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digitalmars.D - Improving style of error pages of this website

reply nbro <bro gmail.com> writes:
Hi!

I've just read this post:

https://dlang.org/blog/index.php/author/dblogadmin/

and I've a few suggestions to improve this website:

1. Error pages are not styled for the tour 
(http://tour.dlang.org/). So, for example, if instead of writing 
the following currently valid URL "http://tour.dlang.org/" I type 
"http://tour.dlang.org//", it gives me a "ugly" 404 error page. 
That can be definitely improved.

Not only, and this is even more "critical" for new users. If I 
type "https://dlang.org//asdasd" instead of "https://dlang.org/", 
the server returns us a "ugly" 404 error page.

At this point, I guess these problems may exist in other parts of 
the website.

2. Forums, like this one, could definitely be improved by adding 
markdown as a markup language to edit and style posts. There 
should also be the possibility to edit already posted questions 
and answers, and the edit as well as the original answer or 
question should be somehow visible and recoverable, similar to SO.

3. The dlang tour is nice but it could still be improved with an 
auto-completion tool (maybe too much advanced for now).

4. These forums require us to provide an e-mail, even if it's 
invalid. I don't understand why. We could just do that only 
registered users can post and that the e-mail address is visible 
only if the registered user wants to show it.

5. Definitely the style of this form as well as of the inputs to 
insert our name, e-mail address, etc, are not "pretty"...

Of course these are just "my ideas and suggestions".

I'm not a D programmer yet, but I'm quite excited with this 
language, which combines all the nice things of the languages 
that I use: Java, C, C++, Python...

Cheers!
Jun 09 2016
next sibling parent reply nbro <bro gmail.com> writes:
On Thursday, 9 June 2016 at 13:10:45 UTC, nbro wrote:

 Hi!

 I've just read this post:

 https://dlang.org/blog/index.php/author/dblogadmin/

 and I've a few suggestions to improve this website:

 1. Error pages are not styled for the tour 
 (http://tour.dlang.org/). So, for example, if instead of 
 writing the following currently valid URL 
 "http://tour.dlang.org/" I type "http://tour.dlang.org//", it 
 gives me a "ugly" 404 error page. That can be definitely 
 improved.

 Not only, and this is even more "critical" for new users. If I 
 type "https://dlang.org//asdasd" instead of 
 "https://dlang.org/", the server returns us a "ugly" 404 error 
 page.

 At this point, I guess these problems may exist in other parts 
 of the website.

 2. Forums, like this one, could definitely be improved by 
 adding markdown as a markup language to edit and style posts. 
 There should also be the possibility to edit already posted 
 questions and answers, and the edit as well as the original 
 answer or question should be somehow visible and recoverable, 
 similar to SO.

 3. The dlang tour is nice but it could still be improved with 
 an auto-completion tool (maybe too much advanced for now).

 4. These forums require us to provide an e-mail, even if it's 
 invalid. I don't understand why. We could just do that only 
 registered users can post and that the e-mail address is 
 visible only if the registered user wants to show it.

 5. Definitely the style of this form as well as of the inputs 
 to insert our name, e-mail address, etc, are not "pretty"...

 Of course these are just "my ideas and suggestions".

 I'm not a D programmer yet, but I'm quite excited with this 
 language, which combines all the nice things of the languages 
 that I use: Java, C, C++, Python...

 Cheers!


Another thing I've just noticed is that there's not "forgot 
password" feature when login to this website. I think I once 
registered to this website, but I forgot my password, and now 
there's no way of recovering it.

Another issue that may exist is that there's no notification and 
also subscription system that would tell you about news regarding 
a post (but not just necessarily a post) where you're involved 
because you had subscribed to it...
Jun 09 2016
parent nbro <bro gmail.com> writes:
 Another issue that may exist is that there's no notification 
 and also subscription system that would tell you about news 
 regarding a post (but not just necessarily a post) where you're 
 involved because you had subscribed to it...


Never mind regarding the subscription.
Jun 09 2016
prev sibling next sibling parent reply Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
On Thursday, 9 June 2016 at 13:10:45 UTC, nbro wrote:

 2. Forums, like this one, could definitely be improved by 
 adding markdown as a markup language to edit and style posts. 
 There should also be the possibility to edit already posted 
 questions and answers, and the edit as well as the original 
 answer or question should be somehow visible and recoverable, 
 similar to SO.


Currently, the forum is simply a web interface to the D newsgroup 
server. It is not not a stand alone forum. There is also a 
mailing list interface to the newsgroups. Implementing editing, 
markdown, or anything specific to the forums is a bit problematic 
because of how it would be reflected in the newsgroups and the 
mailing list. That said, I've got a post coming to the blog 
tomorrow that will talk about future plans for the forums.

 4. These forums require us to provide an e-mail, even if it's 
 invalid. I don't understand why. We could just do that only 
 registered users can post and that the e-mail address is 
 visible only if the registered user wants to show it.


Vladimir can answer authoritatively, but I believe this is 
because of RFC 850, which requires an email in USENET message 
headers.
Jun 09 2016
parent Mike Parker <aldacron gmail.com> writes:
FYI, the newsgroups can be accessed at [1] and the mailing lists 
at [2].

[1] news://www.digitalmars.com/digitalmars/D
[2] 
http://lists.puremagic.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/digitalmars-d
Jun 09 2016
prev sibling parent reply Jack Stouffer <jack jackstouffer.com> writes:
On Thursday, 9 June 2016 at 13:10:45 UTC, nbro wrote:

 1. Error pages are not styled for the tour 
 (http://tour.dlang.org/). So, for example, if instead of 
 writing the following currently valid URL 
 "http://tour.dlang.org/" I type "http://tour.dlang.org//", it 
 gives me a "ugly" 404 error page. That can be definitely 
 improved.


Please file a bug here: http://issues.dlang.org. Thanks


 2. Forums, like this one, could definitely be improved by 
 adding markdown as a markup language to edit and style posts.

 [snip]

 4. These forums require us to provide an e-mail, even if it's 
 invalid.


Both these things can be addressed by the fact that the forums 
are actually just an interface to an NNTP server, so the email is 
required. I know that some people here don't use the web 
interface at all and just use something like Thunderbird to 
browse the forums.
Jun 09 2016
parent Seb <seb wilzba.ch> writes:
On Thursday, 9 June 2016 at 13:33:43 UTC, Jack Stouffer wrote:

 On Thursday, 9 June 2016 at 13:10:45 UTC, nbro wrote:

 1. Error pages are not styled for the tour 
 (http://tour.dlang.org/). So, for example, if instead of 
 writing the following currently valid URL 
 "http://tour.dlang.org/" I type "http://tour.dlang.org//", it 
 gives me a "ugly" 404 error page. That can be definitely 
 improved.


 Please file a bug here: http://issues.dlang.org. Thanks


The tour is currently managed here, but I filled an issue

https://github.com/stonemaster/dlang-tour/issues/215

Maybe we should move it also to the official Github namespace?

Dlang.org issue:

https://issues.dlang.org/show_bug.cgi?id=16147


 nbro: Thanks a lot for sharing your feedback with us! Highly 
appreciated!
Jun 09 2016