Web site

GRASS Web Site planning

The current GRASS web site appear a bit overloaded and unmodern (since it has been kindly handcrafted with vim since 1998, of course following some evolution from plain HTML to HTML/PHP with RSS integrated). The question is:

• go Content Management System (CMS)?
• or stick with static pages?

To keep in mind:

• traditionally low number of contributors (hey, this could be better with a CMS)
• mirror sites want to copy/clone the site without more efforts than using rsync (i.e., static copy)
• the new layout should be modern, fresh and attractive

Update 7/2010: grass.osgeo.org is now running on new hardware on Debian Lenny.

Nice sites

Here a list of sites which are looking nice:

reSt + Sphinx

• Geotools.org
  • System: Sphinx
  • Advantages:
    • Page files can be maintained in SVN
  • Disadvantages:
    • No WYSIWYG editor
    • I think the GeoTools site is about as fancy as you can get with it (not very).

• MapFish
  • System: Sphinx
    • Another nice FOSS4G sphinx site

CMS Made Simple

• CMS Made Simple
  • System: CMS Made Simple
  • Advantages:
    • WYSIWYG editor
    • Access control via roles
    • Static mirroring seems to be possible via http
    • Very light system, installed in a few minutes
  • Disadvantages:
    • Requires browser for editing

Drupal

• OSGeo Foundation
  • System: Drupal
  • Advantages:
    • WYSIWYG editor
    • Access control via roles
    • Static mirroring seems to be possible via http (? check)
    • Can be run within OSGeo's Drupal server
  • Disadvantages:
    • Requires browser for editing
    • Rather heavy system, installation may be complex but OSGeo can provide it

• Geopublishing
  • System: Drupal (? unsure)
  • Advantages:
    • see OSGeo above
  • Disadvantages:
    • see OSGeo above

PmWiki

• LyX
  • System: PmWiki
  • Advantages:
    • Looks professional, it's very hard to tell that their front page is actually a wiki
    • Does not make the homepage look like a personal blog (/node12345) or wiki site
    • Wiki editing means low barrier to entry
    • Lightweight (200kb) & snappy
    • html→pmwiki converter: libhtml-wikiconverter-pmwiki-perl
    • The LyX people took good notes on how to set it up (oops I lost the url) and are approachable.
    • A good philosophy (more)
    • Stored on disk in flat files so you can use unix command line power tools to bulk maintain pages.
    • thus Mirrorable
    • See lyx's www-* svn
    • See lyx's RSS feeds
    • Active, monthly/quarterly new releases for the last 5 years
    • Translations status looks nice
  • Disadvantages:
    • Install by hand as no Debian package
    • Might have a single administrative password for locked pages (ie homepage), so need to investigate how change history is stored (e.g.).