Re: Web site matrix

[Gustavo Tavares]

I second Daniel’s notion here. Either have a little hide / expand button or have a link to the full chart. 

Very helpful info and would accelerate set up immmesley.

On Fri, Aug 20, 2021, at 6:31 PM, Daniel Boyd wrote:

Riccardo,

I appreciate not wanting to have an overly complex chart on the main web

site. And I think having a comprehensive chart on the Wiki is a great idea.

However, I do not think that's a good reason to exclude this (or something

similar) from the main web site. I think a simplified version of the chart

would still be really helpful. Identify the most common configurations (from

the standpoint of how frequently do visitors to the web site come looking

for configuration X?)

I think one of the most common use cases for the site (and, again, I'm

assuming; analytics could confirm), is new (new to GNUstep) developers with

a particular idea in mind -- writing a new app, porting a macOS or iOS app,

etc etc. And they want to be able to quickly discern if GNUstep is a viable

option. "Can I use GNUstep to port my Mac app to Windows/Linux?" "I keep

hearing great things about Cocoa. Can I use GNUstep to get into Cocoa

programming in Linux?" 

I think people want to know:

1) what operating system(s) can I run this on?

2) Can I use ObjC 2.0 features (this will be a deal breaker for many, if not

most developers coming from the Apple ecosystem)

3) How can I quickly get an environment set up so I can start coding? (hence

the link to the installation instructions)

I think one of the major goals of the web site should be to surface this

information to new visitors quickly and simply. And I don't think the

current web site does this well enough. There very well may be a better

approach--the matrix was just the first thing that popped in my mind.

-----Original Message-----

From: Riccardo Mottola <riccardo.mottola@libero.it> 

Sent: Friday, August 20, 2021 4:19 PM

To: Daniel Boyd <danieljboyd@icloud.com>; 'Discuss-gnustep Discuss'

<discuss-gnustep@gnu.org>

Subject: Re: Web site matrix

Hi Daniel,

Daniel Boyd wrote:

>

> I think the web site could benefit from a matrix along these lines:

>

> This is just a example. Obviously, you'd want to add lines for the 

> BSDs and MacOS etc. And there may be better columns and a better 

> layout. This was just my original thought.

>

I just re-read your suggestion understanding it differently.

This "Matrix" could get very long.. we support a lot of combinations. I am

personally a tester and debugger of the less usual stuff. Especially with

gcc we can get currently very far.

I think this should live in the wiki instead, so it can be edited easily and

cross-linked with relevant tutorials to build or configure it. I would leave

out the "installation method" and referring to the table for building.

Adding a note if e.g. packages are available and recommended for "Debian"

(Linux is not debian).

I would add also architectures where relevant (e.g. ppc32, arm, etc... 

since it makes a difference with certain combinations)

I can help with a lot of data here in about a fortnight, when I plan to

re-run full builds.

Riccardo