yep. Finance people? Does it meet your reporting needs? (elfur/marlene I can let you have a treasurer role login without any probs) Marketing people? Any branding issues? Will it do the desired job of recognising donors? DesDev people? Beyond the points Jeff's brought up, any problems? Generally, anything to stop it happening, at least until something better is provided? http://acornparenting.org:8080/donation_wall for those playing along at home. That's on the eouk box btw: the URL will of course be more sensible (eg http://give.evolt.org) - it's just a quick Apache config change plus DNS. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > As far as sharing the data across *eo sites for > consistent donation bar purposes, I'm sure a simple XML > feed would do nicely. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > yes it would. Can provide a feed for you, no problem. Spec the format (sample file would be helpful) and you'll get it. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > Note that this is an already existing problem with leo, > deo and beo (which has a wrong-coloured top bar btw). ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > sure, but it's not accuracy of the numbers that matters, Assuming that the 'not' was a typo, it remains a problem for leo, deo & beo. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > Well, when you code up a fully integrated system to > manage all of *eo, we'll use it. I don't propose waiting > for the donation wall until that happens, particularly > as at the moment, you're too busy to forward emails to > theforum. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > easy with the cheap shots. No cheap shots, Jeff - I genuinely understand how busy you are. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > (Incidentally, Weo members won't neatly map onto donors) ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > they would if we developed and enforced some form of global login > system. I don't propose requiring that anyone be a member before they give us something. Cheers Martin -- "Names, once they are in common use, quickly become mere sounds, their etymology being buried, like so many of the earth's marvels, beneath the dust of habit." - Salman Rushdie From martin.burns at uk.ibm.com Mon Aug 4 10:09:02 2003 From: martin.burns at uk.ibm.com (Martin Paul Burns) Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2003 10:09:02 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] Re: [Finance] RE: [DesDev] Donation Wall Message-ID: "Jeff Howden" To: Sent by: cc: finance-bounces@list Subject: [Finance] RE: [DesDev] Donation Wall s.evolt.org 04/08/2003 03:34 Please respond to finance > i simply made it a point to challenge the current offering because i know > how things work around here. we put something up to get it up quickly and > then when someone else comes along with what they think is a better > solution, the new solution gets lost in the din of debate. I think we can get round that in 3 ways: 1) Agree that this is temporary 2) Agree how we'd recognise its replacement (global login sounds sensible) 3) Agree that this should be part of the larger redesign [side-issue - if you want to come back on it, start a separate thread please - I think maybe a global login might be a sensible thing to do with the redesign] >i'm still fuzzy on who will actually be *using* this donation wall. 1) Tracking and reporting for Finance 2) Donor recognition for Marketing There's basically 3 high level use cases: 1) Treasurer (or rather 'user with treasurer role') adds new donations, which can be in cash, in kind (as a monetary equivalent), by members or not. 2) Site visitors are pointed from the 'support evolt' article on weo to see who else has given and average amounts. 3) Total amount is made available as an XML feed to other *eo sites ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > sure, but it's not accuracy of the numbers that > > matters, > > Assuming that the 'not' was a typo, it remains a problem > for leo, deo & beo. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< >yes, agreed. and the same solution that weo uses can be used there as well. Not at present, while weo uses CF, deo and beo use PHP and leo uses something Python/Mailman-ish (but has PHP, Perl, ASP and SSIs available). Although an XML feed may solve this. Cheers Martin From jeff at jeffhowden.com Mon Aug 4 03:34:10 2003 From: jeff at jeffhowden.com (Jeff Howden) Date: Sun, 3 Aug 2003 19:34:10 -0700 Subject: [Marketing] RE: [DesDev] Donation Wall In-Reply-To: <1059962423.7151@LISTSERV.alphashop.com> Message-ID: <1059963554.25947@LISTSERV.alphashop.com> martin, ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > From: Martin > > > i didn't say "it's all rubbish". i simply offered my > > opinion on implementation. > > Which were essentially "I wouldn't do it like that" > without much suggestion for how else it would be done > rapidly. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< i simply made it a point to challenge the current offering because i know how things work around here. we put something up to get it up quickly and then when someone else comes along with what they think is a better solution, the new solution gets lost in the din of debate. so, i was just trying to make sure that what was being put together now would last us as long as possible. