Revision as of 21:22, 8 February 2007

Current Status

We have several proposals of which every single one has advantages and disadvantages; supporters and opponents. I think arguments like "but company xy has something similar" do not count.

I think that

• Bille made a good shot with a simple slogan like "KDE Technical Reference" as title. This alone is hard to market, thus let's take something of the form "TechBase: KDE Technical Reference" along with techbase.kde.org. The prefix (here: techbase) is something we can market very well. (Other example: technet.kde.org with "TechNet: KDE Technology Network")
• techbase, techzone, technet, workbench, garage, and maybe others are all good candidates.

We have had our discussions and should focus on finding something :)

--Dhaumann 21:22, 8 February 2007 (CET)

Name Suggestions

TechZone: I like this name for several reasons: They give a clue on the pages purpose, are not biased towards either devs or system integrators, and leave room to brand them (Question to Promo team: is that a good idea). Please note that we will redirect developer.kde.org to this domain, so people who are looking for this domain straight will still end up in the right place. The word Base in TechBase was criticized as being meaningless plus there is already a domain called devbase.com, and I want to stay out of tm issues. --Danimo 01:42, 19 January 2007 (CET)

I agree with these ideas. Regarding not biasing articles, that imho is a particularly important idea. While the major apps/suites (KOffice, Kontact, Kolab, Kopete, etc) are taken care of, there is an incredibly vast set of vertical markets untouched by KDE. These markets are not often discussed, yet make up a rather significant developer market. Examples would be software to manage a dental office, consulting firm, accounting firm, millwork companies, etc. Those working on this won't necessarily fall into a neat and clean category, so I'd consider this advantageous. --CuCullin 16:21, 19 January 2007 (CET)

I don't think the word base is meaningless it all. At least for English speakers it carries both the idea of a canonical location ("home base") and solidity (base and foundation can be used interchangeably in many cases) --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

In my opinion, TechZone sounds like it's trying to be 'cool'. The word 'zone' sounds like it describing something much less well defined than, say, 'base' and so makes it sound very vague. --milliams 00:42, 20 January 2007 (CET)

TechBase: I like this name because we already call the site that elsewhere, so there's some continuity. It also is representative of the fact that this site (as i understand it) is meant to be the base of technical information for and about KDE on the interwebs. There is a company called TechBase International"KDE Technical Reference" which does things completely unrelated to KDE so maybe there's some tm issues, but I doubt it. Perhaps we might want to have a thing where the full name of the site is KDE Technical Base and we just call it TechBase for short --Mattr 02:22, 19 January 2007 (CET)

I like the Word 'base'. For exactly the two reasons aseigo mentioned (under TechZone). Maybe officially naming the site "Technology Base" and just having the URL as techbase.kde.org? However, I'm sure that everyone would just refer to it as 'TechBase' anyway --milliams 00:42, 20 January 2007 (CET)

I think this is my favorite professional-sounding wiki name, and my favorite overall, basically for the reasons already mentioned. --Mpyne 21:29, 4 February 2007 (CET)

TechCenter: Similar to TechZone and TechBase. Maybe also similar to the qt-centre.

TechZone and TechBase : I feel that "tech[base|zone]"is a poor choice of name - it's a made up word and as such will age rapidly. It's a lowest common denominator, meaningless choice. The KDE project is bigger than that and would be better served by clean, functional terms such as "KDE Technical Reference", "KDE Technical Resource". If it has to be one word, "Learn" or "Platform". --Bille 23:18, 17 January 2007 (CET)

You feel it is a lowest common denominator, meaningless choice. I feel otherwise. Let's try and stay away from communicating things as if they are universal truths when they are actually subjective reflections. "Learn" might be an interesting name; "Platform" would make it confusing for me to talk about the KDE platform vs the website called Platform; "Technical Reference" would be very hard to market. One of the sides of this that I have to deal with that probably most others don't is representing it to the public during interviews, in press materials, when giving presentations at conferences, etc... So for me the marketability of the term is also important, as are the clarity and accuracy issues you raise in your comment here. --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

Aaron, I knew what feel means before you italicised it. I'm not enough of a solipsist to confuse my feelings with universal truths. Just sharing my subjective opinion here. Why do you feel "KDE Technical Reference/Resource" is hard to market? IMO it says exactly what the site does, has the KDE brand and can be communicated in any language. After all, what you'd be marketing is KDE, with the message that KDE has comprehensive technical resources - you'd not be marketing eg our "KDE Technical Reference" site vs. some competing "Larry's KDE Experts Forum" --Bille 10:23, 20 January 2007 (CET)

