From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Michael Tremer To: development@lists.ipfire.org Subject: Re: Launching our new website Date: Wed, 10 Jan 2024 11:01:10 +0000 Message-ID: <064EAEF3-B48E-40FD-8D2C-6C425AEE5AB5@ipfire.org> In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="===============3282644664623896429==" List-Id: --===============3282644664623896429== Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Hello Jon, > On 9 Jan 2024, at 22:36, jon wrote: >=20 >>=20 >> Based on your reasoning, you don=E2=80=99t want red at all. It is not a co= lour that shows safety or calmness. That would be blue. Red shows danger and = panic. >>=20 >> Yet it is the colour of choice for many firewalls and security products ou= t there. >>=20 >> This colour was picked by someone who doesn=E2=80=99t do anything else but= these things as their day job. I am just going with that expertise that is a= vailable to me. >=20 >=20 > If I did not want red I would have stated it. I was going for compromise a= nd an elegant red would be great. >=20 > Earlier in these threads someone (maybe you) had mentioned they don't like = maroon that it is depressing (I am paraphrasing). This is pretty much what I said=E2=80=A6 looking at current trends of website= s, fresh, bright and =E2=80=9Cfun=E2=80=9D colours are in and the rather dark= er ones are disappearing. > So does this mean the ipfire firewall (the local one I see at https://ipfir= e.localdomain:444) will be changing from maroon to red (to me, pink). Originally I did not plan to do so, because I do not want to spend any time o= n IPFire 2 that isn=E2=80=99t strictly necessary. During this weeks video cal= l I was asked to at least adapt the current design slightly so that it has so= me similarity with the new website. > I am assuming it is since the Community just changed colors. Ideally I would like everything to be one =E2=80=9Ccorporate=E2=80=9D design.= That is however difficult to achieve because things are built in different w= ays and it is not worth to spend weeks on Bugzilla when not too many people u= se it on a daily basis. So some things will only do a small =E2=80=9Cnod=E2= =80=9D towards the theme. -Michael >=20 >> On Jan 9, 2024, at 5:33 AM, Michael Tremer w= rote: >>=20 >>=20 >>=20 >>> On 8 Jan 2024, at 21:40, jon wrote: >>>=20 >>> Hy Michael, >>>=20 >>> Comments below... >>>=20 >>>> On Jan 8, 2024, at 12:33 PM, Michael Tremer wrote: >>>>=20 >>>> Hello Jon, >>>>=20 >>>>> On 8 Jan 2024, at 17:35, jon wrote: >>>>>=20 >>>>> Over all I like what was created. Lots of good stuff! >>>>>=20 >>>>>> This should hopefully make everyone happy who for a long time wanted b= uttons to change from one thing to the next here. Here it finally is! >>>>>=20 >>>>> YES! I do like change buttons across the top! =20 >>>>>=20 >>>>> Can Community also be added? Community should be a "one click" to find= since it is highly used/access. >>>>>=20 >>>>> Please add a site search to the top. It did take me a few clicks to fi= nd Community. >>>>=20 >>>> I don=E2=80=99t think that it belongs there=E2=80=A6 >>>>=20 >>>> * I don=E2=80=99t see the community portal as a tier one destination for= a) new users, b) returning users. Instead we have multiple places that kind = of do a similar thing: The wiki, Discourse, and the bug tracker. All of them = don=E2=80=99t fit, which is why there is a page that helps people to decide w= hich one they want: https://www.michael.dev.ipfire.org/help >>>>=20 >>>> * On the sitemap (https://www.michael.dev.ipfire.org/sitemap), Discourse= comes after the documentation (LWL is in the middle because of the colour an= d creating symmetry). >>>>=20 >>>> * I toyed around with a drop down menu, but that because even more clutt= ered and does not work well on mobile. >>>=20 >>> In my opinion, with the removal of the individual sub-domains (e.g., blog= , wiki, etc) it seems to be signaling a one-stop for all items IPFire. Some= thing like a landing zone. And people that want to learn more would go to th= at landing zone and then start their journey from there. >>>=20 >>> To me, for that landing zone to be effective, you=E2=80=99d want people t= o be able to easily access Support or the Community. =20 >>=20 >> Yes, the website is basically a place to direct people to the place they w= ant to go to. The website itself does not carry a lot of static information i= n our case. >>=20 >> But support isn=E2=80=99t the first priority that people are looking for... >>=20 >>> And keeping the "Support" thought in mind for what seems to be a landing = zone =E2=80=94 now people see a LWL banner stating Support goes to LWL. >>=20 >> This is a standard business model that we are running here and I can assur= e you that I do not get support tickets at LWL that were supposed to be a pos= t on community.ipfire.org . People don=E2=80=99= t confuse those two things. >>=20 >>> To me, these are mixed messages. >>>=20 >>>=20 >>>>=20 >>>>> LWL >>>>> =E2=80=94=E2=80=94 >>>>> I truly feel there should be a little more separation between IPFire an= d LWL (i.e., non-profit vs. profit). I realize you are highly invested in LW= L=E2=80=99s health and well-being. >>>>>=20 >>>>> I would like to see the Professional Support and the "BUY" type items m= ove to another page. Maybe the HELP page and something softer like, "need ev= en more help? Let the professionals at LWL assist!".