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idn
January 20th, 2006, 04:50 PM
I know this place is a great source of help for n00bs, but I was hoping to create a new site dedicated to those n00b users

At the moment, ubuntuguide is a bit undermaintained, but when I first used ubunutu it was a great source of help.

I was used to the command line however, from windows, so it was fine when they asked me to sudo apt-get... or nano /etc/....

But for someone completely new, this can be daunting. However ubuntu has made it almost unnessessary to do this, especially with the add/remove programs application.

So I am creating a new site called myubuntu.org. Its a going to be a pretty simple site. It is basiaclly going to be a dumbed down version of ubuntu guide, from the point of view of use cases, so the user will initially be presented with about 5 use cases such as


I want to listen to music
I want to watch a movie
I want to chat with friends
etc


Once they click on a use case, it will offer them more options, such as


I want to chat to a friend
I wanna phone a friend
etc


They can then drag sub use cases into a 'to do' box. The user can then, at the end of their session, print out their own custom manual, which gives them instructions on how to install the application if neccessary, how to configure it, and maybe some sample tutorials, such as how to set font colours in gaim, or improt songs into rhythmbox

Anyway, I would like to have some support from the community for this, I have attached a mockup.



What I really need is what you think users will need. The idea is to give the user an easy way to do what they wont, so I dont want a list of 10 different music players to play music, just one or two.

So if you could post information on an application that you think will be useful it would be great, especially for kde as I dont use that.

For example, if you thnk users will benifit from using Beep Media Player, can you post me a link, a short list n00bs will need to know about BMP, possibly a screenshot + the icon, and a n00b description. Not something like 'BMP is a GTK app which uses GStreamer, but something like 'BMP is a cool themeable appl, which plus stright into your current desktop easily'.

Anything else will also be welcome, enjoy the mockup :)



Edit:

I also need a logo!!

aysiu
January 20th, 2006, 04:57 PM
How much bandwidth can you afford? If your site is going to be as useful as the Ubuntu Guide but not as command-line dependent, you're going to need some good screenshots.

By the way, if you do make it screenshot heavy and have the bandwidth to support all those graphics, I'd be willing to volunteer to make some screenshots for tutorials.

kosmic
January 20th, 2006, 05:30 PM
Ya count with me to help in translating and make some guides :)

earobinson
January 20th, 2006, 05:31 PM
Why not do it on the offical ubnutu wikis?

manicka
January 20th, 2006, 05:35 PM
The official starter guide uses gui based instructions for most tasks

http://help.ubuntu.com/starterguide/C/index.html

The cli based unoffical guide for Breezy is now here and quite up to date

http://easylinux.info/wiki/Ubuntu

earobinson
January 20th, 2006, 05:38 PM
The official starter guide uses gui based instructions for most tasks

http://help.ubuntu.com/starterguide/C/index.html
exactly, why not make that stuff better!

briancurtin
January 20th, 2006, 05:38 PM
Why not do it on the offical ubnutu wikis?
or even the beginner forum, made for beginners (aka "n00bs")

i think the goals of this thread can be achieved with things that are already in place
edit: earobinson beat me by a few seconds, basically saying the same thing with the line above this

idn
January 20th, 2006, 06:07 PM
i think the goals of this thread can be achieved with things that are already in place

Not really, the wiki is good, but its not great for someone who is new to ubuntu and wants to jsut know who to listen to their music. there is too much information on there. Those other links dont really match the goals of my site.

Still, I guess the proof is in the pudding. If no-one uses it no-one uses it :)

Ya count with me to help in translating and make some guides
Great thanks alot, this will defintely be useful to me. I will contect you once I have developed more of the english site.


How much bandwidth can you afford? If your site is going to be as useful as the Ubuntu Guide but not as command-line dependent, you're going to need some good screenshots.

By the way, if you do make it screenshot heavy and have the bandwidth to support all those graphics, I'd be willing to volunteer to make some screenshots for tutorials.

I am going to host my site with

http://www.dreamhost.com/shared/

I will get 1TB of bandwidth a month. I am choosing this company because they also provide jabber accounts, so my jabber handle can be the same as my email :)

If anyone is willing to host screenshots to cut down on the bandwith it would be much appreciated. For the screenshots I was hoping to do them all with the default theme. So they all look the same, wont confuse the users when their application looks different to the one in the screenie.

This means I was going to create a different user account on my box and revert it to the ubuntu defaults. If you could do this as well it would be great!

I was going to limit the amount of screenshots to 7 max per application. Again the purpose of this site is to really cut down on the amount of information the user is presented with, so they only see what they need to see.

idn
January 20th, 2006, 06:17 PM
What I could really do with now is if anyone can give me any ideas of the top level use cases I should display.

At the moment I have

I want to...


... listen to my music...

...from my music player...
...from my music catalogue...

... watch a movie...

...from my DVD
...i have downloaded...

... communicate with my friends...

...by phone...
...using chat (MSN / AOL etc)...
...using email...

... create or view my pics...

...from my digital camera...
...to catlogue them...

... create a document...

...for a presentation / assignment / report ...
...to take some notes...




Ideally there should be 7 top categories max, and about 3 - 5 max under each top category.

Lord Illidan
January 20th, 2006, 06:24 PM
Games you didn't mention. You could mention a shooter, an RTS, etc, and the commercial games out there...Quake 3, Doom 3, etc.

Drivers, you also didn't mention.

idn
January 20th, 2006, 06:32 PM
Games you didn't mention. You could mention a shooter, an RTS, etc, and the commercial games out there...Quake 3, Doom 3, etc.
Maybe also cedega? Good idea though... :)


Drivers, you also didn't mention.
Dont want to mention things like this, if they need drivers for games or anything else, Ill refer them to the documentation.

Killashandra
January 20th, 2006, 08:58 PM
Can you play nintendo on Ubuntu?

manicka
January 20th, 2006, 10:23 PM
Not really, the wiki is good, but its not great for someone who is new to ubuntu and wants to jsut know who to listen to their music. there is too much information on there. Those other links dont really match the goals of my site.

I think you might be confusing the wiki with the official help pages. The help pages are very clear and easy for n00bs to understand.

The doc team is always looking for people to help with their doc projects. Even if it's only as a proofreader, everyone can contribute.