NASA's website

[kg]

What do folks think of NASA's website? It seems to me that they are doing an amazing job at outreach. It seems like they have put alot into it. Is it maintained by NASA engeneers or is it farmed out to a public relations firm? Are they explaining their science goals and results well? I'm not a scientist myself but I think they are doing a much better job then what I see in the newspapers.

 

[origin]

What do folks think of NASA's website? It seems to me that they are doing an amazing job at outreach. It seems like they have put alot into it. Is it maintained by NASA engeneers or is it farmed out to a public relations firm? Are they explaining their science goals and results well? I'm not a scientist myself but I think they are doing a much better job then what I see in the newspapers.

I think it is great site and I agree with you. I hope to god they do a better job than the newspapers!

edited to add - Not all newspapers get it wrong - just most.

 

[EarthlingX]

What do folks think of NASA's website? It seems to me that they are doing an amazing job at outreach. It seems like they have put alot into it. Is it maintained by NASA engeneers or is it farmed out to a public relations firm? Are they explaining their science goals and results well? I'm not a scientist myself but I think they are doing a much better job then what I see in the newspapers.

I think it's a mess, and a labyrinth. Extremely hard to find something, you have to rely on bookmarks. A lot of dead links, leading to non-existing pages, not updated subpages, and i could go on - most painful is, they have everything suited for IE, and MS programs, which i avoid in a very big circle, for too many reasons to state here.
I also don't like Quick-time, it sucks, in short. More RealPlayer links, to start with, and do something about dead links.

Putting all of the centres on one site is also bad idea. I always, as soon as i can find it, bookmark link, which is not on the main site, which is too slow and too cluttered.

I could continue for a very long time.

edit.
To be fair, i have to add, that other agencies, CSA, ESA, JAXA, Roscosmos, are even worse. Most horrible is ESA - your only guide is Google, in most cases, extremely hard to find what you are looking for; CSA doesn't update more than two pages on the site, maybe; JAXA has extremely non-useful English part, totally out of sync with Japanese part; Roscosmos - very basic, but it is regularly updated though, and has a lot of images with most, if not all, of the news. With Roscosmos it is probably better to check Energia page, rather nice, non-complicated site, and of course many other, which are in most cases not linked from Roscosmos, but somewhere on the Google, if you know what to ask, of course.
Winner of the most sucking space agencies sites from my list is Chinese, with hardly any live link, full of propaganda, no information, or minimum possible, and if there is any, it's in Chinese, which doesn't help, but it was probably not even meant to.

 

[JonClarke]

Some people are hard to please it seems.

 

[EarthlingX]

Some people are hard to please it seems.

Or know how to do it better, because they see better done things every day.

I'm sorry if saying that the king is naked disturbs you, but this is what i think about NASA's site, which was the question.

At least all information, images and such on their site, is public, and that is why i don't mind making bookmarks too much.

If they got rid of M$, it would be a first step, after the dead links, that is.

 

[EarthlingX]

Here is an example of a NASA site, where i like design, i'm satisfied with it, so to speak :
WISE - Mission

It is more or less, all that i like. There are other nice NASA sites, but not the main site.

Another nice site :

Science@NASA

I hope, you can see a pattern.

Compared to them, the main site is 'half cooked', so to speak. Unfortunately, this is how it is, since the change to current design, and it doesn't show any improvement since, only more cluttered and labyrinthine, with pages having internal links which bypass top and left menus, to the places a couple levels under the levels accessible from the menus. They are at least not closed in the frames, which makes it simple to get a direct URL, and make your own index, as i did for my use.

In my opinion, it is not wiggly crap you see on the screen that makes site good, but simple, fast and direct access to the information which it is supposed to provide, and of course Web standards, not proprietary variations and deviations.

 

[EarthlingX]

Here is an example of a very interesting site (i see it for the first time after about 20 years browsing NASA pages), hidden deep in (try finding it from the main site, without using it's name, you don't know it yet, of course) :

Microgravity University

The Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program provides a unique academic experience for undergraduate students to successfully propose, design, fabricate, fly and evaluate a reduced gravity experiment of their choice over the course of four-six months. The overall experience includes scientific research, hands-on experimental design, test operations and educational/public outreach activities.

Anyway, i'm pulling back a little, i a found list of centres on the front page .. interesting ... maybe i've been using my links for a bit too long .. darn .. how did i get into this ? Did someone actually did something there ?

edit.
I think i know what's the problem: organization of the page sux.
I know how to fix it, but what's the point.

 

[kg]

I'm not an engeneer so I don't really have an opinion of how well a website works. As a matter of fact I'm a bit surprised when my computer works at all!
It seems like NASA is a large agency with alot of parts. Do they try to coodinate everything they put on the web or do they task every poject manager with the responsibility of public outreach?
I'm a bit confused why there seems to be at least two Cassini mission websites, Ciclops, which doesn't have a NASA logo
http://ciclops.org/index.php?flash=1&js=1
and Cassini Equinox Mission, which does have the NASA logo
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm
I am very happy that someone has taken the time out of buisy job of running this mission to make such amazing pictures available to the public.

 

[EarthlingX]

I'm not an engeneer so I don't really have an opinion of how well a website works. As a matter of fact I'm a bit surprised when my computer works at all!
It seems like NASA is a large agency with alot of parts. Do they try to coodinate everything they put on the web or do they task every poject manager with the responsibility of public outreach?
I'm a bit confused why there seems to be at least two Cassini mission websites, Ciclops, which doesn't have a NASA logo
http://ciclops.org/index.php?flash=1&js=1
and Cassini Equinox Mission, which does have the NASA logo
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm
I am very happy that someone has taken the time out of buisy job of running this mission to make such amazing pictures available to the public.

I'm a regular visitor on Ciclops and Cassini, and have both pages bookmarked, including their daily RSS feeds with images: thank you Carolyn Porco and Cassini team, Force be with you.

About the main page :
- First page uses too many different fonts, it makes it hard to see things, one from the basics of a web design.
- folding menu covers too big part of the screen, hides possibility to notice that something is bellow.
- centres, structural , legal, and similar information is all over the place, not to mention, with smallest fonts possible, and that includes access for people with different privileges.
- news are mixed with the static data.

At least the menu on left is now in sync with the data frame, so - so, in sublevels, like centres and such, i'm not so sure, if it has been so for a long time, but i may be wrong, i use bookmarks anyway.

It would be very nice, if they had a structural, hierarchical diagram of centres, missions and such, in one place, which i don't see as a problem, simple sql query with decently prepared database - put it in a tree, and voila !

Enough for now about NASA, they receive enough bashing anyway, and this was not meant as bashing, but a constructive comment. ESA is even bigger mess, rather hopeless case, and none of the other agencies excel at the Web design, or providing information about what they do, at least not under my criteria.

 

[nimbus]

Real Player is bad news, man. They probably faded from market because of their habit of growing roots into your system just like Apple's Windows stuff.

 

[EarthlingX]

Real Player is bad news, man. They probably faded from market because of their habit of growing roots into your system just like Apple's Windows stuff.

I have vlc, but i usually use RealPlayer for streaming, sort off given up, and have an image of disk ready to ghost it over, in the case of emergency. Didn't use it for streaming, though.