BELIEVE IT OR NOT….
Tuesday morning (Jan 30) from 2:00am-3:00am, we will replace the existing LDS.org with the new site (what you see today at beta.lds.org).
Please note that beta.lds.org still points to many pages in the old design (and old Vignette 6 content management system), and that will still be the case when we cut over. Over time, all these old pages and sites will be rebuilt with the new designs in the new Vignette 7 content management system.
Beta.lds.org
For a few weeks, we will leave the beta site functional, although there will be a redirect on the home page to send users to the new site at LDS.org. If you have bookmarks to pages within beta.lds.org, they will still find the beta pages for those few weeks, although you should change them to refer to the new site (usually just by removing “beta.” from the URL).
Gospel Library
The new site will use the new Gospel Library (as you see it today at beta.lds.org) which is a completely new database of XML text (with links to associated PDFs, audio files, etc.). If you have links on your sites to content in the Gospel Library, you will need to update those links to the new URLs. To prevent your links from breaking immediately, we will keep the old Gospel Library functional for some time (at least six months). In a future article, I will post guidelines and helps on how to update your links.
Feedback
We welcome your feedback on the new site. Just click “Feedback” at the top of any of the pages of the new LDS.org.
Do you now if the FireFox LDS Search plugins will still function after the transition?
If it works with the Gospel Library in beta.lds.org today, it should work after the cut-over. The only difference will be the URL without “beta.”.
Great work! Very exciting to see the progress.
What would be uber-awesome is a PDF version of the LDS scriptures.
I know authorizing that sort of thing isn’t your department…but just food for thought. 🙂
In any case, congrats on the coming site launch!
Doug,
I agree. It would be great to have all the church manuals, scriptures, and many historical texts in PDF versions. I am personally working on a PDF version of the Journal of Discourses. It would solve so many compatibility issues (Mac vs. Windows vs. Linux) and browser issues (Safari vs. IE vs. Firefox). I look foward to the day when it will happen. The Church scriptures currently available as an application still is not Mac compatible. If they just made everything in PDF format, we wouldn’t have a problem. Now if we just get them to stop using only Windows Media and start using the platform neutral Quicktime, all would be great!
I am also looking forward to the new website. Especially the PDF resources in the gospel library.
In a previous blog Standard Formats for Audio and Video on Church Web Sites, I explained that all new video we create will be in Windows Media, Quicktime, and Mpeg 2 VOB formats. Over the next several months, we’ll go back to the existing videos and prepare them also in the 3 formats.
We are considering the issue of providing a PDF version of the scriptures. No decision yet.
Very exciting news about the video formats! Tell everyone in your department thanks!
PDF of the scriptures would also be great for reference when you don’t have internet access. It could also go on the new iPhone in that format!
“the newer Macs run PC software just fine.”
that’s a pretty lame excuse for not implementing cross-platform support, which would be trivial if the source documents were simply converted into open standard formats. so mac users who don’t purchase parallels or vmware are expected to reboot their computers into boot camp to… read the scriptures? yeah, that’s gonna happen.
Take it easy dr. It is not LDSWebguy’s decision although he probably has strong influence in making recommendations. Your post sounds very mean.
But, in all honesty, dr does have a point (even though he lacks some manners). Us mac users would really have no desire to use the less secure Windows in order to access the CD-ROM. I was really hoping the next version of the ROM would be in PDF version or include a MAC version.
Dear LDSwebguy, please remember that while Windows has 90% of the computer world, at least 60% of that 90% represents corporate computing. When you look at just households worldwide and exclude corporate computers, the number of LDS households with Macs is much higher. Please let the church programmers know that there are many LDS households that desire really good church software for Macs (look at what those two guys are doing over at Virtual Historian – it is an incredible program created on a Mac for both Windows and Mac users). Thanks for all the hard work you do and keep working on making the stuff platform neutral.
Michael and dr, I understand your point, but the fact is still that only 5% of our Web visitors are using Mac OS. Having said that, you’ll be pleased to know that our tech department finally believes that open source and standards-compliant is the right way to go, and you’ll see a LOT more of it from here on out. I’m a BIG proponent of standards. Mac platforms and browsers are now included in our standards so all new work must test (QA) against them.
