<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Reference: Ton's request
for volunteers to assist with fixing the Blender education section.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Thanks for the reply from
Luca.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">I have been pondering what
to do and if I could assist in this.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">To participate I feel that
some direction should be given specifying the objective of the update
to the Blender Education section. In the first instance it would
require a definition of what the Education section is and then it
would probably need a broad outline of what is to be achieved.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">A very simplistic approach
would be to consider that the Education section is everything that is
linked to the 'Education and Help' tab at the top of the <a href="http://blender.org">blender.org</a>
homepage.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Before venturing down the
path of the Education links perhaps consideration should be given to
the Blender homepage itself. I feel that the waters are already a
little muddied since the homepage ( <a href="http://blender.org">blender.org</a> ) is the starting
point for everything Blender which includes 2.50+ and 2.49 and
everything prior to 2.49. </font>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">With the introduction of
Blender 2.50 and the new Interface there has been a dramatic change.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Perhaps the Blender
homepage ( <a href="http://blender.org">blender.org</a> ) should now be revised to be 2.50+ specific
and be remodelled to distinguish it from everything prior to 2.49. It
of course should include a regressive link to the old site.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">In my view it is simpler
and easier to write new rather than try and remodel the old.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Blender 2.50+ is a new
baby. Let it grow by itself without prejudice.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">On the subject of my
Blender Book I concede that it is linked from
<a href="http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Books">wiki.blender.org/index.php/Books</a> but I'm damned if I can find any
link from either <a href="http://blender.org">blender.org</a> or <a href="http://wiki.blender.org">wiki.blender.org</a> that gets me to that
page. The only way to get there is to enter the address. I'm probably
blind so please point the way.</font></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">The chance that a new user
will enter a search for '<b>Wiki </b>Blender Books' when looking for
'Blender Help' or a 'Blender Manual' is remote. A search for 'Blender
Books' doesn't help either. </font>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><br>
</p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in"><font size="2">Sincerely John Blain</font></p>
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On 15 May 2011 22:56, mindrones <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mindrones@gmail.com">mindrones@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
Hi John!<br>
<div class="im"><br>
On 05/15/2011 09:03 AM, John Blain wrote:<br>
<br>
> As you may recall from earlier correspondence, I have written a basic<br>
> Blender Manual and have attempted to have a link placed on the Blender<br>
> website. I have also attempted placing a link on the Blender Wiki Page<br>
> and have submitted to Blendernation. All attempts have been to no avail<br>
> and constructive criticism has been minimal . This has not been encouraging.<br>
<br>
</div>First off, your book is linked and well exposed in the books section of<br>
the wiki, see:<br>
<br>
<a href="http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Doc:2.5/Books#An_introduction_to_BLENDER_3D_a_book_for_beginners" target="_blank">http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Doc:2.5/Books#An_introduction_to_BLENDER_3D_a_book_for_beginners</a><br>
<br>
It's even on top of the list! :)<br>
<br>
Searching "blender 2.5 books" Doc:2.5/Books is 4th on that list, so all<br>
in all it's quite easy to get to your book.<br>
<br>
<br>
That being said, your book is huge and very well written, so I'm glad<br>
that you offered your help :)<br>
<div class="im"><br>
<br>
<br>
> At this stage I am thinking that the existing Blender Education should<br>
> be left in place and perhaps a new 2.5/2.6 Education series should be<br>
> created. There is a huge amount of existing work which, although<br>
> outdated, is extremely useful.<br>
<br>
<br>
</div>Agree on that, but this is also a huge cause of bad ranking of the wiki.<br>
At some point we should accept that blender 2.3 docs are just old and<br>
let them go.<br>
<br>
If you search for "blender documentation", the first link you get is<br>
<a href="http://www.blender.org/download/documentation/" target="_blank">http://www.blender.org/download/documentation/</a><br>
<br>
My hope is that<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.blender.org/download/documentation/" target="_blank">www.blender.org/download/documentation/</a><br>
<br>
could be moved to<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.blender.org/education-help/documentation/" target="_blank">http://www.blender.org/education-help/documentation/</a><br>
<br>
and cleaned up from those very old links, especially<br>
<a href="http://download.blender.org/documentation/htmlI/" target="_blank">http://download.blender.org/documentation/htmlI/</a><br>
and<br>
<a href="http://download.blender.org/documentation/htmlII/" target="_blank">http://download.blender.org/documentation/htmlII/</a><br>
<br>
For two reasons:<br>
<br>
1) these pages, have been mainly ported over the wiki long time ago and<br>
are obsolete<br>
<br>
2) *more importantly*, these pages have a better ranking then the wiki<br>
pages (probably because they've been online since the beginning and<br>
because they're pure html)<br>
<br>
Some suggestions about these pages:<br>
<br>
1) delete them<br>
this would break the bookmarks all over the world :), OR<br>
<br>
2a) add a robots.txt to tell the search engines not to index them<br>
anymore, AND<br>
2b) add a permanent redirect to the correspondant wiki page so that<br>
search engines know that that page is no more but instead the new page<br>
to be shown in search results is the wiki page.<br>
<br>
I would love to take the responsability to do (2b), because I know the<br>
wiki structure well.<br>
<div class="im"><br>
<br>
> Having registered my interest and before accepting any responsibility, I<br>
> would wish to be advised who is the authority for approval and criticism<br>
> of a new Blender Education section. If review is to be made by a<br>
> nebulous body of critics then the path forward could prove to be<br>
> disastrous.<br>
<br>
<br>
</div>I think it is part of the game and often discussions are a very valuable<br>
help.<br>
<div class="im"><br>
<br>
> On 15 May 2011 01:30, Ton Roosendaal <<a href="mailto:ton@blender.org">ton@blender.org</a><br>
<br>
</div><div class="im">> Same goes for the tutorial section;<br>
> <a href="http://www.blender.org/education-help/tutorials/" target="_blank">http://www.blender.org/education-help/tutorials/</a><br>
<br>
<br>
</div>IMHO the documentation part (including tutorials) should be ported over<br>
the wiki and redirected there from <a href="http://blender.org" target="_blank">blender.org</a>.<br>
<br>
<br>
--<br>
<br>
I'm not sure I can write actual contents in this period, but I can offer<br>
my help for wiki work.<br>
<br>
<br>
It is especially important that we eliminate any overlapping contents<br>
<a href="http://blender.org/wiki" target="_blank">blender.org/wiki</a>, because having 2 similar pages from BF competing for<br>
the best ranking isn't very useful and creates confusion while searching.<br>
<br>
For any topic that comes to mind, for a certain version of blender,<br>
there should be an unique source of documentation.<br>
<br>
For those situations, I'd prefer that we discuss here.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
Luca<br>
<br>
_____________________________<br>
<br>
<a href="http://www.mindrones.com" target="_blank">http://www.mindrones.com</a><br>
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