Re: Improving the first contact with Ada

[Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org>]

Yannick Duchêne wrote on comp.lang.ada:
> Ludovic Brenta a écrit:
>>> Sorry, I know Ada is about content and the image it radiates,
>>> esthetically, maybe the least of your concern (I don't point you
>>> directly Ludovic) but the web site of ADAIC is a time machine to
>>> ~1993.  I came across that site often and I left it as many times
>>> because I though this was an obsolete site!
>>>
>>> Seriously, it needs refreshing!
>>
>> I agree.  Maybe that's the problem with Ada people: they spend too much
>> time writing quality software and not enough doing marketing.  I try to
>> do my part in the technical marketing department but I'm not a webmaster
>> or a graphics designer.  I think you'd get the same kind of anwser from
>> most people on this newsgroup.
>
> If may give my opinion.
>
> 1) Most of time, people who says “software designers are poor graphic  
> designers”, are themselves poor software designer. They stop on graphic  
> design, because this is the sole thing whose quality they are able to  
> evaluate (does not only applies to Ada, this also applies with web  
> applications written in JavaScript and the like).

I differ.

I use emacs in full-screen mode with no menu bar, no button bar and I
rarely ever touch the mouse.  My "desktop environment" is
ratpoison[1].
I wrote a few web pages in the past: in emacs and hand-written, with
no
JavaScript or CSS.  When I browse in firefox, I have a habit of doing
View > Page Style > No style to *disable* any fancy (and usually bad)
CSS layout that the "web designer" at the other end thinks is "cool"
but, to me, just gets in the way.  I like my web pages simple and to
the point, just like the software I use or write.  I am not a graphics
designer and definitely not a web designer but I think I am a good
software engineer.  Maybe I *could* become a good web designer but
I'm just not interested.  Back in the days when I worked on a large
web application, I avoided the "web" part and concentrated on the
back-end (server) part.  I like Plain Text.  I prefer command-line
tools over GUI tools, so when I write a utility for my own use, I
never give it a GUI.

[1] http://www.nongnu.org/ratpoison/

> 2) People seeking for documentation, should be aware that, when seeking  
> for documentation, documentation should come first! Not graphical design!  
> What can you expect from someones who run away from a graphical design and  
> prefer to go elsewhere, with may be a better graphical design, but lower  
> quality documentation. Look at Jean Pierre Rosen's AdaControl : may some  
> others sites has a better graphical design than his one, but none has such  
> an application as AdaControl. A choice must be made and every one is  
> responsible for his/her choice.

This would seem to indicate Jean-Pierre and I are of the same breed:
excellent software engineers, lousy web designers :)

> 3) AdaIC has a graphical identity, if it change it, pretty sure many body  
> gonna ask themselves what happened (“is it still the same AdaIC ?”)
> 4) AdaIC design is not so bad, it is even good (well balanced and  
> constant). Old fashioned ? What was nice 15 years ago is ugly now ? So  
> people 15 years ago all had bad taste ? Something is silly in this  
> assertion, and even some famous web designers agree that this is a silly  
> point of view (some lough out loud when they here about so called “Web 2.0  
> graphical style”).

I too like the style of AdaIC, except for the hardcoded "column"
layout
that wastes precious horizontal space.

> 5) If you want to differentiate from others, don't copy everyones else  
> graphical identity, get yours.

Right; don't be a lemming.

--
Ludovic Brenta.