=20 >>>>>=20 >>>>> I realize these comments might be maddening and I apologize for that. = I just feel like there should be more separations between "church and state" = or non-profit and profit. >>>>=20 >>>> The difference is very clear by using a different colour and the adverti= sing is *that* obvious because I am still talking to people who tell me that = they are unaware that support is available and don=E2=80=99t use IPFire becau= se they want support. I KNOW. I could barely make it any bigger. >>>=20 >>> If this is a big number, then new/existing Community users could easily g= et an email stating that point as part of LWL sales or marketing. To me, IPF= ire is a volunteer organization for the benefit of any user, group, etc. and = for the benefit of the open source project for a really good firewall. >>=20 >> Yes, but we need to pay for the fun of having this volunteer organisation. >>=20 >>> More comments below. >>>=20 >>>=20 >>>=20 >>>>=20 >>>>> More comments below. >>>>>=20 >>>>>=20 >>>>> PS - Once again, sorry for the "kiss" and "kick". >>>>=20 >>>> I am happy to listen to both, positive and negative feedback. Very often= things are not ideal, but they are the result of a long process and somethin= g the results are the best that we could come up with in the given time. >>>>=20 >>>>>> On Jan 8, 2024, at 11:11 AM, Michael Tremer wrote: >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> On 8 Jan 2024, at 13:17, Adolf Belka wrote: >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> Hi Michael & Rico, >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> On 06/01/2024 15:08, Michael Tremer wrote: >>>>>>>> Hello Adolf, >>>>>>>>> On 5 Jan 2024, at 14:43, Adolf Belka wro= te: >>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> Hi Michael, >>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> On 04/01/2024 17:44, Michael Tremer wrote: >>>>>>>>>> Hello everyone, >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> (yes, yes, I am still alive=E2=80=A6) >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> I would like to pre-announce our new website which Rico and I have= been working on over the last couple of months, and collect some final feedb= ack before we roll it out as soon as possible. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> So here is an outline of what has happened and what will happen ne= xt: >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * Rico has helped me to implement a fresh design for our website w= hich has been drafted by another friend. The goals were to get rid of the sad= and grey website, which is also *way* too simplistic, and create something t= hat is nice looking, memorable, and brings people in. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * During that journey, we have waved goodbye to Bootstrap which is= hard to work with once you have discovered Bulma (https://bulma.io/), our ne= w CSS framework of choice. We have also rewritten and refactored some parts o= f the backend code. There is now less Javascript and less CSS - and I am sure= that we could actually still go and save a lot more. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * One of the biggest rewrites is fireinfo, as with a growing numbe= r of profiles, our PostgreSQL database started to suffer. We haven=E2=80=99t = tested this in full production, yet, but I am sure this will be a lot faster = than the older version. This all only affects how we store the data and nothi= ng changes for the clients or users. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * We have upgraded the PostgreSQL driver from psycopg2 to psycopg3= , and we use async programming a lot more where possible (these are all lesso= ns learned from the build service). >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * We have replaced memcached with redis. Not because memcache didn= =E2=80=99t do its job well, but rather because of the reason that we have bot= h in our infrastructure and it is a little bit easier to just deploy one. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * There is a new integration with Asterisk to see current calls - = previously the phone stuff didn=E2=80=99t work at all any more since we repla= ced FreePBX with Asterisk. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> But that is enough about the technical stuff=E2=80=A6 Let=E2=80=99= s talk about what has visually changed, and why: >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * First of all, we have brighter colours. Very bright! Because we = are a fun project! The grey used to depress me slightly and if you ask a desi= gner what would represent us as a community, you get this. I am a lot happier= with that. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * The tux is gone. This is kind of a bitter sweet moment, but the = old IPFire =E2=80=9Clogo=E2=80=9D is gone with this. I am sure it will be fou= nd here or there in a couple of places, but there is no way to make something= ancient like this work with something modern-looking. I spent days together = with professionals to draft a new logo, and we got nothing, well, apart from = the simple things that is: IPFire_ >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>=20 >>>>> It would be great to have an "official logo". Especially for coffee mu= gs and t-shirts. I do like the IPFire_ ! >>>>=20 >>>> IPFire_ will become the logo. This is 1000 times easier to print on thin= gs instead of heading the tux with all its gradients, a background and some w= riting on its belly that becomes impossible to read. >>>>=20 >>>>> Maybe make the underscore blink every one in a random (long) time. Jus= t to keep users on guard! >>>>=20 >>>> Lol, that would actually be funny. >>>>=20 >>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * IPFire_ is not supposed to replace the word =E2=80=9CIPFire=E2= =80=9D in texts, but I think it is a nice way to highlight the nerdiness/cons= ole people/Linux things without becoming complex to understand, or confusing = to the corporate people=E2=80=A6 >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * On top of the front page, we finally have some mission statement= : More Than A Firewall. We need to talk more about what we are and what we ca= n do, and we need to explain (I don=E2=80=99t know why, but we do) to people = what opportunities IPFire can open for them. This still needs a lot of work a= nd I am happy to hear any ideas what is a nice way to communicate what IPFire= is to new people using as few words as possible. