We’ve been working on a refresh of our main front page and I wanted to get your take on it before we make any final decisions. As developers who actually build with Vaadin, your perspective matters more than any marketing theory.
First impression - Does it quickly communicate what Vaadin is and why you’d use it? Or do we need to get to the point faster?
Code examples - Are they helpful or just noise? Do they show real-world enough scenarios?
Technical accuracy - Does anything feel dumbed down or off-base from your actual experience building with Vaadin?
What’s missing - If you were evaluating Vaadin for a project, what information would you expect to see on the frontpage that isn’t there?
Signal vs. noise - Too much marketing fluff? Not enough substance? Let me know if anything makes you roll your eyes.
Don’t worry about being diplomatic - I’d rather hear “this completely misses the mark” now than after we launch it. We’re developers too, we can handle direct feedback.
Also, if you have 30 seconds, it’d help to know: how long have you been using Vaadin, and what do you mainly build with it? Just for context on where feedback is coming from.
I’m getting old… I was exposed to Vaadin 15 years ago… building applications for internal usage, government applications available in intranets and end-users exposed applications over the internet.
My first impression would be, I’m missing a catchy slogan like “Gets shit done” - that’s exactly why we use Vaadin. It gets shit done quickly, secure and good-looking while costing us no fortune.
I would show a single code example and if applicable, swap between “how it looks” and “how to code” like within the docs
3/5)
Integrated binding, validation, theming, layout, and responsive behavior
You might wanna replace theming with customizable styling… the wording theme is deprecated with 25+ - everything is a style (looking back at Rolf’s presentation)
Real-time by default
While technically true… this feels really like marketing fluff
Visual Editing In Dev Mode
That requires a license, right? Not sure if this already counts as false advertising if no money icon is present… but I’m no legal guy…
might be a bit stupid… most of the times I get questions like “can Vaadin be used with X” where X is… REST, GraphQL or any other Data Service… and the answer is always YES, Vaadin does not care how you feed data into it. Everything you can connect via Java can be integrated as data provider or consumer.
I’m with Simon, Grid the must have example. Nothing beats the Grid in business application. (Forms too… but that might be a bit too much code)
The current selection of components to “highlight” feels weird - numberfield on the front page? That’s a huge downgrade compared to the all-mighty combo box (just as example… icons and other as well…)
About Simon’s comment with the logos: Spring should still apply (if I remember correctly) - Vaadin (Flow) should still work on plain-old Spring without Boot. But I’m also missing a Java Logo :)
I have been using Vaadin on and off for the last 20 years, keep returning to it for some reason ;-) Always gov related, intranet as well as public facing.
Some feedback:
Love the live coding example, but it could be more catchy than just a card. Perhaps an AppLayout where you add nav entries, nice looking components (grid, map, forms) in the content area etc
CTRL-F “AI” did not return any results
Visually the current frontpage feels better structured and has nicer layout, i am not sure what the new layout improves upon except for the live coding example.
1 → good first impression overall
2 → can be more catchy
3 → on target
4 → good
5 → Saying there’s 2000+ add-ons is not realistic nor appealing to newcomers. 200 working and properly maintained add-ons would already be fantastic.
Dear Roman,
I am working with Vaadin over 5 years now and created software with V8, V14 and V20+ and ongoing. While helping with a client for our ERP system for my employer, I created also some (long forgotten) hobby projects. Currently we are working on an internal AI platform. I’ve read the docs so often, that I only have to type in docs into chrome and it opens the latest.
As a side hustle, I am creating some website in Vue.js.
Let’s get to the direct feedback. This were my thoughts on the first sight:
The buttons are having uppercase text, what is consistent in this page, but not other Vaadin pages (which also will be refreshed?).
Secondary texts does not always have the same grey color and size (17px and 19px), I would take the brighter color. It feels too dark/hard to read on the first couple of sections.
Sections (caption and subtext) are not aligned the same, some are centered and some are left. I personally like it centered. See on smaller browser width like below 800px.
I like the live code section at the top, but it feels a bit slow.
The section “The web framework for Java developers” feels empty on the left side while having a lot of text is on the right.
The component overview does not feel alive and on first sight, does not show that the components can be used. Also, maybe you can find a balance between the card_content height and its components, Dialog and Date Picker are looking a bit empty. When looking at this section I would increase the border-color on the cards and also on all the buttons on this page.
“More than a framework” section: I like it and would also use such icons in the “The web framework for Java developers” section.
In general it has a good content to “call to cation” ratio.
I now that this page is not final and maybe some point are maybe already on a todo list.
Coming to your other points,
The texts feel more focused and less marketing fluff, but the current page does present it better.
I would love to see the “Optimize Java Web App Development with Built-in UI Components” section from the current page
I have been doing UI (Swing, J2ME(!), Android, iOs, GWT) for the last 25 years. Also my DB skills suck.
For for some reason, I never liked html/css/js.
I got attracted to Vaadin a couple of years ago, because I realised, I could do full stack in pure Java! Right now I am working on building a custom CRM+ERP.
First impression
The evolving code is distracting. Before I could read the One framework from… part, suddenly the code started to appear and I had to follow it, thinking I might miss out something important. (I noticed the “Reload code” button much later). Maybe make it the first section with some title like “Rich UI with just a few lines” or “As simple as A B C”?
The shipment media gives a wrong impression of a live tracker map with a few lines of code. Maybe switch to a product image?
The “See Components” gave an impression it’s already selected, and if I scroll down I expected to see the component gallery immediately. This visual confusion is probably due to the adjacent “Browse Docs” button. Maybe present them differently?
The See Components and Browse Docs open in the same window. Maybe default it to new tab?
Which Docs? Developer? API? Maybe provide a concise name?
PWA finds mention only once. In today’s mobile world, that could be a big attraction: Write once, use on web and mobile too! Maybe make it more prominent?
See Components and Browse Docs is repeated down the page again, just above the component preview. The Browse Docs there looks odd. Also maybe rename See Components to See All Components or Component Gallery?
Maybe addon directory deserves a special mention along with components?
Maybe “Forum” deserves a more prominent mention on this page? Forums are a lifeline for every new developer.
The pic of the gentlemen looks like they are attending some meeting which could have been an email. Maybe a more enthusiastic pic?
So my question is how to develop exactly like the Card animation? Code on the left, clean live visual on the right? I’m sure it can be done with IDE plus browser views, but not as clean as the animation? New people may assume the animation is how Vaadin development works.
I believe changes are necessary. What you propose is better than the grid currently used as an example on the main page.
The only thing I would immediately add as an important feature is the showcase of different design options for the finished component. And text, which tells that yo can simplify styling and visual customization.
Most developers are afraid that customization will be difficult and that the entire Vadin is limited to only a standard set of components.
Keep 'em coming 
