OCaml.org Reboot: User-Centric Design & Content

Tarides is pleased to announce the launch of the updated community site, ocaml.org.

Over the past year and a half, we have supported and collaborated with members of the OCaml community on the creation of an updated community website. We are proud to present new features and improvements that will benefit both existing and new generations of OCaml users.

Features

Some of the quality-of-life improvements that users can expect from this update include:

• Package documentation site which contains the documentation of every version of every OCaml package
• Job board to list job opportunities from the community
• Syndicated blog that links to blog articles from the community and offers original blog posts
• Success stories that explore how notable companies solve real-world challenges using OCaml
• New documentation site which aggregates resources and tutorials to learn OCaml
• OCaml playground to try OCaml directly in the browser

The Road So Far

We have worked hard to address concrete requirements from users and provide solutions for the new website. The 2020 OCaml Community Survey highlighted several areas to improve, resulting in new features and content being added.

The survey concluded that the original site lacked easily accessible package documentation, and that job applicants and employers had a difficult time connecting. To address this, we decided early on to include both a job board and a fully-incorporated package documentation page. The job board now provides a place where job seekers can discover opportunities in OCaml, and employers can look for applicants. The package documentation page allows users to find, explore, and compare documentation all conveniently located in one place. Additionally, the team wanted to improve site navigation. This included ensuring easy pathfinding between related topics, together with a focus on improving overall accessibility, allowing successful navigation within the site.

Taking the perspective of different users of the site inspired the creation of brand-new content like Success Stories that highlight ways professionals, academics, and others use OCaml to solve hard problems, create impact, and foster collaboration. It also inspired the new area for tutorials and guides, as well as the OCaml playground, both aimed at making learning OCaml easier and more engaging.

Looking Ahead

There is still plenty of room for improvement and new ideas, and now is a great time for the community to be more involved. We’d like everyone in the community to participate in improving the site and we have created a contribution guide to make the process easier. Please reach out on the issue tracker with ideas and suggestions. We are especially looking for people to help maintain and run the website, and improve the content and general user-experience to help grow our community even more!

To learn more about the reboot and how to get involved please read the original Discuss post.