This makes me wonder if he has even noticed it...
- As a matter of fact, you can miss a message if you do not care to
make sure you are viewing the updated page.
- If you go to the last page you can miss it as well when it is a reply
to another but the last!
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -
This is why I far prefer posting in a bulletin board where the
presentation is taken care of. This Google seams to swallow these
messages just like a rubbish-can would. You can look in there like you
would in a waste pile.
It is unfortunate that I am not able to do that myself but I would
suggest somebody should do something to get us a real Forum powered by
PhpBB or something like it. Else, all that is shared here about the AG
will be soon lost for everyone but Google.
Mike, I insist on the need for a solution that won't rely on Google
"generosity".
This is what people do nowadays when they care supporting an active
users community, like I know you do. Users helping each other to get
the most they can from their experience with this demanding device is
far better than any aggressive and costly marketing campaign. This
asset must be appropriate though.
- I don't believe that a bunch of scattered messages, some
individual's pages and blogs are not any good in time.
- A Wiki is a very nice way to store stories about the past but it is
also a clumsy tool.
- Forums, on the other end, talks us about present and future with
smileys, pseudos, signatures and some amount of flaming
Well, I would far prefer to come with solutions rather than just
exposing a task to be done by others. But all I am able to do about it
for the moment is to express the wish and say that I am ready to take
an active part in the solution.
Some ideas about that?
Mike
I have got a positive appreciation on Invision Power Board too.
My son John did this choice for his http://www.casiocalc.org forum with
a perpetual license for 150$ a few years ago. (...now 185).
He is happy with this choice and did not suffer from hackers attack
like the one that has recently wiped the FingerWorks support forum ...
http://forums.fingerworks.com.
These mostly affect those servers with frozen bulletin board systems.
An evolving version won't let back doors opened long enough. Old
versions are far more easy targets!
Soon I am gonna sell mine though - I need the cash.
You had even better with this one reaching 1580$ here:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5870025853
To make this point less off topic, I'll open a new subject on The price
tag.
Granted that relies on My generosity versus googles, lol.
Perhaps if Mike doesn't have the time, he could add an FTP and DB user
to his webserver, and one of us could volounteer time to install a
forum?
Is the majority convinced that this Google Group is inadequate? It seems
very user friendly. I just reply to an email and the reply gets posted
(even with attachments). Does IPB work like that? Is IPB definitely the
way to go? Is there any other reasonable alternative(s) we should evaluate?
What happens to this Google Group if we set up another forum? Will it just
become inactive? Is there a big problem using this Google Group for another
month or so? With regard to not knowing when something gets posted here,
you can set it up to be alerted anytime there is a new post. What other
issues should I consider?
Mike
-----Original Message-----
From: alph...@googlegroups.com [mailto:alph...@googlegroups.com] On
And I agree with your idea of getting through testing and shipping
AlphaGrips first... Hey, I'm still waiting ;-)
The groups.google.com interface is not so good at tracking ongoing,
older messages. If you're reading the group via email, it's really not
a problem.
I strongly favor staying with a public group over a private forum.
Private forums are disconnected information silos, so you're stuck
with the forum search engine (which are always bad) if you're looking
for old information. As is, I have my standalone email search, gmail
search, and google groups search to find stuff. I'm not sure if other
search engines index googlegroups, but I'd be surprised if they
didn't.
Private boards are usually not available via email, which annoys me
because I've got almost all my daily information coming through rss
(80 feeds, 10 of which are planets) and email (19 lists). Adding
another site to check means I won't be checking that site.
Finally, there's the administration. I don't doubt that erk_dog is a
fine sysadmin, but I trust google's availability, security, and
systems administration prowess over his.
To answer the ftp/db security questions: Adding a db user isn't really
a problem. Most servers I know of don't run ftp, so depending on what
ftp implementation you use, that might carry some security risk.
Email notification is good, security and availability as well, but I
also like privacy because another name for it is freedom. Public
transportation has its advantages but many have their own for a reason.
Although this freedom is an illusion -- (put the admin burden here) --
feeling at home is something that matters for most of us.
What I miss here for instance is bbcode that allows for some amount of
formatting and embedding graphics and style is completely ignore too.
Even if the purpose of a message is about sharing some idea, I prefer
having the possibility to make it look better than what we have here...
It may come with the non-beta release, who knows?
In a private forum, admins are in touch with members, Google has all of
us to satisfy, that also means no individuals, just everybody at the
same time... What can that accomplish when it takes only two geeks like
us disagree on everything with enthusiasm ... ;o)
-- Edmund.
--
Edmund C. Ng
nom...@gmail.com
"Old joke about the optimist and the pessimist:
The pessimist says, 'Everything is terrible. It can't get any worse.'
The optimist says, 'Oh, yes it can.'"
But as soon as you put something worth for more than the few people
following the particular thread, the material will soon be swallowed by
the flow.
A forum organization on the other hand is thematic. Space is organized
over topics rather than erratic unrelated streams you can manage only
from their date, their title or the fact they contain some collection
of keywords. Yes Google knows how to search a pile of messages, no
argument here!
Nice to have: Just do not dump Google Group. Let's use it for what it
meant to be, a very quick and easy way to throw something on the table.
When something takes shape, it is always possible to open a new topic
on the forum with a review. We can even drop a few seeds with a link
for Google robots to follow ;-)
The only thing I could suggest is using the rating system honestly.
You can see highly rated posts from the main thread view. Of course,
then you don't see the ratings if you just look at the emails.
If there is more interest (other than just Ivan) in a full bulletin
board, I could set one up on my websever.
--Adrian
Well several people have offered to host a site / forum for AG's lol.
I think a collaborative portal site would be the best thing.
Mike, would you be willing to tell us exactly what you are using for
AG's website?
Perhaps we could form a "board of directors" for the community site, and
then you could give a place for us to put the site.
That way AG still maintains ultimate control over the site, and you
wouldn't have to worry about disputes between the "board" or anything,
because AG could just change the password.
With AG maintaining control of the server space, there won't be any kind
of conflicts based on, "well the site's on my server" etc etc....
I think the google group serves a good enough purpose, but I think we
need a site to collect FAQ, How Tos... key mappings... etc.... and
possibly even a forum.
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-----Original Message-----
From: alph...@googlegroups.com [mailto:alph...@googlegroups.com] On
Behalf Of Matt Westfall
Sent: Sunday, April 09, 2006 12:46 PM
To: alph...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: About messaging on Google Group
sounds like a plan bossman ;)
I look forward to having my fullfillment filled tomorrow by the way ;)
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