[Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
Moved to haskell-cafe from haskell-general. On 2006-09-20, Niklas Broberg <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 9/20/06, Aaron Denney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> And I disagree with you. Web forums are usenet reinvented poorly. >> It's impossible to keep track of what's new, threading is either poor or >> nonexistent. Mailing lists with searchable archives work well. gmane >> provides a nice usenet interface to mailing lists. > > I don't recognize the forums I frequent in your description at all. I > have absolutely no problem keeping up with what's new. In fact I find > it a lot easier since many of the topics take place in subforums that > I know don't interest me, so I don't even need to go there to check. And half of the time messages are miscategorized, because conversations are miscategorized, so I do need to go check. > With this mailing list, I have to manually "mark as read" about 2/3 of > all incoming mails because they don't (from the title) interest me, > and I have to read a few that don't interest me because I couldn't > tell from the title. Where as an entire page of messages under a particular "thread" (it's not a thread, because they almost never have the messages showing the exact post they're responding to, just the general list of messages in this topic.) Then I need to go locate the tiny link that gets me to the next page. They're nearly unuseable. > Threading also works as well as could be expected, better than > threading in gmail for instance, so I don't see the problem here > either. That has never been my experience. Threads branch annd mutate and drift. And this is a good thing. The rigid categorizations can't handle this, whereas I can easily ignore entire threads and subthreads with a client designed for it. >> > It's all there, all the time. >> >> Yes, that's part of the problem. > > How is that? You mean because all the old stuff gets in the way of the > new? Then you're just using a bad forum software that can't properly > point out the new stuff for you. I agree that not all forums are good, > but there are definitely those that are. Exactly. but the problem with forums is that everynone must use the same forum software because it's sitting on a website. With usenet or mailing lists, everyone gets their own software that provides the features they want, with the interface they want. >> > It is also easy to create sub-groups/forums for specific projects, >> >> This is the one semi-useful thing. Of course, what you end up with is >> another not-so-useful forum. > > This is probably the one most useful thing yes. I wouldn't call it > semi-useful though. Just remember all the responses that the HCAR gets > each year of the form "wow how many cool projects are out there that I > had no clue existed". What if all (or many of) those projects were > actually there, on the forums, where everyone knew where to look? Forums are another place to look, instead of on the wiki, on the mailing lists, etc. It fragments the community. > And your last sentence, I just don't understand. "not-so-useful" just > because it's a forum, or did you mean somethine else as well? Yes, because it's a forum. Almost any feature can be implemented in a web-forum. And many will, but almost none will be done well, because (a) it's hard to get something that will please everyone and it has to please everyone because everyone must use the same software (b) The experience isn't there. Mail & usenet software has been worked on for over 25 years. It works. Your mail client sucks? Get a new one. There are lots, and one should surely work for you. I don't have the option of using different web-forum software when something about it annoys the hell out of me. The biggest thing I see for them is web accessibility. But we already have that. We have archives. We have gmane. Tons of other gatewaying software exist, and could be easily set up, because mailing lists are designed to be used by multiple clients. Web forums are only "pull". I have to go check each individual one, on a semi-regular basis. Yes, there is RSS. It's another hacky workaround for something that mail inherently has. Mailiing lists can be either pull or push. I can dump the list mail in my inbox and get it regularly, or segregate it out to another mailbox, or several mailboxes, or whatever. -- Aaron Denney -><- ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