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * Then, there are a couple of new pages: One of the bigger ones is= the About page that explains in more detail what IPFire does (which is why i= t feels hard to repeat the same on the front page) and it has a large list of= (hopefully) all features that IPFire can do/supports/etc. This needs to be u= pdated with every core update, so please let me know if there is something mi= ssing in the future as I will probably miss them. Additionally, we have a sec= tion with us, the team. Being a faceless project is not very good to attract = more people joining our missing, and here is now the place where people will = see us for the first time - the people who make IPFire happen. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * The download page has mainly been made shorter and now includes = the change log. Cloud providers have been added to an extra page. If you know= of any cloud providers that support IPFire, please let me know. Torrent down= loads are gone. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * Help: The help page has always been a hard one for me. This time= it contains a sentence or two that explains what all those things are good f= or :) Let=E2=80=99s see how that is going to work out=E2=80=A6 >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * This is a big one: We are getting rid of the thousand subdomains= that we are having. There is no more wiki.ipfire.org , blog.ipfire.org , people.ipfire.org , location.ipfire.org , and so on= (exceptions do apply of course). Everything is now in one place: ipfire.org = . The blog is a subsection of the website, people registe= r accounts on the main page, log in, the documentation has moved there as wel= l. This should hopefully make everyone happy who for a long time wanted butto= ns to change from one thing to the next here. Here it finally is! >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * But there isn=E2=80=99t enough space for everything on the main = navigation bar. So at the bottom of the page, there is an extra link called = =E2=80=9CSitemap=E2=80=9D with all the other things that didn=E2=80=99t get a= large link. There is a lot of development stuff on there, too. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * When logged in, the users area is a bit tidier and hopefully we = are able to bring a couple more features to this in the future=E2=80=A6 >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * Since users might also be logged in on the main page/the blog/et= c. we show =E2=80=9Cjoin us now=E2=80=9D and =E2=80=9Csubscribe to our newsle= tter=E2=80=9D only when people have not already done so, which makes it a lot= more obvious what the next step of action for users is and a lot less confus= ing for the people who have already done so. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> * There has been a large list of bugs/feature requests submitted b= y a number of people who have been fixed in this. We might have introduced a = couple of new ones, so please file a ticket in Bugzilla if something is broke= n and that needs fixing. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> All in all we hope that this is a big first step to make IPFire ap= pear the modern distribution that it is, instead of having the dark image of = some coders in their basements. To summarise this all in one email feels very= short for all the labour that we have put into this over the years, but I su= ppose it is a good sign to have simplicity in the end. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> We would like to ask you now for your feedback on all of this. I k= now that many of you have seen this before, but please help us to double chec= k, that a big launch does not become an embarrassment for some tiny reason :)= We have taken some risky decisions and we are happy to see how they are turn= ing out=E2=80=A6 >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> The new website is currently running at https://www.michael.dev.ip= fire.org/ to get to things like fireinfo, just change the subdomain like so h= ttps://fireinfo.michael.dev.ipfire.org/. A couple of things like editing your= own profile won=E2=80=99t work because the development instance can=E2=80=99= t write to our LDAP system, but apart from that, things should be running jus= t fine. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> I am exciting to hear some feedback and hopefully we can build a s= mall roadmap out of it for the future! >>>>>>>>> Some relatively minor feedback. >>>>>>>> That is probably very good at this point :) >>>>>>>>> In the section labelled Under The Hood, >>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> It mentions the ciphers Blowfish, DES/3DES and CAST5. As these are = so insecure, and hopefully in the near future will disappear, I don't think w= e should have them as a focus point. >>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> Similar thing with LZO Compression. The function was insecure so si= nce OpenVPN2.5 the option no longer does any compression on the server, even = if the LZO Compression checkbox is checked. So I think best to not mention it= in this page. >>>>>>>> I did stop a moment when I wrote it down initially, but then decided= to include it, because we actually do support this. And I thought that the p= age should simply have an almost complete list of all features that IPFire su= pports. >>>>>>>> Thoughts I had before were to add a little (Deprecated) tag, but tha= t makes the page too long and complicated. It will also become a nightmare to= keep up to date. I could settle on something like a star though. > >>>>>>>> The preferred option would be that these bullet points become links = to the wiki pages and there we have a lot of space to explain. Would that wor= k for you, too? >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> I think a star against them is fine. It highlights them in a way and = the details can be found in the wiki as the ciphers are mentioned there as be= ing insecure. