Silverlight is an upcoming technology, and in fact I would prefer to work in an enviroment that I'm more comfortable in, but the fact of the matter is that Sliverlight isn't an option.

The penetration rate of Sliverlight is much lower than flash. For Maplesoft.com, only 30% of visitors have Silverlight installed compared to over 90% for Flash. Also, Silverlight is not available on Linux, you have to use the 3rd party project, Moonlight to get Sliverlight working on Linux.

Also, Flash is definitely not going away in the next 10 years. So many huge websites rely on Flash including YouTube, CNN, and Facebook. Even Microsoft themselves still use Flash extensively on their websites.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 Flash would n't be a requirement. We would be using Flash to create an editor that supports Copy/Paste from Maple, something that isn't possible with HTML and JavaScript. We would still support a simple editor that doesn't require flash.

Also Flash works fine on most Netbooks.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 Good idea, we'll likely add the ability to split threads into new topics in the future as well.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 We do plan to eventually allow high-ranked users to edit other people's posts. The idea is that they can help turn a question from helping one person out, into one that will be a useful reference for the future. And yes, you will be able to edit your posts even after someone else has replied.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

The main idea with moving to the Question and Answer format is to help keep the threads on Primes in a format that is easily digestible by new or light Primes users.

We want people to be able to search for a question they have, and see the answer to that question clearly marked below it. The more structured format will allow us to do this. You talk about how the gems of MaplePrimes are often buried deep into a thread, this is the specific problem we with to avoid. We want the answer to bubble up to the top, and be discoverable without looking.

The new format will certainly change the shape of discussions on Primes, but we hope it will be for the better. In the case where one question raises another question, I hope that you will start a new thread with that question. And there won't be any restrictions from answering your own question.

To get an idea of how the new Primes will work, I strongly recommend browsing Stack Overflow. Most of the questions their have rich discussions beneath them, while still having it easy to find the answer to the problem right away.

I also recommend you read the Stack Overflow FAQ, as MaplePrimes will be following a very similar format to that site.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

We definitely see the value of being able to copy and paste directly from Maple into Primes. Unfortunately, there isn't a way to support the clipboard in plain HTML and JavaScript. Within the browser, we only have access to the plain text data in the clipboard which is the same as you would get if you pasted straight from Maple into a text editor.

Now, an idea we have for the new site is to develop a new text editor in Flash. Flash would allow us to build a much more powerful editor that would avoid a number of the limitations of the current editor. It also would enable much richer Copy/Paste between Maple and Primes. We would leave a basic HTML & JavaScript editor available for those who don't have Flash installed, but we would defiintely encourage the use of the new editor.

What do you think of using Flash for the Primes text editor? Also I have created a poll asking if Flash is available on your browser. Please vote.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 These all work now as well.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

Since we are now using Google for search, we no longer have the issue with ignored words. And a search for "use" now brings up ?use. 

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 We plan to update the online help pages throughout the year as new versions of the pages become available.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 Responding to each bullet

• The search now works like Maple where if a search directly matches an iterm it shows the page directly. It still gives you the option to see the full search results
• This will be coming
• This is already there, view the source of any help page with sections and search for "a name"
• I can see how this would be useful, but it is very tricky to implement in HTML. We're working on finding a way to do it.
• Also tricky, but possible. We'll look into it.
• The site is now much faster than it was when it first launched.
• The category pages now show better summaries for each page. The titles are still often the uglier title such as "student/plot_options", but this is because that is the internal title for the page in Maple. What is displayed in the Table of Contents is different for each category. Notice how there are a number of pages titled, "Overview" in the Table of Contents. Obviously, they all need to have unique names, so for example the "Overview" under "What's New", is actually titled, "updates/v13"

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

 The search now directly takes you to ?numtheory[kronecker], and if you view all the search results, you now get 6 pages of results.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

We just pubished a new update to the online help that greately improves the search functionality. The new search is powered by our in-house Google mini. 

Also, if a search term exactly matches a help pages, youa re now taken directly to the relevant help page, and you are given a link to show the rest of the search results.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

In the new version of the site, we should get the ability to save any type of content as a draft.

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft

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William Spaetzel
MaplePrimes Administrator
Software Developer, Maplesoft