I feel "KDE Technical Reference/Resource" is hard to market because it has about as much zing to it as a colon exam. It's not easy to say (6 syllables, even) and unless you prepend "KDE" to it it's not recognizable since it's a generic term. "Technical reference" could apply to any number of things within KDE, so this would be THE Technical Reference website. Contrast with "TechBase", "TechZone", "WallZomper", etc.. easy to say, compact, not an ambiguous noun so further qualifiers ('the', 'KDE', 'website') aren't necessary once it is introduced into the vernacular. These short names also lend to being the domain name of the site, unless technicalreference.kde.org seems like a good idea to you? Describing the site to people as the KDE technical reference is probably a clear way of doing it, but a name and a description are not the same thing --Aseigo 22:56, 20 January 2007 (CET)

The thing I don't like about this is that it is just a noun like "web page". This site has a purpose, and I think the name should promote that purpose - otherwise, there would be no limitation on any KDE content going on here. Users might add application manuals, or e.V. info could go on here, whatever. That would only create confusion imho. --CuCullin 16:21, 19 January 2007 (CET)

KDE Wiki: Wiki is now a noun just like a web page. Many of us are used to talking KDevelop wiki, SUSE wiki, and even below, Daniel used Kolab Wiki for Kolab. After all it's easy to remember and compatible with KISS principles... --jstaniek 16:10, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Isn't the KDE wiki wiki.kde.org? That's already taken. Besides, we still need a name on the right of the KDE logo. "KDE Technical Reference" or similar titles are better than "KDE wiki". --Dhaumann 16:56, 19 January 2007 (CET)

I thought the old wiki.kde.org, now redundant (look at its TOC), is pretty much a history now when the new developernew wiki appeared, and as Mediawiki not only contains predictable hyperlinks and good interwiki and templates support, but its engine is far superior to the old one and constantly improved.

At least I consider moving all of my content out of it elsewhere. There's no day when I did not have problems with its tikiwiki's configuration, html layout and speed.

Application manuals? The old wiki.kde.org does not contain this kind of stuff, so history shows it's not a problem. Every larger KDE apps can host its own wiki, as we know in case of KOffice, Kexi, KDevelop, KDEWebDev family, etc. So Wiki is still my favourite term.

Regarding "KDE Technical Reference", it sounds a bit serious. There's similar very popular (100x more according to google) term: "Knowledge Base". Personally I have no problem with having wiki.kde.org (because it's as short as possible) and "Knowledge Base" title. --jstaniek 18:54, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Part of that, imho, is that wiki.kde.org (and TikiWiki) isn't as friendly as MediaWiki. Perhaps it should be wiki.kde.org, and simply have a nice listing somewhere on this site discussing what does and does not belong on here, just to direct content that may be more appropriate elsewhere. Personally, I like a more descriptive name because I think it separates this wiki from others. --CuCullin 19:49, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Knowledge base is an interesting name posibility IMHO. It's a bit on the dry side but it is accurate. My concern is that it might cast the net too wide and we'd end up with scope creep, e.g. becoming a place for user information. I don't think we should try and cater to absolutely everyone with this site, and a more focussed name might help with that. --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

Knowledge base is a term that in current usage seems more like a Quality Assurance / bug reporting type of thing. A few companies (including Microsoft) reference bug reports/security flaws/etc. with a knowledge base article on their website. --Mpyne 21:29, 4 February 2007 (CET)

"wiki" is not something I could market (see my comment to Bille's response on this matter for more on this point). "Wiki" does not speak directly to the target audiences due to being a generic noun/verb, nor does it say what is on the site since a wiki can contain anything. It's also already taken anyways =) --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

"Wiki" only describes what it is, not what it does or what it's for. In a way wiki is synonymous with "site". And we'd never think of calling this "KDE Site" yet that conveys just as much information to the reader. --milliams 00:42, 20 January 2007 (CET)

Do you also mean platform.kde.org or reference.kde.org then? We are searching for both a readable name and a subdomain name. --Dhaumann 16:56, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Empower KDE: could be used as empower.kde.org for a subdomain. Is it ok to tell people to "go to Empower KDE"? I think it gives regular users the idea that it's not for them (they just use KDE), and it gives the developers/isvs/etc. the pleasant feeling of contributing. I thought of 'power users' at first, but it didn't sound appropriate. --Exit3219 19:56, 20 January 2007 (CET)

IMHO that'd require visitors to think in order to understand it, and a subsite name shouldn't be like that ;) Logixoul 20:48, 24 January 2007 (CET)

KDE Workshop or KDE Workbench or KDE Garage or KDE Lab - fresh ideas that came by night: --jstaniek 01:52, 24 January 2007 (CET)

lab is so-so; garage, workbench and workshop all work for me, though. garage is kind of "cool" sounding =) --Aseigo 06:16, 24 January 2007 (CET)

Does garage make sense in other languages, too? In Germany that's the place where people put their car... Maybe also a place where you can do handicrafts (but I'm not one of them) :-) --Dhaumann 12:18, 24 January 2007 (CET)

Garage is rather popular term for cool, fresh, positive, and alternative development, also related to music (see Apple GarageBand..). It's also related to car tuning community nowadays ;). This thing is quite modern in many countries, I guess. --jstaniek 20:24, 24 January 2007 (CET)

