COIN.ARMY.MIL version 2.0 is active

[USA&USMC_COIN_Center]

Hi Neil,



Ouch ! I've been stuck in that situation myself (Treasury Board Comon Look & Feel design restrictions) and, if the bureaucrats have taken control, it is the most frustrating thing imaginable. If it will help any, a couple of friends of mine in the Carleton HCI lab wrote a paper that analyzed the "impression time" of a "first view" (~ 50 milliseconds). If you shoot me an email, I'll be glad to send it off to you (an 1 page executive summary is available here).

Marc

Don't be too hard on them, they're working hard to make it right. They've been helpful to in many ways.

PM enroute. To everyone else who feels the same, please jump in. I know the CAC web staff could use the input on the design and layout of the public site - soon all of CAC's orgs (CALL, CADD, BCTP, CAL, etc) will move to the exact same layout. No feedback has more credibility than the public's, as stated earlier - and that is who the public websites are for.

Steve, noted on the public content. We're working on what we can make available, and trying to point to open resources like SWJ. The restricted sites have far more content. Even with Frontier 6's sunshine policy, the rest of DoD's OPSEC regs haven't caught up. And no small part is the time we have to invest in its improvement.

Any feedback on the CAC SharePoint site?

[Ron Humphrey]

Any feedback on the CAC SharePoint site?

I am comfortable getting around it due to familiarity with the overall format of BCKS/AKO etc but for some reason I see red whenever I visit

Also it will be good when more of the like sites on sharepoint come more online.

[Entropy]

Question -

Does the CAC access only work from .mil or .gov domains? I ask because I have a CAC reader and software at home and couldn't access the CAC site.

[JJackson]

I would agree with page size comment, keep within 1024*768, and key data and links in 800*600, small point but pick background colours that contrast with browser default control colours (like the scroll bar).

I would agree with Ken if you have restricted access to items on any site then go for a 'for those with AKO or CAC access click here' and then display additional content. On the tombstone version the CAC logo is much lower res than the others (looks like a blown up scanned letterhead) - update.

I would be wary of the site Marc gave as an example in post 4# as it looks great but breaks two homepage rules - needs high band-with (I am assuming you will be getting hits from those in the field with inconsistent connections) and requires a bolt-on (Flash-player, Quick-time, Java etc.) again all good for content rich second pages but not to load homepage.

JJ

[marct]

Hi J,

I would be wary of the site Marc gave as an example in post 4# as it looks great but breaks two homepage rules - needs high band-with (I am assuming you will be getting hits from those in the field with inconsistent connections) and requires a bolt-on (Flash-player, Quick-time, Java etc.) again all good for content rich second pages but not to load homepage.

Totally agreed - the forces.ca site is good for the North American public which likely has the bandwidth and addons, but is definitely not good for a general entry site. There are server side scripts that can detect browsers and plug-ins and do replaces, at least in asp.net, which may be an option.

My only concern would be that the resources on public site also be available on the CAC and ako sites. That would allow you to use a media rich public site while having low bandwidth CAC and ako sites.

Good catch, John!

Marc

[Entropy]

This comment is for the CAC version of the site.

First of all, there's a lot of great information there, even for an Air Force puke like me. I do have some constructive criticism, however:

1. I found the layout a bit confusing. The various boxes that attempt to categorize all the files don't do a very good job imo. For example, "professional" briefings and articles seem like useless categories - isn't the "professional" the minimum standard? A clearer categorization scheme would be nicer. You could categorize by type - like interviews, training materials, AAR's and other "what we did" types of stuff, doctrine (which you already have), academic articles, etc. There are, I'm sure, other categories as well. An alternative is categorization by scope - from senior level interest to junior. Again, I'm not an Army or Marine guy, but it seems like it would be nice to be able to direct the junior folks to a specific box on the site and say "that is required reading." Same with SUL's and junior officers, etc.

2. There's a lot of duplication - the same, or essentially the same - file in different boxes, or even the same file in the same box but with slightly different names (for example in the "coin seminar files" there's "Afghanistan COIN December 07 Brief" and "Afghanistan_COIN_Brief_Dec_07" which appear to be exactly the same brief.

3. More description on the files besides the filename. You could implement this either with the html title attribute or a column next to each filename. Another useful addition would be either an information cutoff date for the material, the date it was published (for journal articles, for instance), and/or the date it was added to the site.

4. The search box does not seem to work. The "all sites" option gets me the AKO wall, and the "this site" function does not return any results, even searching for "COIN."

5. For those of us in the lesser services without AKO access, some sort of visual cue to tell us which links are AKO only would be very handy. Alternatively, you could give us all AKO accounts

6. Some kind of differentiation or ability to see information that applies only to a particular conflict or theater. For example, I'm focused on Afghanistan right now and while much of the Iraq-specific information is useful, it would be nice to either have a separate Afghanistan category or some way to get all the info on that, or any other, theater.

That's what I see off the top of my head. Again, I was Navy and am now AF, so if I've exposed my ignorance, please feel free to set me straight!

[Entropy]

BTW, I'd like to thank CAVGUY for hooking me up with Mr. Traynham to get my CAC access problem fixed. Turned out it wasn't me, but some server and DISA problems. I was told to report them whenever they reappear since in the computer world the squeaky wheel gets the grease.