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> For the LZO Compression, I have planned to go and update the wiki on = that point so it makes it clear that no one is actually getting any compressi= on if it is checked, just the compression headers added. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> If links to the wiki can be made then that would work very well. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> My photo is still rotated 90 degrees in the Meet The Team section. >>>>>>>> Yes, I noticed. Did you try to upload it again or did this happen wh= en I tried to upload it? >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> It has been fixed now. Last check my head was the right way round :-) >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> Other people have mentioned the red colour as being a bit too harsh/b= right. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> I never noticed that in my case. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> Thank you for this feedback. I think the colour is not really the prob= lem. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> I have my screen on full brightness all of the time; right now it is d= ark and I only have a small light on my desk; and if I open the login page in= fullscreen mode on my 27=E2=80=9D screen, I cannot under any circumstance ca= ll this a burning colour. It is a fun colour, but it does not in any way hurt= my eyes. And I think that can only be because of the screen which represents= a different colour to me than to other people. >>>>>=20 >>>>> The idea of brighter is good, but the red/pink is too pink. Sorry to b= e mean, but barbie pink is a lot (and I=E2=80=99ve looked at it on a few diff= erent screens/browsers). Maybe a few shades closer to red. In my opinion th= e red (like on the old blog) was a more "elegant red". >>>>=20 >>>> This colour is very far away from a barbie pink... >>>=20 >>> Yes, I agree it is far from barbie pink. But, that wasn=E2=80=99t really= my point. >>>=20 >>> So throughout this thread I=E2=80=99ve seen comments about staying away f= rom Raspberry Pi things and pushing more to office/company things. I agree. = But I strongly suggest keeping to colors that suggest security and integrity= . =20 >>>=20 >>> Bright red (pink in my mind) is not a color that you=E2=80=99ll find when= thinking about those words. =20 >>>=20 >>> I am guessing there are a hundred web-sites discussing the philosophy of = colors. And I am guessing most of them relate bright red (to me, pink) to so= mething sexy. And I=E2=80=99d rather have someone think smart, intelligent, = secure - rather than sexy. >>>=20 >>> Please pick an elegant, strong red. >>=20 >> Based on your reasoning, you don=E2=80=99t want red at all. It is not a co= lour that shows safety or calmness. That would be blue. Red shows danger and = panic. >>=20 >> Yet it is the colour of choice for many firewalls and security products ou= t there. >>=20 >> This colour was picked by someone who doesn=E2=80=99t do anything else but= these things as their day job. I am just going with that expertise that is a= vailable to me. >>=20 >> -Michael >>=20 >>>=20 >>>=20 >>>>=20 >>>>>=20 >>>>> =20 >>>>>=20 >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> Today I checked this out on my laptop with a 15" screen and on my des= ktop with a 32" screen. >>>>>>> I personally do not have a problem with the colour effect. I have tri= ed switching between the Home and the About pages but it did not feel too bri= ght to me at all. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> The About page is a lot brighter because it has a white background. So= it can only be down to some software in GPUs or screens that make certain co= lours more vivid. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> If it is going to be toned down, then it should stay the same colour = but reduce the brightness and not by too much. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> One thing I noticed today when going through the website was that whi= le the AWS site is showing the latest Core Update 182 as being an available i= mage, on the Exoscale site it has the available version as Core Update 149. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> Exoscale does not have a process to update the image, and they tend to= not react to emails. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> I will put this on my list so that they update the image. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> Is that Exoscale or us that has to keep that image version up to date? >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> Well, it would be nice if they would do it=E2=80=A6 but you know how t= hese companies work... >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> This is nothing to do with the new website but it just seemed peculia= r when I noticed it so I thought I would mention it. >>>>>>=20 >>>>>> -Michael >>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> Regards, >>>>>>> Adolf. >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>> -Michael >>>>>>>>> Regards, >>>>>>>>> Adolf. >>>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>>> Best, >>>>>>>>>> -Michael & Rico >>>>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>>>> --=20 >>>>>>>>> Sent from my laptop >>>>>>>=20 >>>>>>> --=20 >>>>>>> Sent from my laptop >>=20 >>=20 >=20 --===============3282644664623896429==--