Well we (.us) still think of a garage as the place where your car goes first and foremost, but the second connotation is easily the place in a house where any kind of major work is performed. Carpentry, car repair, etc. Kids trying to learn music are typically kicked out to the garage (hence the term "garage band", which leads to the name for Apple's music editing software). I think this is a good term if we're going for something "marketable", especially since most people find the type of maintenance they'd do in a garage to be both rewarding and not-too-difficult, which is what I think we're going for in this wiki. --Mpyne 21:29, 4 February 2007 (CET)

A typical mini FAQ may contain: Q:Where to start if I want to develop for KDE? - A:Go to our garage, you'll get all tools you need to succeed ;D. --jstaniek 15:56, 25 January 2007 (CET)

Garage for me gives connotations of cool, gritty work. I'm all for Garage. Maybe 'KDE Garage' or 'Tech Garage' or whatever, but I like it. It's also a failry unique yet easily rememberable name. I can easily imagine directing people towards "the garage" for tutorials etc. --milliams 00:55, 25 January 2007 (CET)

Or KDE Backstage (but i like garage too) 81.243.163.184 11:41, 24 January 2007 (CET)

I vote for KDE Backstage. It's the most accurate, and it's catchy. Tech* isn't as accurate, as we also provide some kinda non-technical info, like policies and schedules. Logixoul 20:48, 24 January 2007 (CET)

KDE TechNet: (technet.kde.org) I like the name "technology network" in short "technet" because it covers a wide (unlimited) range of technical informations on this or other sites. Additional for me it sounds better than techbase or techzone. --rhabacker 10:19, 24 January 2007 (CET)

technet.kde.org along with "TechNet: KDE Technology Network" is pretty nice. The part "net" (or network) suggests a web of information. --Dhaumann 21:22, 8 February 2007 (CET)

The name can lead to confusion with Microsoft's technet that provides information for system administrators

And what's the problem? ;) I think such arguments are invalid. You will always find someone who already has something similar. --Dhaumann 21:22, 8 February 2007 (CET)

Thoughts on the Scope of This Wiki

Thoughts on the Target Audiences

Perhaps someone could clarify what is meant by "system administrators". At the extreme this term could apply to everyone from those with root on their local desktop install to people managing a network of thousands of PCs. I suspect the first of these includes the vast majority of KDE users. I assume this is not what is intended as this is a separate site to wiki.kde.org. -- TheoSpears

We're talking about people that administer a multitude of PCs, probably they are doing this professionally most of the time. We want to provide resources for them (howtos, scripts, pittfalls and workarounds). The wiki also gives us the unique chance that they can contribute their knowledge back (works fine e.g. on the Kolab Wiki. --Danimo 02:12, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Also, do we need to put this up on this site? The question being, does Sys Admin information belong? Or should it remain at http://www.kde.org/areas/sysadmin/ ? --CuCullin 18:22, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Good question. That fact that pretty well nobody knows about /areas/sysadmin is telling. I'm constantly educating people about the existence of that area on our website because people don't find it on their own. The reason seems to be that it is too buried in a general purpose side (www.kde.org) to be easily findable and because it isn't promoted well. We can elevate it's visibility by putting it on the front page of the wiki and we can use marketing and promotional support applied to the wiki to increase awareness of this body of information. In other words, we can tell people all at once about this "hub of technical information" which should let us reach more people with a simpler concept (simpler because you don't have to think, "ok, sysadmin technical documents would be over here... programmer technical documents would be over on this site..."). also note that we already will have sysadmin type information here to educate programmers on topics such as Kiosk. may as well keep it all together, no? bonus points that unlike www.kde.org, the wiki is community editable and updatable. /areas/sysadmin languishes so badly because you need special privileges to make changes to it. -Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

This is also a place where sys admins can find out more about the whole KDE community. This Wiki should be more like the very first place for anyone who wants to know what is KDE. Screenshot, announcement, the best apps(amarok, k3b, koffice, konqueror, etc.), so that the user will WANT to try this out.--Imagine 19:16, 19 January 2007 (CET)

I'm concerned that this scope creep would make it very hard to organize things well. We have other sites that are for user oriented information; keeping our sites focussed will make it easier to promote as well as more rewarding for visitors as they will have places "just for them". I agree we can use our web sites to market KDE better, but that is a separate topic that is IMO out of scope for this website. That said, this site should be first place people who want technical documents should think of going. --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)

With such an international audience, presumably we need to think about how the name carries around the world. I know that this can sink any discussion with concerns from every country, but I wonder how well (for example) 'zone' and 'base' are understood in this context, particularly since both have more than one meaning in English. Tomchance 08:24, 19 January 2007 (CET)

Good point. How can we test this? Float names by people on irc or blogs or? --Aseigo 00:15, 20 January 2007 (CET)