Landing Page Re-Thinking
Problems (as opined by @davideast and @jeffbcross):
- It's ugly, feels cold and unwelcoming, feels outdated
- Too much information on one page. This page should primarily act as a feeder to other content.
- Primary calls to action (view on Github and Download) don't reflect actual goals
- Confusing navigation. E.g. Learn link takes users away from the controlled experience, "Develop" isn't clear that this is where Docs live.
- Random content thrown onto page (videos take a lot of space, random codeschool link)
- Tiny fonts with lots of text, makes users less likely to read (too much time commitment)
- Examples are lacking context (Ie the basics requires interaction with annotations before anything is explained). There should probably be one in-context example that gives the gist of Angular, and links to other documentation.
- Edit Me links cause SSL warning because they post to non-https.
Proposals:
- Think more about the experience for these types of users: developers who are new to Angular (What's Angular about?), advanced angular developers looking for specific reference (How do I use this service?), occasional developer looking for tutorial or guide (What's the best way to define a complex directive), (secondary user: non-developers curious about angular)
- Start with fresh content outline for the page, and write content more purposefully and succinctly
- Relevant, targeted content and calls to action above the fold. (TBD what is most relevant)
- Re-think navigation from user perspective
- Create parts of IA to allow for content that's currently randomly placed throughout page
Lots of good feedback and suggestions here!
- random codeschool link
This appears to have been removed.
- Edit Me links cause SSL warning because they post to non-https.
These appear to go to https links on Plunker now.
It's odd that we use 88 KB (44 + 44) just to show a preview image of the videos and half of it is just to show a red YouTube icon over the top on hover.
I also find it odd that I have to click on 'DEVELOP' when I'm looking to start searching the docs. There should be a search box on the home page.
Clicking on LEARN->Videos takes you to a channel that is mostly unrelated to AngularJS (the first two rows are Angular). Redirecting to a curated playlist would probably be better.
Clicking LEARN->Case Studies takes you to https://www.madewithangular.com which may not be maintained anymore. The maintainer listed on the site goes to a 404 on GitHub. The associated Twitter account hasn't tweeted in about 3 years.
DEVELOP->Contribute, and even the next link for 'Contributing', doesn't mention that the project is in LTS and how likely contributors efforts are to be accepted.
DEVELOP->'Seed App project template' goes to a seed that is significantly out of date. It doesn't use components, doesn't use webpack or typescript (or even types), etc.
DISCUSS
- Blog goes to an out of date blog that redirects you to blog.angular.io which doesn't have any recent AngularJS content.
- Twitter goes to an Angular account that doesn't tweet about AngularJS
The "DESIGN DOCS & NOTES" button above the fold takes you to a empty Google Drive folder.
@Splaktar At this point, when AngularJS is in LTS mode and in a year or so support will stop completely, I don't think it makes sense to focus on any significant docs revamp.
Within those constraints, I agree.