Add demo site

[SuperQ]

Add a new page for describing and linking to the new demo site.

Signed-off-by: Ben Kochie superq@gmail.com

[brian-brazil]

Why are we adding a new html page, rather than mentioning this in existing docs?

[SuperQ]

@brian-brazil Because I want it promoted at the top bar. We're also planning to add additional demos based on K8s deployment.

[brian-brazil]

I'm not sure this meets the bar to be up top, it's already got a fair few links. HTML pages also have additional maintenance costs which standard documentation does not, so we should try to avoid them.

This would seem better as a page under Overview.

[RichiH]

While true, demos are special and distinct by nature, having its own top-level navigation element seems prudent.

[juliusv]

So my two cents on the demo link at the top: as so often, I'm split :) This definitely makes sense for products where a demo really helps give completely new people a quick overview over how things work (in the sense of "a picture is worth a thousand words"). But a Prometheus demo by its nature doesn't really do that. I think most completely new users looking at that demo site wouldn't really know what to do with it, or what it means. Unless (maybe!) we really flesh it out with a lot of explanatory text and make sure they see Grafana first, etc. Absent of that I'm also tending more towards having it somewhere in the normal docs, but easily findable in there (like a "Demo" page under the "Introduction" section).

[paulfantom]

Unless (maybe!) we really flesh it out with a lot of explanatory text and make sure they see Grafana first, etc.

That's exactly why it doesn't point directly to prometheus instance, but to a portal site, where we can write explanatory texts etc.

Additionally, I am currently working on incorporating monitoring mixins to deploy them alongside basic prometheus stack. I think this way demo site will give a quick overview on how things should work.

[juliusv]

That's exactly why it doesn't point directly to prometheus instance, but to a portal site, where we can write explanatory texts etc.

Additionally, I am currently working on incorporating monitoring mixins to deploy them alongside basic prometheus stack. I think this way demo site will give a quick overview on how things should work.

That would be great actually. But then I think we should hold off on adding a new top-level menu link until the demo site is really understandable for a newbie (in the purpose of the individual elements, getting a quick feel of things, etc.). Otherwise I can see a million new people clicking the link and not knowing what to do with it at all, and being somewhat disappointed... and users who already know Prometheus are not the ones who need the easily-findable demo link.

[paulfantom]

I can happily report that node-mixins and prometheus-mixins are deployed to demo-site. This means all things regarding deployment are now complete:

• prometheus stack is deployed in automated fashion
• mixins are auto-generated from master branches and deployed every day
• site was nuked and restored to check for reproducibility

As for adding texts/explanations/etc to portal site - I have no clue what to add nor I am in a position to decide on it. Here is the file with the current site: https://github.com/prometheus/demo-site/blob/master/playbooks/files/index.html. We can either:

1. add explanations there
2. add explanations here (in docs repo) and keep that file as a portal for easy DNS names management
3. add explanations here (in docs repo) and remove portal site.

[grobie]

I wouldn't add the demo site to the top menu either, as it's already rather crammed, but it might be a good addition for a button on our main page next to "Get Started" and "Download". Adding a button there linking to the portal sight might be all what's necessary here? But https://demo.do.prometheus.io/ doesn't load for me.

How do you want to proceed here @paulfantom @SuperQ?

[jan--f]

Hello from the bug scrub!
Seems like we still don't mention the demo page at all on the homepage. Seems like a missed opportunity. @SuperQ any interest in still pursuing this?