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > Generally, anything to stop it happening, at least until > something better is provided? > > http://acornparenting.org:8080/donation_wall > for those playing along at home. That's on the eouk box > btw: the URL will of course be more sensible (eg > http://give.evolt.org) - it's just a quick Apache config > change plus DNS. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< i'm still fuzzy on who will actually be *using* this donation wall. is it meant to replace the "support evolt.org" article on weo? is it meant to be a tracking tool for treasurers? give me a clear picture of the problems it's intended to solve and i'll feel alot better about it. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > yes it would. > > Can provide a feed for you, no problem. Spec the format > (sample file would be helpful) and you'll get it. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< no problem. i have some ideas, but we can save that discussion for alittle later. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > sure, but it's not accuracy of the numbers that > > matters, > > Assuming that the 'not' was a typo, it remains a problem > for leo, deo & beo. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< yes, agreed. and the same solution that weo uses can be used there as well. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > easy with the cheap shots. > > No cheap shots, Jeff - I genuinely understand how busy > you are. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< then please be alittle more sensitive in your comments. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > I don't propose requiring that anyone be a member before > they give us something. ><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< me neither. i just want to come up with ways to make it more appealing for members to donate (ie, recognition for those that want it). .jeff ------------------------------------------------------ Jeff Howden - Web Application Specialist Resume - http://jeffhowden.com/about/resume/ Code Library - http://evolt.jeffhowden.com/jeff/code/ From neuro at well.com Mon Aug 4 10:09:54 2003 From: neuro at well.com (William Anderson) Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2003 10:09:54 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] Re: [DesDev] Donation Wall References: Message-ID: <014b01c35a68$2b4ea9a0$c902a8c0@local.zensoft.net> Martin wrote: > Jeff wrote to desdev > [snip] > > > <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > As far as sharing the data across *eo sites for > > consistent donation bar purposes, I'm sure a simple XML > > feed would do nicely. > > <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>< > > > yes it would. > > Can provide a feed for you, no problem. Spec the format (sample file > would be helpful) and you'll get it. Make it some common XML type, e.g. RSS, and let people use the data for their own ickle "help evolt.org" links :) Could also have an ickle png for people to link to with the current goal on it. -- _ __/| ___ ___ __ _________ "When Microsoft Office is your only hammer, \`O_o' / _ \/ -_) // / __/ _ \ pretty much everything begins to look like =(_ _)=/_//_/\__/\_,_/_/ \___/ a nail. Or a thumb." -- Rob Pegoraro U - Ack! Phttpt! Thhbbt! neuro at well dot com http://neuro.me.uk/ From martin.burns at uk.ibm.com Thu Aug 14 09:18:08 2003 From: martin.burns at uk.ibm.com (Martin Paul Burns) Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2003 09:18:08 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] Help Support Evolt article update Message-ID: http://evolt.org/help_support_evolt now has regular (monthly) suggested donations. Can we please get out there and pimp it? Also, David, when you've opened a bank account, should cheques go to you, or first to Marlene and then onto you to bank? In either case, given Marlene's housemove (congrats, btw - how's it going?), the cheques address should be updated. Once we've worked out what it's to be, either Marlene or I can do the update. Cheers Martin From martin at easyweb.co.uk Sun Aug 31 10:29:53 2003 From: martin at easyweb.co.uk (Martin Burns) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 10:29:53 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? Message-ID: I seem to be picking up a feeling that desdev are thinking about using HTML4.01 for the new site: > > From: "Peter-Paul Koch" > >so, XHTML 1.0 Transitional? has anyone decided what MIME type > > >we'll serve it as? CSS 2.1? no tables for layout? no embedded > > >style? no overuse of classes, spans, or divs? > > > I agree with everything. As to mime type: keep it simple and use > > text/html. The other stuff is too complicated for use and useless > > anyway. > > well, if we don't get the MIME, then it isn't really XHTML... it > won't validate as such... and given that (i think) that MIME type > causes IE6/win some issues, that's a concern... > > of course, HTML itself *isn't* a discarded standard... we *could* > still do all of the above in HTML *and* serve it as the correct MIME > type... > > as it is, the articles themselves won't validate when you consider > none of the elements have a self-terminating slash... > > or am i being too picky? Now while I'm not really all *that* bothered, I can see that using HTML4.01 (/me hopes to high heaven that this doesn't also mean table-based layout) will lose us a lot of credibility externally. When we last redesigned (1999), we could express a lot of fair scepticism, but not now. Thoughts? Cheers Martin -- Now playing on iTunes: "Streets Of Sorrow/Birmingham Six" by The Pogues from 'If I Should Fall From Grace With God' - a hit from way back in 1987 From roselli at earthlink.net Sun Aug 31 11:06:05 2003 From: roselli at earthlink.net (aardvark) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 06:06:05 -0400 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3F51904D.30373.3FC5C300@localhost> > From: Martin Burns > > I seem to be picking up a feeling that desdev are thinking about using > HTML4.01 for the new site: and by desdev, you mean me... since i suggested it for two key reasons: - we have to go clean *all* the articles looking for elements like
,
, , etc... - a page isn't valid XHTML without the MIME type, but that MIME type can hose some browsers... > Now while I'm not really all *that* bothered, I can see that using > HTML4.01 (/me hopes to high heaven that this doesn't also mean > table-based layout) will lose us a lot of credibility externally. i didn't suggest table-based layout... and i agree, a lot of people would give us crap for it, but given the reasons above, do we want a site that *really* validates, or do we want a site that can hose some browsers? if the argument's solid, it just becomes part of the 'behind the rebuild' article... > When we last redesigned (1999), we could express a lot of fair > scepticism, but not now. > > Thoughts? see above... -- my latest book project: Web Graphics for Non-Designers http://amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1590591712/evoltorg02-20 ISBN: 1590591712 From martin at easyweb.co.uk Sun Aug 31 11:14:21 2003 From: martin at easyweb.co.uk (Martin Burns) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 11:14:21 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? In-Reply-To: <3F51904D.30373.3FC5C300@localhost> Message-ID: On Sunday, August 31, 2003, at 11:06 am, aardvark wrote: >> From: Martin Burns >> >> I seem to be picking up a feeling that desdev are thinking about using >> HTML4.01 for the new site: > > and by desdev, you mean me... since i suggested it for two key > reasons: > > - we have to go clean *all* the articles looking for elements like >
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, , etc... I agree, from a content perspective, manually cleaning all the live article would be a major pain. But Seb mentioned on #evolt that he has some kind of cleanup tool. >> Now while I'm not really all *that* bothered, I can see that using >> HTML4.01 (/me hopes to high heaven that this doesn't also mean >> table-based layout) will lose us a lot of credibility externally. > > i didn't suggest table-based layout... and i agree, a lot of people > would give us crap for it, It's for marketing to think through how much that matters, and if it does, then to put the case to desdev. > but given the reasons above, do we want a site that *really* > validates, or do we want a site that can hose some browsers? > if the argument's solid, it just becomes part of the 'behind the > rebuild' article... Oh sure, no question. Just want to make sure that we know about the risk and consciously accept it. Cheers Martin -- Now playing on iTunes: "Only The Brave" by Runrig from 'Searchlight' - a hit from way back in 1989 From rudy937 at rogers.com Sun Aug 31 13:58:26 2003 From: rudy937 at rogers.com (rudy) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 08:58:26 -0400 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? References: <3F51904D.30373.3FC5C300@localhost> Message-ID: <003601c36fbf$93b07e80$52639c18@r9373j4yqbe8dy> > ... but given the reasons above, do we want a > site that *really* validates, or do we want a site that > can hose some browsers? de template, boss, de template! make the template xhtml strict without layout tables articles we can catch up with and fix later (good on ya, seb) hose some browsers? dude, remember our audience sure, our audience includes web developers who may have an older browser or two in their arsenal, but hey, they know what they're doing if they visit with one, and it's important for these visitors that the hosing actually occur in my most humble opinion, occasional non-web-developer site visitors who have only a hosable browser at their disposal are not to be pandered to at the expense of the much larger group of web developers who have current browsers and are interested in seeing us pull a chuck yeager (push the envelope) rudy From seb at poked.org Sun Aug 31 15:53:14 2003 From: seb at poked.org (Seb Potter) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 15:53:14 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: >> - we have to go clean *all* the articles looking for elements like >>