On 9/21/06, Misha Aizatulin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: My concern about introducing a web forum would be that it is yet another place I have to search every time I need information (besides the haskell report, compiler docs and tracker, 2 wikis and the mailing lists :) That probably speaks to an effort for better organization of the information rather than banning a way to create more. So setting up a web forum would only be good if it can do something a mailing list cannot do. Well there's one thing that a web forum can do that a mailing list can never do, which is provide a mechanism for those who like web forums better than mailing lists. How important that is really depends on how many people would rather use a web forum than a mailing list. Many of the responses so far have decried web forums in preference to mailing lists, but this is, after all, a mailing list. - searchability. I wouldn't agree - I can download the whole contents of a mailing list from gmane and search it in my mail client - goes way faster than in a forum. A similar mechanism could be implemented for a web forum. The data is just sitting in a database, after all. An format for easy downloading and searching would probably not be difficult. I personally don't care either way. I'm happy with the mailing list. But I know of many people that do prefer web forums, and they seem to be perceived as a lower barrier to entry, even if that isn't actually true. I would probably read both if both existed. Kurt ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
On 21/09/06, Misha Aizatulin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: My concern about introducing a web forum would be that it is yet another place I have to search every time I need information (besides the haskell report, compiler docs and tracker, 2 wikis and the mailing lists :) So let's have a single unified search box. This is what was done on wordpress.org -- a single glorified interface searched the wiki, support forums and bug tracker. Everything's currently hosted by the umbrella domain name haskell.org, so all the information's at least theoretically in the same place, so getting the various tools interoperating with one another shouldn't be impossible. +1 for the introduction of forums. -- -David House, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
Kurt Hutchinson wrote: > Let those interested in a web forum set one > up and run it. Those interested in email can ignore the web forum. My concern about introducing a web forum would be that it is yet another place I have to search every time I need information (besides the haskell report, compiler docs and tracker, 2 wikis and the mailing lists :) So setting up a web forum would only be good if it can do something a mailing list cannot do. Following things were mentioned before: - ease of starting new topics. Maybe. I personally end up searching through all topics in forums anyway, because people often tend to post in a "wrong" topic :) Christian Neumann before mentioned that mailman might support topics as well. Also IMHO the current division of mailing lists (general, café, libraries, etc.) is exactly right for organizing and separating information. - searchability. I wouldn't agree - I can download the whole contents of a mailing list from gmane and search it in my mail client - goes way faster than in a forum. - ease of access. But preventing spam would probably require subscription just as for a mailing list. Any more advantages of a forum? Cheers, Misha ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
Hallo, On 9/21/06, Bill Wood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: I have only recently started accessing some web fora, but I've noticed that some of those "powered by phpBB" are vulnerable to spamming, whereas the news groups seem to be less so. For example, the "python-forum" has nearly lost it's "General" forum to spammers. Maybe the experts know better engines, better ways to set up a forum, or better ways to administer them after they're up, but it is a concern. I only hope this mailing list will continue. I can't stand the slowness/spams/avatar/size of web fora. -- -alex http://www.ventonegro.org/ ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
I have only recently started accessing some web fora, but I've noticed that some of those "powered by phpBB" are vulnerable to spamming, whereas the news groups seem to be less so. For example, the "python-forum" has nearly lost it's "General" forum to spammers. Maybe the experts know better engines, better ways to set up a forum, or better ways to administer them after they're up, but it is a concern. -- Bill Wood ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
On 9/21/06, Gour <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: So, why the two cannot co-exist and let users decide which one to use? Gentoo community is nice example of it. I was just about to ask the same thing. Clearly, some prefer email and some prefer web forums. This is undoubtably true of new Haskell users with questions, as well. Let those interested in a web forum set one up and run it. Those interested in email can ignore the web forum. The Perl community has a similar setup with the popular Perlmonks web forum, and their hundreds of mailing lists. There are many users who read and post on both, and many who do not. I believe Bulat was just trying to find out if anyone else would like to help set one up, not suggesting that it replace the mailing lists. Kurt ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
