Open-event-server: Propose a system for help pages

[mariobehling]

What is the best system for help pages? We need:

• A site that is easy to maintain.
• Needs to be able to keep pictures
• Easy to update by non tech people
• Nice to have thing is if the user can type something in a search box and get suggestions.
• Good would be if we could simply host it on Github Pages, but if not possible then it is also ok.

See an example here: http://help.eventnook.com

[shivamMg]

We can create our own system, integrated with our own site and put it out at domain.com/support. We can provide a front-end editor for people to add and edit support-articles. The authentication and authorization system can be taken from the organizer server itself. We'll let only the Staff members (Admins and Super Admins) create and edit articles. OR we can create another site-wide role, like guide_editor that is only allowed to post and edit articles at the guide. The text editor must have support for rendering images (like the wordpress visual editor).

Another way to do it, could be using Pelican. It's a static site generator, mostly used for writing blogs. The content is (generally) written in simple Markdown files and is rendered by Pelican as a website. You can look at http://osuosl.org, it's written in pelican (https://github.com/osuosl/osuosl-pelican). Of course this requires the guide editor to have knowledge of markdown. Also, I think a separate repo would be required.

Regarding search we can put all our support/help related material under a path (e.g. orga-server.com/support) or a sub-domain like eventnook does. We can then use Google Custom Search. We can also use flask extension to provide search functionality. Flask-WhooshAlchemy seems to be one. If we go with Pelican, there are some search engine plugins that can be integrated with it.

[sainiak009]

@niranjan94 @mariobehling I would like to start working on it. My queries are :

• As suggested by @shivamMg Either we can have our own support system integrated with this project or we can have a separate support system. ?
• Text Editor can be a simple one with support for rendering images or It can be a markdown editor ?.
• Can we use Google Custom Search or Flask-WhooshAlchemy ?

[niranjan94]

• I'm not sure. I think one integrated with this project ?
• We could use a simple WYSIWYG Rich text editor like summernote
• WhooshAlchemy looks cool ... we can go with it

@mariobehling your views ?

[mariobehling]

I think one integrated with this project ?

Preferably a solution hosted separately, e.g. at "support.eventyay.com". Features required:

• simple search
• possibly a system that can be hosted on github pages
• easily translatable

What documentation generators are suitable? Any suggestions?

[sainiak009]

@niranjan94 @mariobehling : Nikola and Pelican Both seems to be popular for static site generation but I will suggest using Nikola as it is more user-friendly, Nikola's default theme is Bootstrap which we are also using. It supports reStructured, Markdown, plain HTML etc, Github deployment can be done by just a command line. Plugin for search functionality is already there and It is easily translatable too. What are your views ?

[mariobehling]

@sainiak009 Thanks for looking into it. Nikola and Pelican both do not use their system for their own documentation. So, in that area they are unfortunately not convincing.

[sainiak009]

@mariobehling NIkola uses It's system for it's documentation. Here is the link
Nikola just place It's latest docs at readthedocs but all documentation of nikola can be found Here too.

[sainiak009]

@niranjan94 @SaptakS What are your views and suggestions ?

[niranjan94]

I guess we're going with Jekyll. Meets all our requirements.

According to https://github.com/fossasia/support.eventyay.com

So this can be closed.