Author: Alexis Van Espen.
The project is about Esperanto.
In a nutshell, Esperanto is a language constructed in the 19th century. Because of its artificial nature, it's often disregarded as "not a real language", "not suited for real communication"... Hence, "not worth learning". Nothing could be farther from the truth. The project is to build a simple website to briefly introduce what Esperanto is, and why and how to learn it.
I will have achieved my goal is at least two members of the jury desire to know more about Esperanto.
Here is an outline of the project's high level goals. This is "the problem", what we need to solve.
- Make Esperanto better known.
- Dismiss common myths about this language.
- Bring more people to consider learning Esperanto.
- Demonstrate my knowledge and commitment in this field.
- Connect to other language lovers around the world, possibly opening opportunities for collaboration as a developer.
The site targets people interested in lifelong learning, specifically language learning. Based on my own experience, the age typically ranges from 25 to 65 years old. They spend a lot of time on the web, consuming online courses on learning platforms. Generally, this audience is open to change and feels empowered about their own life.
The audience may be divided in two broad groups:
- People who do not know anything about Esperanto. I want to give them a flavour of the language.
- People who already know about Esperanto. I may want to connect with them, possibly as a developer.
The problem can be solved through the implementation of features. They constitute "a possible solution".
Arguably, the problem could be solved with a movie, a play, a book... These solutions should be kept in mind. For this milestone project, however, I obviously want to build a website. This makes perfect sense: as we said, the target audience spends a lot of time on the web.
Which features could we include in this release?
| Id | Feature | Importance (I) | Feasibility (F) | Score (I * F) | Comment | Include in the milestone project? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Make a version of the website in English. | 5 | 5 | 25 | As explained above, I do not expect every visitor to read Esperanto. English is an international language, which makes the site accessible to a wide proportion of the intended audience. Furthermore, building the website in English will make it much easier for the jury to review. | Yes |
| 2 | Share some contact details. | 5 | 5 | 25 | Easy and necessary to allow for potential cooperations. | Yes |
| 3 | Introduce what Esperanto is in the first place. | 5 | 4 | 20 | Briefly lay out the history of the language. Share relevant facts and numbers about Esperanto speakers, Wikipedia, newspapers... The message is: "This is a living language!" | Yes |
| 4 | Give people a few reasons why this language is useful and enjoyable. | 5 | 4 | 20 | Explain the basics of the grammar, let people feel how logical and regular it is. Demonstrate how vocabulary sounds familiar. With an example, show "correlatives" at work. This part is all about showing, demonstrating, giving examples. | Yes |
| 5 | Share some pointers about how and where people can start learning Esperanto. | 5 | 4 | 20 | Popular resources include Lernu.net, iKurso and Duolingo. The requirement would be met with only these three, knowing that more are to come. | Yes |
| 6 | Share a short personal bio. | 4 | 5 | 20 | Slightly less essential than contact details, and what to share precisely requires some thinking. In any case, potential partners may be more inclined to get in touch with somebody they know something about, rather than a complete stranger. | Yes |
| 7 | Make a version of the website in French. | 4 | 4 | 16 | French is my native tongue, and widely studied across the globe. Since I live in Belgium, potential cooperations would be more likely to happen in Belgium or France: this makes a French version of the website relevant. Relevant... But not necessary: a great deal of the target audience is expected to speak English anyway. Furthermore, a translation represents a serious workload. Finally, it doesn't contribute anything to the milestone project. | No |
| 8 | Embed the Esperanto hymn from YouTube. | 2 | 5 | 10 | The Esperanto hymn is easy to find on YouTube or other websites. Why add it here? It's easy to embed a video, but will it bring any added value? The main argument is that it brings some life to the website: a language needs to be heard! But if the video is removed from YouTube, it leaves a gray ugly broken space on the website... Very unprofessional feeling. | No |
| 9 | Make a version of the website in Esperanto. | 5 | 2 | 10 | How could a website showcasing Esperanto not be available in this very language? A subgroup of the audience would be Esperanto lovers -potential partners-. They would expect to see some level of proficiency. The importance is high, but I still have a lot to learn before I can actually translate a website in Esperanto. | No |
| 10 | Make a list of online resources related to Esperanto (articles, books, music, etc.). | 3 | 3 | 9 | The website could act as a hub to a wide range of material. But the basic requirement can be met with feature 5. Going further requires to dedicate time to making an inventory. This involves a significant amount of work, with no benefit for the milestone project. | No |
| 11 | Write a short review for each online resource. | 3 | 2 | 6 | Visitors can browse the web by themselves. Making an inventory of online resources only makes sense if I comment on each one. Doing so demands plenty of work. In future releases, each review may be included as a separate requirement. | No |
| 12 | Record a short video of myself speaking Esperanto (with English subtitles). | 3 | 2 | 6 | This feature addresses the arguments against feature 8. If I record a video myself, the link would never break; it would allow visitors to enjoy the music of the language while demonstrating my proficiency to potential partners. For now, I consider it a nice to have. | No |
| 13 | Make a list of offline resources related to Esperanto (clubs, schools, etc.). | 2 | 2 | 4 | Recent research suggests life exists outside internet. For Esperanto, there are schools, conversation clubs, conferences, workshops... This is hardly relevant for a website with a broad, international, audience. As my knowledge builds up, as I meet other language lovers around the globe, sharing insights about offline resources could be interesting. | No |
| 14 | Develop an online learning tool. | 3 | 1 | 3 | It didn't escape my attention that the material covered in subsequent modules -Javascript, Python, and so forth- could be put to good use to develop an online learning tool. At present, I wouldn't be able to do it. Additionally, such a tool needs careful planning. There is no point in replicating what already exists; and excellent online courses do exist for Esperanto. | No |
| 15 | Write a short review for each offline resource. | 2 | 1 | 2 | This is the counterpart to feature 13. Listing resources is useless; people can google keywords as well as I can. Only a review makes the link valuable. But this implies taking part in the offline event at hand. I keep this in mind for future releases. | No |
For this milestone project, the scope will include all features with a score of 20 or above. Together, they represent a "MVP" (minimum viable product): a website that addresses the core problem in a simple way. The deliverable will be open to review, changes and improvements for the next releases.
At this point, I am no big fan of Bootstrap. Although I clearly see its power for complex projects, I think it's overkill for a simple website. To some extent, it's a matter of taste and habit. The point is, how could I develop a responsive website without Bootstrap? A search on LinkedIn Learning led me to Clarissa Peterson's Responsive Layout course, released on 24th October 2018. I certainly didn't lazily copy/paste code from this course, but wish to thank the instructor for her interesting explanations.
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