I see that the design still remains fundamenally unchanged from the original announcement months ago. I will reiterate again many of the points I made in a detailed response through the ‘feedback’ link.
From a best-practice design perspective, the current design is superior for a number of reasons.
1. While it might ‘look’ nice, the new design wastes considerable real estate. With visual issues and a still predominant distribution of old equipment, design has to be considered from an 800×600 rendering. I’ve just switched my monitor to check the design and what appears is the top bar and search — rendering most of the page below the fold.
2. The purpose of a home page is to support numerous scenarios. Providing access to multiple scenarios is key to its design. The new design features only 3 scenario-specific options: Search, Prepare a Lesson, Prepare a Talk. I would propose that the designs of the latter two are so non-compelling that effectively the design supports but one primary scenario: Search. I would be curious as to the research results as to whether or not the ‘blank’ search box was preferred over the search design at the top of the page — if they were provided in the same spot.
3. I’m not sure what the logic was to ‘hiding’ the church locator under ‘About the Church’. This design makes the assumption that members do not (as I do) regularly use this feature to attend church when they are traveling. Members would not have a mental association to look for anything under ‘about the church’, unless they were looking for something on behalf of someone else.
4. Main Navigation. The number of possible selections from the main navigation are 55, with a 20% exposure rate. This is less important than the fact that it is likely (if I had access to the data) that some of the highest profile scenarios are now buried. The fact that the flyouts are in alpha-order also suggests that the design was not considered from the true use of the site. The only acception to alpha-order was provided to the press. This sends a subliminal message that the press is more important than the membership.
The new design has clear ‘markings’ of a marketing redesign, not a functional redesign. The latter is the true audience and the purpose for which a redesign is justified. If this design does indeed follow evidences of research and use, then please share that with us so that we can appreciate the design.
In flipping between the two sites, I cannot say that the new one is any more visually pleasing than the existing one. But that’s not the purpose of the site of a redesign (nor is a change in technology). Change must be done with purpose and must accomplish very specific design goals. This redesign appears to be devoid of good interactive design goals.
On a positive note, Search being the most predominant function, having it exposed for immediate access is a tremendous step forward from the previous 3-step, split process. The new results page is somewhat better than the existing design (the frames were enough to drive anyone away from the site, just for nervous mental relief). But here again, the design of the page falls short of best practice. The level of detail includes too many rows. Even in 1024×768, only 2 results appear above the fold. The same search in Google displays 6 results and 2 in the right column.
Keeping the existing design, exposing search and replacing the search results, would be a far superior tactical move, until a true functional, evidence-based redesign can be put into place.
Paula,
I appreciate the time you took to give an analysis of the new LDS.org. I’d like to respond to your suggestions:
Visual look of the home page. Some people comment on the “waste of space” on the home page. However, this was a purpose-full branding decision. Traditional information Web sites (Yahoo!, about.com, etc.) contain lots of links on the home page for quick navigation to the complex information elements. The direction we received was to make this site look very different from traditional Web sites. Rather than a “busy” look, we want visitors to the Church site to have a very different feel: calm, relaxed, quite, and reverent. We’re after the feel of sites like BMW or Jaguar rather than about.com. That lead us to our current design with half the page dedicated to branding and a cool color (plus the six navigation categories) and the bottom half to a limited number of features. The design of six navigation categories with fly-outs still provide one-click access to 54 different pages, plus the features and buttons on the bottom half of the screen. We know this design isn’t perfect. We’ve tested it extensively and made many subtle modifications from the first designs. We’ll continue to refine it over time.
Access to multiple scenarios. Our research showed that 50% of the visitors who come to LDS.org do so to prepare a lesson or a talk. That’s why we put these two tasked-based navigation elements on the home page in addition to the topical navigation in the top half of the screen. Later this year, we’ll provide the ability for a user to register and sign-in. Based on the user profile, we can then customize the content and navigation, and allow the user more control over the experience.
Navigation. The location of options under the six categories are all based on user research (card sort activities, focus groups, and user observation). We’ll continue to refine them with further research and based on the metrics we gather daily from actual use of the site. Regarding the order of options under the categories, we have tested some alphabetical and others in our perceived order of important and yet others in the order of most frequently-used first. Based on the results, we are reordering all the lists for Tuesday’s launch in alphabetical order.
