Dear Linux Magazine Reader,
If you occasionally surf to our online home, you may have already noticed some big changes. We rolled out a new website a few weeks ago, and we're all very excited about it. We've been talking about it for years. I have personally responded to about a hundred email messages on the topic, and I was only involved with one part of the big picture.
It was interesting to see up close how expanding technology can lead to expanding expectations. The first time I participated in a web-related project, we were happy to hack around typing tags in manually with emacs. Later we were overjoyed to witness the dawn of the WYSIWYG era and the arrival of a few simple layout tools.
Now the rise of content-management systems brings a whole new flexibility, which requires a whole new approach. Since each article is not just text but is more like a record in a database, the possibilities for building new features are nearly endless - especially if you are ready to do a little coding. In fact, the opportunities for innovation are limited only by the time available for writing code, troubleshooting code, and emailing each other about what to do next.
The enhanced functionality leads to a bigger vision, which means that, despite the progress, we are still in a world where no project is ever finished before the deadline. In the best case, though, the rising expectations lead to better, more elegant, and more useful web creations, and that's what we've achieved in this case. Thanks to all the team members who participated.
If you are a regular visitor, you may already know that one of the most interesting features of our website is the archive. We are proud of the size and scope of our archive - the collection of past articles we make available to readers online. On the old site, you could call up articles by word search. On the new site, we wanted to make the archive browsable as well as searchable. As you'll see, you can choose a topic in the navigation bar and browse through all the articles associated with that topic.
You'll also discover that we have a newfound interest in news. Rather than just linking to the same RSS feeds everyone else is using, we are actually out there searching for our own stories and writing our own reports. Our international talent pool makes such things easier than it is for many of our competitors, and we hope to deliver an international viewpoint that is different from what you'll find elsewhere.
Watch the site for changes. We welcome you to both our front doors: http://www.linux-magazine.com and http://www.linuxpromagazine.com. In the coming months, we hope to introduce more new features, such as web-only blogs, reviews, and technical articles.
Be sure to let us know what you think - and what you'd like to see in the future. Send your comments to letters@linux-magazine.com.