site. I was tired of all this marketing talk and nothing being done about it. So here I am, starting work slowly but continuously.Original post edit
My original announcement for this task was posted in this thread about "Finding a niche for Tcl":http://groups.google.de/group/comp.lang.tcl/browse_frm/thread/98ec976d58b75c86/e7eb63b0b9993e81The plan edit
On the site http://www.typoscriptics.de/old/tcl/portal you will always find the current status of the new Tcl portal. My plan is to ...- Get all content from the original site over to the new one
- Look for a good design (the current is just a placeholder at the moment)
- Add more content, links and the like and update the site with news on a regular basis
Current status edit
I am in phase 1 now collecting and reorganizing content from www.tcl.tk. Any time I see something interesting, I add a placeholder to the new site so I can remember what to add in phase 3.(pages in parentheses are not yet transferred)- Home page is transferred
- about/ is transferred
- about/highlights.html grabbed (needs revision)
- (about/uses.html)
- (about/audience.html)
- about/features.html grabbed (needs revision, same page as: advocacy/top10.html and advocacy/whytcl.html)
- about/compare.html grabbed (needs thorough revision, same page as: advocacy/choose.html and advocacy/whyscript.html)
- about/language.html grabbed (needs revision, same page as: scripting/syntax.html)
- software/tcltk/license.html grabbed
- about/support.html grabbed
- about/history.html is transferred
- about/dos2unix.html (same page as: scripting/lesson1.html)
- about/netserver.html (same page as: scripting/netserver.html)
- scripting/primer.html grabbed (needs revision)
- customers/ (same page as about/audience.html)
- customers/success/ (same page as about/uses.html)
- customers/success/AOLcase.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- customers/success/webcontent.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- customers/success/netmanage.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- customers/success/testautomation.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- customers/success/edacad.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- customers/success/other.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- advocacy/perl.html (page does not exist)
- advocacy/xml.html (page does not exist)
- software/ is transferred
- software/tcltk/ is transferred
- software/tclpro/ is transferred
- software/tclpro/debugger.html is transferred
- software/tclpro/checker.html is transferred
- software/tclpro/compiler.html is transferred
- software/tclpro/wrapper.html is transferred
- software/tclpro/eval/ is tranferred
- (software/tclpro/support/faq.html) (NOT transferred; move this to sf project pages, which has no home ATM?)
- (software/tclpro/doc/) (NOT transferred; move this to sf project pages, which has no home ATM?)
- (software/tclpro/support/index.html) (NOT transferred; move this to sf project pages, which has no home ATM?)
- software/plugin/ is transferred
- software/plugin/whatis.html is transferred
- software/plugin/download.html is transferred
- software/plugin/faq.html (page does not exist)
- (software/plugin/applets.html and links from there to the demos)
- (software/plugin/safetcl.html) (NOT transferred, stuff is presumably outdated?)
- (software/plugin/instructions.html)
- (software/plugin/external.html)
- (software/plugin/man/ and links from there to individual manual pages) (NOT transferred, better to move these to the plugin SF pages?)
- software/plugin/v2/* (NOT transferred, better to move these to the plugin SF pages?)
