[Rubyinstaller-devel] One-Click Ruby Installer needs a new home, can you help him?

[Charles Roper]

Luis Lavena wrote:
>>> I decided that the best for the project is going to be a public
>>> contest/challenge/competition with polls for voting. See my reply to
>>> Michal about it.
>> You want to perhaps be a little bit cautious of a competition because voters
>> inevitably vote for eye-candy and fail to consider other more subtle issues,
>> such as context, continuity and ease of build/maintenance.
> 
> In the Web 2.0 era, ease of use and eye-candy are part of it.

Yes, usability and polished, appropriate design are crucially important, 
I agree 100%.

>> If you really do want to go down the competition route and you have some
>> cash to dedicate, you might want to consider CrowdSpring:
>> http://www.crowdspring.com/
> 
> Didn't know about that website, thank you. Anyhow, I cannot use
> CrowdSping to collect the money, which is why Pledgie is good for.

The value in CrowdSpring is the community of designers that hang out 
there. There is a pool of very capable designers who are eager to work 
on projects like this and CrowdSpring reaches right into the heart of 
that community.

>> The key in this (and any creative endeavour, for that matter) is in the
>> brief. What you've done so far is great, but I would also extend it by
>> providing 5 sites you like and 5 sites you don't like. That will give
>> designers a much better idea of what (and what you're not) after.
> 
> I don't want to narrow and limite the creativity by 5 sites I like or
> not. As I commented before, don't want my personal taste (or lack of)
> limit what the community will love to have.

OK, fair enough. I was looking at it from the perspective of a designer 
who has done client work for individuals rather than a whole community. 
I know that it can be really, *really* helpful knowing the kind of 
aesthetic the client was hoping for. They *always* have some idea. ;) 
But I appreciate you're not the client as such, right? The client is the 
community.

>> http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/
>> http://ruby-toolbox.com/
>> http://guides.rubyonrails.org/
>> http://www.engineyard.com/
>> http://rubyonrails.org/
> 
> Good point, but:
> 
> ruby-lang.org is overwhelming and sometimes confusing. Just to get to
> the ruby-core page to know how to contribute takes you time.
> 
> ruby-toolbox.com: and you worried about aesthetics over good UI
> design? That site is a classic 2.0 design.
> 
> guides.rubyonrails.org are good prove that sometimes
> kind-of-wiki-content can be aesthetically be pretty, but is not the
> website of a tool, language or solution: is a documentation place and
> documentation is prioritized.
> 
> Also, don't want to make RubyInstaller looks like Rails, Ruby is more
> than Rails, and One-Click Installer should keep in that way.

Yeah, what I was getting at here wasn't the details of each design, but 
a kind of 'feel' present in each site. I'm not saying any of them are 
good sites particularly, but I am saying they have a similar theme in 
the way they look. When you land on one of these sites, your brain 
unconsciously tells you, "OK, I'm on a Ruby related site". Each is 
different, and does different things, but each looks "Ruby-ish", you 
know? But perhaps it doesn't matter - hopefully the designers that come 
forward will be experienced enough to recognise that this site needs to 
sit comfortably within the Ruby community and not be a complete odd-ball. :)

I'm looking forward to seeing the contributions. :)

Charles