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, , etc... > > I agree, from a content perspective, manually cleaning all the live > article would be a major pain. But Seb mentioned on #evolt that he has > some kind of cleanup tool. Indeed. I'm in the middle of testing this against the entire content base at the moment, and Will let you know how it goes. >>> Now while I'm not really all *that* bothered, I can see that using >>> HTML4.01 (/me hopes to high heaven that this doesn't also mean >>> table-based layout) will lose us a lot of credibility externally. >> >> i didn't suggest table-based layout... and i agree, a lot of people >> would give us crap for it, There is a third option that I will put to desdev, and this follows from my suggestion of having multiple views of content through a transformation process, and is my argument for actually writing the templates in xhtml1 *strict*: With the templates and content in xhtml1 strict, they are valid xml. This means we can use a transform through xslt to output pages as other formats, such as pdf, rtf, plain text... and if necessary we could produce an xslt that outputs html4.01 For me, this isn't a decision, it's just obvioulsy the correct thing to do from an application architecture point of view. Doing it any other way is a compromise that reduces our ability to expand evolt. It also makes a fully open and standards compliant method of providing things like rdf feeds... no need for bespoke code solution to open a database connection, retrieve relevant data and manually construct the rdf... you just take your template and transform it in xsl. In terms of marketing, evolt cannot afford to be seen to be agonising over trivialities like xhtml or html, or even making a decision to support one or the other. If we go down one route and cut the other off, that's when we lose. - seb -- http://poked.org From martin at easyweb.co.uk Sun Aug 31 17:51:30 2003 From: martin at easyweb.co.uk (Martin Burns) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 17:51:30 +0100 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5EC26A2C-DBD3-11D7-883B-000A959F6A30@easyweb.co.uk> On Sunday, August 31, 2003, at 03:53 pm, Seb Potter wrote: >>> - we have to go clean *all* the articles looking for elements like >>>
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, , etc... >> >> I agree, from a content perspective, manually cleaning all the live >> article would be a major pain. But Seb mentioned on #evolt that he >> has some kind of cleanup tool. > > Indeed. I'm in the middle of testing this against the entire content > base at the moment, and Will let you know how it goes. > With the templates and content in xhtml1 strict, they are valid xml. > This means we can use a transform through xslt to output pages as > other formats, such as pdf, rtf, plain text... and if necessary we > could produce an xslt that outputs html4.01 > > For me, this isn't a decision, it's just obvioulsy the correct thing > to do from an application architecture point of view. Doing it any > other way is a compromise that reduces our ability to expand evolt. It > also makes a fully open and standards compliant method of providing > things like rdf feeds... no need for bespoke code solution to open a > database connection, retrieve relevant data and manually construct the > rdf... you just take your template and transform it in xsl. > > In terms of marketing, evolt cannot afford to be seen to be agonising > over trivialities like xhtml or html, or even making a decision to > support one or the other. If we go down one route and cut the other > off, that's when we lose. Or rather, if we cut off one route without a good reason - a good story to tell - then we lose in PR terms. Just relaunching in XHTML Strict/CSS these days won't cause any bad PR, but it'll be just a 'so what?' story. Probably the best reaction we'd get would be "And about time". But all the above is a *really* big good news story we can go out and boast about, particularly if we have some cool open standards stuff in the backend too. Cheers Martin -- Now playing on iTunes: "The Last Flamenco" by Acoustic Alchemy from 'The Beautiful Game' - a hit from way back in 2000 From lach at illuminosity.net Sun Aug 31 11:29:51 2003 From: lach at illuminosity.net (Lachlan Cannon) Date: Sun, 31 Aug 2003 20:29:51 +1000 Subject: [Marketing] (x)HTML standard for new site? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3F51CE1F.2060001@illuminosity.net> Martin Burns wrote: > Thoughts? Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I don't see it mattering much either way. If we convert to xhtml then we can easily run content through something like HTML tidy, and tweak where needed (and no we obviously couldn't do it all at once. We could have a list of articles which needed to be checked to go through). Personally, I think that because of the perception of XHTML we're best off going with that for an upgrade, not to mention that a lot of tools are going the xhtml way too, which is an important point to bear in mind. WRT to the mime-type issue, it's perfectly valid to serve xhtml as text/html. Yes it may not be 'proper' xhtml, but frankly, who gives a shit. It doesn't matter. There's no benefit to sending the 'proper' mimetype and a lot of downsides. -- Lach http://illuminosity.net/