Search. Research showed that search was a major failing of the previous site, so we’ve invested considerable money is a very powerful search engine that allows us to perform a federated search across all Church Web sites, several related sites (like BYU and others), and multiple information databases. It will also allow more powerful search in nearly 100 languages. Our designs put search at the top of every new page. User testing also showed that users wanted a large search box on the home page, and our metrics reports show they have used it a lot on the beta site. On Tuesday’s launch, the search results will still not be what we would like them to be. We are still refining the search algorithms and you’ll see search results improving over the next few weeks. We weight authors (so articles by the First Presidency and apostles rate higher than articles by others), time (more recent content first), and key Web pages. Since some people use search instead of navigation, we weight key Web pages so people can find them (for example, if you search “provident living,” you should be able to find the Provident Living Web site).
We will continue to work to refine all these areas, and appreciate your further suggestions.
i’m sorry for being curt last time, but sometimes i get so tired of ms-centric thinking that i just have to get right to the point. it’s mystifying to me that the church wouldn’t go out of its way to open its arms to anyone who would seek to know more, and deny no one, be they black or white, bond or free, male or female, mac or pc. i’m glad to hear that the importance of standards is starting to sink in with the web developers. on that note, as of today, pdf is officially an open standard, so i’d suggest you guys go wild with that.
the new look is actually fantastic, and is a big step forward. the web development team should strive to stay open to user input and implement good suggestions. i see how low resolution (e.g. 800×600) browsers might have a bit of an issue with the new layout.
First of all, congratulations. ^_^
Second — I think it’s a step forward, though I’m distressed that (as of the moment I write this) the “additional information” links on each Gospel Topics page, along with almost every other bit of Java script, won’t work in my Firefox (2.0.0.1) but do work in IE 6.whatever.
Actually, I kind of hate the site in Firefox (scripts are all allowed, etc. — and oddly, the Beta worked just fine for the most part,) but I think it looks better, and it definitely functions better, in IE. If it weren’t for the amount of wasted territory in the top half of my screen and the dropping of so much good information, I’d say “good job, take a vacation.” As of now, I miss the quote being in that left top anchor spot (I actually read the quote on a near-daily basis — at least, I look to see if it changes; on the Russian site, it doesn’t seem to change as often.) And when I’m looking for “navigation” I think “left sidebar” not “kind of on the top near the name of the Church. No, no, in the middle. No, not centered, it’s still a list, but it’s kind of — forget it, I’ll just use the search box instead.” Stuff like that kind of bugs me, though I will still praise you daily if you promise to never, ever make it look like Yahoo’s current front page. Your saying that the entire site will be available in Russian also makes me giddy, though I’m trying very hard not to make assumptions about what you mean by “entire.” (Hint: the scriptures, online, in Russian, would cause me to forget all previous Java script grumbles and willingly use IE instead of Firefox every time I have to go look at Church stuff.)
Also, um, weren’t there going to be more “human-friendly” URLs in our future? The one for the “Prepare a Talk: Faith” (and by the way, more talk topics linked from that page would be appreciated) includes something like 100 characters of gobbledy-gook. If anything it’s actually worse than the “htm?fn=document-frameset.htm$f=templates$3.0” stuff from the various old-site links I’ve got saved.
[specific things I miss, which list I’m actually making from looking at the Russian site since it’s still in the old format: a really quick “contact us” link, a site map link, substantial calendar information, more providing-context-and-drawing-interest pictures tied to multiple first-page news stories (both the pictures and the news stories are gone now.) Some of those might actually be things that are just on the Russian site that I am wishfully thinking were on the English site.
Specific things I’d love to have, but have no real right to expect: something like a My Yahoo! level of customization, in which I can have my stake and ward calendar items on the front page, immediate access to this year’s Primary manual and things that were always hard to find, like the online Gospel Art stuff (which has been buried in the Family Home Evening section), and the ability to keep new or most-relevant or even constantly-rotating search results on topics of interest — Young Single Adults, or Ohio, or Baptism — while not seeing more offers for free videos. I have an HTML file with a list of about thirty deep links to various things from LDS.org, on a plain white background, which I use for a homepage: I’d be much happier if I could set all of that stuff up on the Church page and use it as a proper portal.]
But, umm, good job nonetheless! And I’m going to check out those new MP3 filenames now…