PHP.net frontpage changes

As many of you know I changed the frontpage of php.net recently by moving conference announcements and call for papers to its own dedicated page in a desperate attempt to regain the control of our frontpage.



WTF?! came up among conference planners which didn't like the changes at all. Heck, why should they? They lost an important, free, ads on a very popular page on the web. The flip side: they have now their own page free of any distractions and irritations around their advertisements.



Regain control? Yes. Conference planers have treated php.net frontpage as their private commercial ground for long enough. It was time for the php.net "staff" to take control of the frontpage back and publish php.net relevant news.



This is a community effort, you are no king. Good point. I am no king. But enough is enough. Flooding the frontpage with conference announcements and call for papers had to stop. It was so overwhelming that there was no point for us to post real news about what was going on with php.net. 24 hours after an important PHP release a call for papers was committed above it, making the release "old news". Within a week of phpdoc major update there was a new conference announcement posted. This is ridiculous. I kicked around on IRC the idea of dedicated conference page and immediately got praised for it. Everyone (online and awake) agreed. Few hours later in a frustration caused by all those announcements I cleaned the frontpage up, moving old stuff into the archives and then added the conference page. Few days later I then added a dedicated feed for the announcements.



Now that things are starting to cool off I posted a patch for a conference teaser on the frontpage. I've learned my lesson. There is no way in hell I will commit without a notice.



Just to be clear. I do think PHP conferences are important, but they are not as important as what the php.net team is doing. They are however important enough to be on php.net, just not cluttering and making fun of php.net efforts.


Seeing post like the one from Cal Evans, Extra! Extra! Get Your Conference News Here!, is kinda funny. I had a hard time finding those feeds, in fact I can only see them in that blog entry.. and his php.net has had a change of policy link points to a post by conference planer.. Heh? Even funnier is the the fact I can't see any indication on importance of conferences on Zends Developer Zone at all. *sigh* That's the spirit Cal! Kick my nuts and send out fancy statements without anything to back it up.

Cal: I'll avenge my nuts in London... ;)

Comments

  1. AnonymousFebruary 12, 2007 at 3:56 PM

    Hi Hannes,

    "Extra! Extra! Get Your Conference News Here!" was actually supposed to be kinda funny. As I explained to someone (I think this person is considered a core developer) when they asked, I fully respect php.net's right to do whatever they choose and since I make my living off of PHP, I meant no disrespect. It was written tongue-in-cheek but most certainty not foot-in nuts. :)

    I feel as you do that conferences are very important to the community. Since php.net's policy had changed, I took take the opportunity to point that out. In my eyes it was as an opportunity for me to promote DevZone more than anything else. (and I'm nothing if not a shameless promoter)

    As for next week in London, find me and let me explain how important I think conferences are over a beer.

    =C=

    p.s. I didn't link to your original announcement about the change because I couldn't find it. I've searched php.mirror and still can't but I may have overlooked it. If you will send it to me, I'll update the article with the link.

    ReplyDelete
  2. bjoriFebruary 13, 2007 at 1:28 AM

    There was no official announcement regarding the move other than the frontpage news entry.

    We can all agree that conferences are important to PHP, but the issue that came up was exactly how important they are.

    I honestly don't see the problem of listing them, with call for papers, on their own page - they even have a link in the top right corner (which is available from _all_ pages).

    However, I like the idea of a "teaser" (I don't recall who came up with it, sorry) above our news entrys and posted a patch for it...

    -Hannes

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousApril 29, 2007 at 12:39 AM

    Yess !!!! very interesting. It must be hard to get . Now you are going high !!! with many others,so please hold on, and be happy.
    I love to know you.

    ReplyDelete
  4. brochure design indiaSeptember 13, 2009 at 11:57 PM

    Its highly informative. I would be visiting your blog hereafter regularly to gather valuable information.

    ReplyDelete

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