- resource/software/ports/ (page does not exist)
- software/java/ is transferred
- software/java/download.html (this page is a missing link at the Tcl/Java pages)
- software/java/new_features.html (this page is a missing link at the Tcl/Java pages)
- software/java/faq.html (this page is a missing link at the Tcl/Java pages)
- man/java1.2.6/contents.html (page does not exist)
- resource/software/applications/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/editor/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/email/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/graphics/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/irc/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/personal/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/applications/misc/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/database/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/expect/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/macintosh/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/network/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/objects/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/tk/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/windows/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/extensions/misc/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/development/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/guibuilder/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/plugin/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/www/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/xml/ (only a link to the wiki)
- resource/software/tools/misc/ (only a link to the wiki)
- software/tcltk/netcvs.html is grabbed (needs revision)
- doc/ (page does not exist)
- (resource/doc/books/)
- (resource/doc/faq/)
- (man/)
- (resource/doc/start)
- doc/white.html (page does not exist)
- doc/scripting.html (page does not exist)
- doc/integration.html (page does not exist)
- doc/compiler.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- doc/tclHistory.html (same page as /about/history.html)
- doc/scriptHistory.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- doc/Y2K.html (page does not exist)
- doc/howto/ (page does not exist)
- doc/howto/probuild.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- doc/howto/wrap.html (page does not exist)
- (doc/howto/compile.html)
- (doc/howto/stubs.html)
- (doc/howto/thread_model.html)
- doc/howto/winext.html (page gone, redirected to home page)
- doc/howto/regexp81.tml (page gone, redirected to home page)
- (doc/howto/i18n.html)
- doc/tea/ (page does not exist)
- (community/)
- (community/news.html)
- (community/features/)
- (community/features/Xconq.html)
- (community/features/webbuilding.html)
- (community/features/intelliclaim.html)
- (community/features/infocoll.html)
- (community/features/millionare.html)
- (community/features/tclkit.html)
- (community/features/familypractice.html)
- (community/features/ashley.html)
- (resource/community/people/)
- (resource/community/websites/)
- (community/tcl2005/)
- (resource/)
- (live/bydate)
- (forms/urlnote.html)
- (live/keyword)
To do edit
- incorporate text from TCL Elevator Pitch
- on the page about SQLite, refer to the book "The Definitive Guide to SQLite" [1]
- find a good place for platform-specific things (other than the link on the page Software->Extensions), e.g. COM interaction on Windows (tcom,optcl, ...)
- provide a good way to make old pages (and their URLs) refer/link to the new updated content, so there are no "missing link"/404 messages
- grab content from Tcl Advocacy
- uses: BIG SCIENCE: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, BIG SCIENCE: JET the Joint European Torus project
- link to Tcl/Tk 8.5: New public C routines
- Why not make things like Tcl3D Demo of the Month a part of the site?
- Add documentation of Thread package — it's almost part of the core.
- Link to Japanese Wiki at http://tcl.s26.xrea.com/wiki/ (though not updated since 2007)
Can you help? edit
Yes you can. Provide content, stories, news, ...! I have already received some content (a tutorial) from Arjen Markus and an offer from the makers of the Tcl-URL! to help me trasnferring the weekly news to the site.Comments edit
EKB Your new design is easier to navigate thatn www.tcl.tk. I look forward to seeing more. (Although I'm not crazy about the layout. It's too "Wordpress"-like for me, and I'm glad that at step 2 in your plan you're looking at designs. Maybe take a look at CSS Zen Garden for inspiration? [2])TR I know Zen Garden and many of these layouts are really beautiful. As the plan is, the focus is on content alone now. The current layout is a placeholder only, so people can see the content being added. When all content is there, I will switch focus to the layout and I think there will be lots to discuss then.EKB Sounds like a good plan!On another note, I think you could quickly fill in your Tcl/Tk placeholders for "hello, world":puts "Hello, World!"and
pack [label .l -text "Hello, World!"]TR True. I was planning something like this. It needs a short introductory text, though. Maybe I'll take some from the wiki ... EKB Yes, in fact, there's a whole The Hello World program as implemented in Tcl/Tk page.EKB One more comment. If you used the same type size on all the pages (home page & others), then the user could set the type size that's comfortable for them. My 2 1/2 cents.TR This may be due to my ignorance on layout right now. I will look into this. Thanks for your comments! EKB No problem! Actually, truth be told, the last one was from my spouse, who is a graphic designer. She gave me permission to pretend it was my idea :-Dtjk You might add a link to the tkchat page to the the related links for Core Team. TR Done! Thanks for the hint.chrisjl - Forgive me if this is already part of the plan, but I'd hate to see you complete this daunting task without me making this point. I hope part of the intended process is to change the URLs to reflect the page content. e.g. Documentation -> Tutorials is currently accessed as the highly forgettable page3/page10/page10.html - I'd much rather be able to tell people to visit www.tcl.tk/docs/tutorials (note the absence of an actual file name in that URL). TR I can assure you, this is part of the plan. The current page names are generated by the web software I am using and as long as I collect content and organize it, I will leave it like that. When all content is there, the names will be changed to something more reasonable :-)LV 2007 Oct 25 The first thing I noticed was the typo in the <head> of the first page - it says Tck instead of Tcl ... TR: Whoops, how could that one stay for so long without being noticed ... corrected now, thanks!
