On 11/29/2011 8:36 AM, Johannes Totz wrote:
PHP forum? Noooooooooooooooooo!!!!!1 If D had a web-based forum only I would not bother reading it or ever coming back to it. I would not have bothered trying to learn any D. I like how these "ancient" newsgroups sort and organise individual messages. I get a nice threaded view, I can see what I've read already, who replied to what. Very efficient.
Conversely, there are people who see a newsgroup and run away screaming. There have been several projects I've looked into over the years and where I didn't get involved with the community precisely because they had a newsgroup and not a forum.
Consider this. I've been using web-based mail for years, so had no mail/newsgroup client installed. Why would I want to install one just for one little project? With a forum, I don't have to install anything. I've been using them for years, am quite used to them, and think the newsgroup interface is antiquated. I hated it even back in 1995 when it was all we had. Forums are in my comfort zone.
Obviously, I made an exception for D because I think it rocks. I went and downloaded Thunderbird. To date, the D newsgroups are all I use it for. But I wonder how many people didn't make an exception? Obviously, we can't please everyone. And I think common sense dictates that in a newsgroup, we will see more people who prefer newsgroups. But I really believe that if we had a proper forum, we'd have a great many more users in the community (for better or worse).
Anyway, this horse has been beat to death more than once here.
Forum? barf... I hate having to sign up here and register there. I opportunistically want to reply to messages. All this clutter around it, avatars, annoying formatting. Please, pretty please, no. A nice web-based interface to the newsgroup? Yeah could do (I wouldn't use it though).