On Thu, 2006-09-21 at 04:55 -0400, Albert Lai wrote: > As requested, I continue here the thread on the proposal for a web forum. > > You will soon enough find out what I think of web forums. [snip] I don't understand one thing: it looks like web-forums should exclude mailing lists and vice versa, but Bulat just wrote: "...we need now to create web forum." ?? So, why the two cannot co-exist and let users decide which one to use? Gentoo community is nice example of it. Sincerely, Gour signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part ___ Haskell-Cafe mailing list Haskell-Cafe@haskell.org http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/haskell-cafe
[Haskell-cafe] Re: Haskell web forum
As requested, I continue here the thread on the proposal for a web forum. You will soon enough find out what I think of web forums. Let me first show you what this mailing list looks like to me using software of my choice: ! [ 192: Mark Carroll] [Haskell-cafe] Card trick ! [ 37: Thomas Conway ] Re: [Haskell-cafe] How can we detect and fix E [ 19: Albert Lai ] Re: [Haskell-cafe] Either e Monad E [ 19: Deokhwan Kim] [ 62: Bas van Dijk] E [ 47: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [Haskell-cafe] Re: Optimization problem [ 51: Ross Paterson ] E [ 42: Conor McBride ] [ 56: Robert Dockins ] [ 42: Conor McBride ] [ 61: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [Haskell-cafe] Re: Optimization prob [ 14: Ross Paterson ] [ 154: Jan-Willem Maessen ] Re: [Haskell-cafe] Traversing a graph in STM [ 52: Josef Svenningsson ] [ 18: Bulat Ziganshin ] Re[2]: [Haskell-cafe] Traversing a graph [ 26: Sebastian Sylvan] [ 22: Ashley Yakeley ] [Haskell-cafe] Re: Wiki contact An elaboration of the cool features I have always enjoyed is in order: On browsing threads, both inter-thread jumps and intra-thread navigation, the screenshot speaks for itself. (If for any perverted reason I want the messages listed chronologically rather than well-organized, the software can do it too.) The messages marked with "E" are messages I have just read. With this mark, they will not show up next time I browse this mailing list again. Take note that I can mark and unmark any subset of messages, unlike certain people's linear-time idea that one single timestamp distinguishes "already read" from "new" across the board. (I have always heard that non-linear thinking is superior to linear thinking. I think I believe it for at least this application.) (Is this an example of what is meant when someone said that a web forum requires "less technical knowledge", i.e., programmers on a web forum will not need to know about subsets?) (Speaking of which, is the thread-browsing part also an example, i.e., programmers on a web forum will not need to know about trees and forests?) Though the marked messages will not show up next time, they are not thrown away yet. They are kept on my disk for quite a while. (I get to set how many days they stay.) The software offers several ways to show them, but I think the most useful one is this. Suppose I look at apfelmus's message on "Optimization problem" (two are shown, I'm referring to the first one), and wonder, "gee, what is it replying to?" To find out, I position myself to that message, then press a button, then the software will show the desired parent message. In fact, the updated screen looks like this (I just include the thread in question): E [ 18: Ross Paterson ] Re: [Haskell-cafe] Re: Optimization problem E [ 47: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [ 51: Ross Paterson ] E [ 42: Conor McBride ] [ 56: Robert Dockins ] [ 42: Conor McBride ] [ 61: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [Haskell-cafe] Re: Optimizatio [ 14: Ross Paterson ] So even if apfelmus's message quotes nothing from Ross's, I can still find out, provided it is recently enough to be still on my disk. Take note that, on a linear-thinking web forum, there could be any number of intervening messages in the same thread between Ross's and apfelmus's, and even though it is true that Ross's is immortalized in the database of the forum, the real question is how to fish for it. (ObRant again about how web forums are "friendly" to "programmers" who have no clue about trees.) Here is a feature unrelated to threading, and in fact it is much more fundamental and pervasive (since almost all email software, not just mine, provides this), and in fact it has much to do with pervasive computing too. Here in Canada, in cafes one can get wireless Internet access, but it has to be paid by the minutes. So suppose I want to visit haskell-cafe when I visit a Starbucks cafe, and there are 30 messages I want to read, and I can read them at the rate of half a minute per message. If haskell-cafe were on a web forum, I would end up keeping my wireless connection for 15 minutes. (Could I disconnect and reconnect between messages? First of all that's really a pain. Secondly, let's say I do that, the billing is still such that I connect for 2 seconds and I'm still charged for 1 minute.) But since haskell-cafe is on a mailing list, I can just connect for a few seconds to download the messages, then disconnect and read offline; I'm charged for at most 1 minute. (Alternatively but equivalently, suppose I want to read haskell-cafe while riding subway - underground trains. Here in Toronto the subway doesn't provide wireless Internet access yet, and probably won't for another decade. If
