Add "what can astropy do" to the front page

[eteq]

Right now the astropy web site doesn't have much (pretty much nothing) in the way of "look, here's some cool things astropy does" on the web site. We should add that, possibly on the main page, or possibly in the "about" section.

I'm imagining something vaguely along the lines of http://jquery.com/ , which has "A Brief Look" at the bottom showing key features.

This was prompted by @demitri suggesting it during SciCoder, after we tried to find just such a page for an intro to Astropy section.

cc @astrofrog @kayleanelson @adrn

[embray]

👍 Something along these lines would look nice too: http://qutip.org/features.html (i.e. it doesn't have to be just code samples)

[adrn]

I'd just like to note that, in line with the link @embray posted, we might benefit from adding a picture of a ninja to such a page...

But anyways, @eteq you're thinking a few small (e.g. much shorter than a tutorial) code examples? The problem is we don't really have "key features" -- or rather, the key features depend on the user's subfield. Maybe have "A brief look" with some tabs or icons to let users choose the most relevant:

• main intro / default: show off units?
• observing: coordinates, time
• data analysis: io.ascii, io.fits, modeling
• simulations: nddata, units, ??
• more?

Even better, use their browser history to look at recent ADS queries and automatically pick which to show them 😃

[demitri]

Clearly @adrn is doing a summer internship at the NSA. No no, don't try to deny it; we know that's a requirement.

What I was getting at was that the home page doesn't say at all what Astropy is. There are far more astronomers who are not using it than those that do, which means it has to be sold. The most prominent information is how to install it. What about people who aren't even astronomers that come to the page? The QuTiP page is awful too - the most prominent piece of information is that it has “straightforward syntax”. Great... but what the #(%& is it??

Adrian's list is a good start. Features of Astropy include:

• Easily convert between most coordinate systems
• A powerful system of attaching units to numbers that automatically transform through calculations.
• Handles many time systems down to the .
• Tools for reading/writing many data file formats, including ASCII, FITS, etc.
• etc.

Below that, I'd put small code snippets that demonstrate what can be done in one or two lines that take many more using other tools. Good examples of this are coordinate conversations, Quantity examples, etc. I don't mean detailed code listings... but we do have a lot of low-hanging fruit there.

Think of it this way - you are trying to get funding to support the project, and all you have to demonstrate it is the home page.

Next, there should be very prominent links on the home page that don't require scrolling to get to. As a first pass, I'd say these should be:

• installation instructions
• documentation
• more detailed code examples / a tutorial
• how to contribute
• search field

Some of those are of course already there, and that's not a complete list. But none of those things should be described in detail on the home page.

Ooh - how about a link that says "What cool thing have you done with Astropy?" People could submit projects or code that we could compile.

Anyway, that was my thinking.

[perrygreenfield]

On Jul 8, 2014, at 12:30 PM, Demitri Muna wrote:

Clearly @adrn is doing a summer internship at the NSA. No no, don't try to deny it; we know that's a requirement.

What I was getting at was that the home page doesn't say at all what Astropy is. There are far more astronomers who are not using it than those that do, which means it has to be sold. The most prominent information is how to install it. What about people who aren't even astronomers that come to the page? The QuTiP page is awful too - the most prominent piece of information is that it has “straightforward syntax”. Great... but what the #(%& is it??

Adrian's list is a good start. Features of Astropy include:

• Easily convert between most coordinate systems
• A powerful system of attaching units to numbers that automatically transform through calculations.
• Handles many time systems down to the .
• Tools for reading/writing many data file formats, including ASCII, FITS, etc.
• etc.
Below that, I'd put small code snippets that demonstrate what can be done in one or two lines that take many more using other tools. Good examples of this are coordinate conversations, Quantity examples, etc. I don't mean detailed code listings... but we do have a lot of low-hanging fruit there.

How about summarizing it like this:

Astropy is a set of fundamental tools dealing with common astronomical software needs such as:

• reading and writing data in common formats
• dealing with astronomical celestial, spectral and time coordinate systems
• managing tabular data
• managing physical units and quantities that have physical units
• dealing with World Coordinate Systems (i.e., mapping data to physical coordinates)
• common cosmological, photometric utilities (add whatever to the list)
• standard data object models to support interchange between Python applications

Astropy is intended to foster the development of applications that have consistent conventions, documentation, and tests, and that are relatively easy to use together. Most of these applications will be found listed under Astropy Affiliated packages.

[This can be compressed as deemed appropriate.]

Perry

[demitri]

I'd avoid mentioning "Astropy Affiliated packages" in the intro - that's already jargon.

[embray]

I think it's absolutely critical that they be mentioned, but in a context that explains what they are and why they're great. Otherwise totally agree with @demitri . Might also be worth highlighting some of the things that are useful to non-Astronomers as well. In fact, I was even asked the other day "I'm an astrophysicist, not an astronomer, so I'm not sure I'd be able to contribute anything useful to Astropy?"

That's in my mind more a semantic issue than anything, but it's good to clarify that Astropy is not "for astronomers", but rather that it has tools that happen to be useful for fields that happen to have "astro" in their name, as well as surrounding fields that don't (eg. "planetary science"). While some subpackages are a little more area-specific (cosmology), a lot of it is pretty broadly useful (Quantities, much of coordinates, Tables, etc.)

[kelle]

copied and pasted from "About" page and added to top of main page. 15d1c0d