AM (20 december 2007) In the beginning of this year I wrote two tutorials for this website. I think they are useful on the Wiki as well, so I add them verbatim (i.e. with explicit references to the Wiki, rather than page titles):
Fabricio Rocha - 10-Apr-2009 - Is this site prototype still available? I could not open it... I have some ideas for a Tcl/Tk site and I would like to contribute.TR - Yes it is. See the link above under the heading 'The plan'. I just opened it and it works. I have, however, not had time lately to drive it further, but I am still trying :-) What would you like to contribute, then?Fabricio Rocha - 10-Apr-2009 - Thanks, TR! I've written you an e-mail!CMcC would just like to say that the prototype site is very pretty. Much more pretty than the incumbent site. Also more clearly laid out, with the menu on the right.
Fabricio Rocha - 11-Apr-2009 - Boiling ideas in my mind compelled me to create another prototype for a possible upgrade of www.tcl.tk. The address is http://tcltk.fabriciorocha.jor.br
. It is based on the marvelous, free Joomla content management system (at http://www.joomla.org). This makes very easy to change the whole site design with CSS templates; some of the registered users can insert content just like writing in a word processor; and there's a lot of free goodies which can be added to the website with some clicks (I have installed some of them, hope you like!)I would like to know your opinions and suggestions. But please observe that I did this in one day, so it still misses a lot of content and functionality (user registration being the most evident one). I will try to add new features and texts soon, specially if you like the proposal. I had to adapt a template made for webhosting sites, and I don't know PHP and my graphic skills are *very limited* :). If somebody there knows Joomla and can write PHP and/or have design ability, feel welcome to help in creating an exclusive template. And if someone feels like wanting to help with the contents, please let me know it! :)LV I'm not that crazy about the color scheme. But, [IMO], it would be sad if it turned out that the primary web site for Tcl was changed from a Tcl based system to some other language. Maybe something like Woof! could be investigated?Fabricio Rocha - I've already imagined this would be an issue, and it's true, because Joomla is PHP running on Apache and MySQL. But, as far as I know, there is no content management system built with or around Tcl (and a CMS is a must for dynamic sites with frequent updates and community contribution). And IMHO it's a matter of niches, or "each one doing what each one does best". PHP is great for websites for sure, there is little discussion on that; and by the other hand I'm certain that a lot of PHP developers and users are sure to have and/or want Tcl/Tk apps running in their desktops because PHP is not that strong in this field... About the color scheme, it can be changed for the whole site in two clicks, as long as there is a template (actually, this template being used has other six built-in colors available).DKF: The worst problem with PHP is that it makes some practices (notably including code that is inherently vulnerable SQL injection attacks) rather easier to write than code that is resistant to such problems. Mind you, if we avoid phpBB then we'll at least be not quite so badly off (going by the evidence collected by my employer's web support team at any rate, which indicates that virtually all defacements, break-ins and email-abuse mischief trace back to that piece of software).BTW, we really don't want to have a site that is open to defacement. We went through that phase a few years ago and it ended up with us just having to delete a large chunk of content. Never again.Fabricio Rocha - Totally agree; nobody wants a site open to defacement. Joomla seems to be more and more secure each day, but certainly nobody will ever guarantee it is 100% "unattackable". By the way, the forum I've put in the test site is not a bridge to phpBB, it's a totally independent Joomla extension. But back to the matters, which would be a solid-enough, hacker-proof system? In strict meaning, I don't know any; but certainly some are stronger than others and I don't know much about this area. And is there a content management system written with/for this stronger technology? Believe me, CMS is vital if Tcl/Tk wants a really attractive and dynamic site, with news and tech articles posted everyday, easy to be maintained by the community itself. Creating a new site in pure HTML or something alike will be very little more useful than keeping the current one, because it will be too hard to implement useful and user-friendly features like a chat, a forum, a poll, multilanguage content, CSS templates etc; and specially harder to bring contributors to it, which otherwise would just login and write an article just like using OpenOffice or writing in the Tcler's Wiki.I am not a technology professional, my job is media and social communication. As long as one (any) certain technology can do the content management like Joomla and other CMSs do, I'll be able and willing to help on that and create another proposal.DKF: I think there are two parts to making things better.- Getting a better set of software in place so that it takes less technical effort to keep things up to date.
- Improving the content.
