Openkore Website Redesign Input

[ponty]

Hi Openkore community!

I'm looking into redesigning the Openkore's main website, and I'm looking for some input the wants from the community who will be using it. In this post we will be focusing on the content/material that needs to be created. So what do you want on the website for it to be more beneficial and encourage you to contribute back to the community? Please note that this is only a brainstorm and not all ideas will be implemented. Though if you really think your idea should be used, I suggest taking the lead and managing a project to get it in place. Also, I'm open for anyone who would like to help me with this as well.

So the main content that will be on the website are:

• About Openkore - Brief Introduction to Openkore (something similar to http://www.openkore.com/wiki/index.php/About_OpenKore)
• Contribution Area - List of ways of how to contribute back to the community. Openkore To-Do list
• Developer Section - Information for Devs
• Donation Info - Money to keep the project alive and continually alive
• Download Section [Stable/SVN release]
• Homepage with recent Openkore news - Pulled from the forums
• Links to Related Content - Openkore and Ragnarok Online related websites
• Plugins - Descriptions of common and stable plugins
• User Support Section (aka Documentation area) - HowTos, Manual, Troubleshooting, Tutorial Videos

I'm thinking of using Joomla! as the content management system (CMS) for managing the website. It's simple to use, opensource, and has a strong support and development community. There's a few extensions and features that I find will also help with the organization/usability in documentation writing and building a sense of community as well.

The Extentions/Features are as follows:

• Archive Content - for organization
• Feedback Form - receiving information to how to improve existing content
• Forum Integration - contributions will be recognized to the individual without having to create two separate accounts
• Multi-Lingual Support - this has always been an issue, but I'm hoping to get more support from all communities
• Modular set-up - makes it easy to maintain the website
• Polls - for collecting information from the community (e.g. prioritize features to be implemented)
• Ratings - articles can be rated to let the reader know whether to use his time going through the article and lets the author know if they need to improve the article or not
• Related Items/Sections - if properly done, it'll make it easier for readers to find information related to their issues/interests

So that's the general layout so far that I have gotten down. Now, I just need your ideas to add on to what we got. Since this is a brainstorming topic anyways, feel free to post any suggestions along with reasons. It could be more specific or general from what I've posted here already. So let me repeat the brainstorm question:

So what do you want on the website for it to be more beneficial and encourage you to contribute back to the community?

Remember to include reasons to why you think that will be good for us to use.

[sli]

This is the kind of thing I do on a daily basis. But I also prioritize a minimalistic approach, as can be seen on the Erok site. It facilitates easy-to-read conveyance of information.

[Bibian]

current website looks fine imo... just that its missing the announcement part cause i removed that since it wasnt compatible with phpbb3...
and i was too lazy to rewrite it

[sli]

Speaking of lazy, I need to fix my news script.

[Cozzie]

using the forums as a mains of communications is a relic of the past. Wikis (when used correctly) and CMS are the way to go as it is open sourced, constantly updated, has numerous plugins (and if not just write ourselves such as the trash button). And it should integrate fully if both are used Personally I think wiki softwares is enough for all our needs although CMS does offer better usability.

Either way, the time is right as we have someone that wants to volunteer and as no one is keen on maintaining the custom coded software we use.

What is needed is a proper bug report/tracker system. Wikis to include everything from guides to manuals and have it able to be loaded onto a CMS shell if possible. I agree with the outline that ponty suggested.

[isieo]

well if someone wants to redesign the front page, why not?
we also need someone to design us a forum theme ~_~. i can pass them the logos if they want to do it...

[Cozzie]

That isnt really necessary imo, nor we have the manpower. battlemode went AWOL as we know.

[ponty]

Sorry guys, I won't be able to work on the site for another 3 weeks as I got other projects to work on right now and this falls at the bottom of my priorities at the moment. I'll finish up on the design for the website/forums during my "study" week. @isieo. The design of the website will nicely integrate into the forums.

[sli]

For bridging to phpBB3, there RokBridge. For bridging to MediaWiki, there's MamboWiki. Done and done.

[ponty]

LoL, yes I was going to use those two for bridging, but I think he was referring to the actual templates...which I'll probably grab one of the themes on rocketthemes and modify it to our content.