[cfe-dev] "clang.org"

[Yaron Keren]

While building llvm/clang from sources is entirely feasible, it requires
setting up a non-trivial build environment, especially on Windows. The
recently posted instructions setting up a windows builder summarize the
process very well and show what's involved.

If we'd like to make clang a popular compiler (as it should!) this process
in unreasonable. Someone wishing to just use clang wants a simple one-click
solution and not a process setting it up. If not clang, he'll find his one
click solution either with Visual C++ Express free edition or one of the
MingW distributions.

The standard is to have a big DOWNLOAD button featured on the front page.
This leads directly to the Windows installer (one-click!) or at most to a
list of the last stable version pre-built binaries with the Windows as the
default.
Why Windows? because that's what Windows users are expecting.
In other OS downloading sources and configure/make is reasonable as 1) the
users are usually more knowledgeable and 2) the build environment is mostly
(all?) ready. Not so with Windows.

The downloading process should be EZ : mindless and requires as few clicks
as possible. Some practical examples are:

http://www.eclipse.org/
https://netbeans.org/
https://sourceforge.net/projects/mingwbuilds/

additional non-links should lead to development (ToT) pre-built binaries,
web browsable sources and svn/git instructions. It is also be nice to have
downloadable sources as tar/zip such as available on some sites as for some
users installing svn/git may be a showstopper.

Specifically, on the current llvm site, the download link should be more
prominent. It should list the pre-built binaries at first. It should link
to the Windows pre-built binaries which currently are well hidden on the
alpha site. Then it should also link to ToT ("Development") binaries and
only finally to source codes and build instructions.

Yaron



2013/11/13 Chris Lattner <clattner at apple.com>

> On Nov 12, 2013, at 10:18 PM, Sean Silva <silvas at purdue.edu> wrote:
>
> I think that Alp made a really good point: "Clang" is a developer-facing
>> product that a lot more developers interact with than compiler engineers.
>> llvm.org and even clang.llvm.org are really focused on bringing people
>> into the open source community and serving us compiler hackers, but it does
>> a really poor job serving users that just want to use a compiler and look
>> up a few options or language extensions.
>>
>
> When I reorganized the clang docs front page, I was actually amazed at how
> things fell out. We actually have a quite nice slice of docs that broadly
> fall under the category "Using Clang as a Compiler" <
> http://clang.llvm.org/docs/#using-clang-as-a-compiler>, and I made sure
> to put those front and center.
>
>
> Yeah, that is great.  It would also be interesting to have a blogroll (or
> something) on it talking about various people using the compiler, tips and
> tricks, etc.
>
>
> Oh, and the main web page could really use an update, being almost
>> unmodified since its inception.
>>
>
> Yeah it would be nice to have a web site that looks like it was developed
> by a web designer, not a compiler hacker :) Our dragon logo is awesome, how
> did that come about? Maybe we could emulate that process to net a fresh
> fancy webpage. (I'm assuming that the dragon logo wasn't designed by a
> compiler hacker; if it was, then this is me bowing to their skill).
>
>
> The dragon came about when Apple paid a 3rd party icon design company to
> design it for LLVM.  I gave them the guidance of "a high tech dragon" and a
> graphics artist did magic :-)
>
>
>> In many ways, this is the same problem that projects like Eclipse have.
>>  Since eclipse is both a community and an IDE, the main "
>> http://www.eclipse.org" web site is pretty useless for people who just
>> want a Java IDE.  I'm not finding any great examples of open source
>> projects "doing it right", but linux.com for example is targeted as
>> users and advocates of the linux OS, not at kernel hackers.
>>
>
> I think the "normal" way to do it these days (for better or for worse) is
> for a project's home page to be entirely "non-developer-centric", but have
> a "github" ribbon/button that developers know to look for.
>
>
> Right, it would make sense to keep clang.llvm.org as the compiler hackers
> kingdom.  There could be a prominent link from clang.org that points to
> it.
>
>
>> I think it could be really great to have a user-centric landing page, and
>> if we do that, making clang.org be it would be truly great.
>>
>
> Agreed. That sounds like a perfect use for the domain.
>
>
> What do you think Alp?  Does this make sense to you?  I think this aligns
> with (my understanding of) your intended purpose for the domain, and would
> be fantastic for the project.
>
> -Chris
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> cfe-dev mailing list
> cfe-dev at cs.uiuc.edu
> http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/mailman/listinfo/cfe-dev
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/cfe-dev/attachments/20131113/a313913f/attachment.html>