Consider discourse instead of GG

[ILYA]

Hello,

I know that there is a parallel discussion thread is ongoing about GG.
However it was mentioned there that alternative solutions are off topic. I do believe that there are better alternatives. One of which is discourse (but there are others). One example of a forum powered by discourse is https://forums.foundationdb.org. Discourse has tagging support which would allow us to find information easier. The software itself is open source and has API to access it programmatically. The discourse.org offers free service for open source projects. In comparison to GG we can backup the forums data and restore it on different hosting if we decide to leave.

Best regards,
iilyak
--
Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.

[Cd.K]

Look at this feature:

Robust GitHub integration

Enable 2-way integration with our Discourse Code Review plugin and start having more in-depth development discussions. You can automatically create new topics for new commits, and replies in Discourse are mirrored back to GitHub. Mark commits for follow-up, assign reviews, and more! For a closer look, check out how the Discourse team uses it on review.discourse.org.

(Discourse Integrations)

And there are more interesting features, even a language cat!

[coda coder]

+1

Discourse is way waaaaay better than GG.

[@TiddlyTweeter]

ILYA wrote:

... I do believe that there are better alternatives. One of which is discourse 

There is NO doubt WHATSOEVER that other fora are better than GG. 

The issue would be TRANSITION. The problem is HOW would you move such a large group that have both web users and email users and a large archive to a better forum?

BUT maybe you only thinking to use Discourse for specialist discussions? Yes?

The problem with that is that over last couple of years there have already been attempts to do that on Reddit, Stack Exchange and Yammer. 

They ALL failed from lack of numbers.

Its a more difficult issue than it first looks like IMO.

I would love to see a better forum but the history here has an enormous weight against change.

Just commenting (I may be wrong!)

TT

[coda coder]

On Tuesday, October 1, 2019 at 2:47:18 PM UTC-5, @TiddlyTweeter wrote:

The issue would be TRANSITION. The problem is HOW would you move such a large group that have both web users and email users and a large archive to a better forum?

 

Its a more difficult issue than it first looks like IMO.

 

It can be done.

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/julia-users/Ov1J6MOVly0

https://opendatakit.org/2017/06/important-moving-from-google-groups-to-discourse-on-friday/

https://developers.bloomreach.com/blog/2018/moving-the-forum-from-google-groups-to-discourse.html

Others projects using it:

https://blog.discourse.org/2017/05/discourse-for-developer-communities/

 

[Cd.K]

I just signed up and I'm just trying out a little:

That's a huge difference to the better compared to GG. 

[coda coder]

Yes, agreed.

Elsewhere, I've used Discourse daily for almost two years. It's a very comfortable environment for helping others.

But the thing I look forward to most, is the ability to turn a post into a wiki. That's something that TW users/helpers would find extremely useful.

https://meta.discourse.org/t/what-is-a-wiki-post/30801

[Cd.K]

coda coder

Did I understand it correctly that we essentially have to install discourse on our own server, export the google group posts and import them into discourse?

Do you know how to configure discourse?

[coda coder]

> Did I understand it correctly that we essentially have to install discourse on our own server, export the google group posts and import them into discourse?

Sorry, I don't know. I have never setup Discourse, I've only used it as a user (and moderator, actually).

[Cd.K]

How to migrate from GG

And there is a maintained GG crawler: git discourse GG crawler commit 13 days ago

You'd just have to try it out.

Then you let the community test for a few weeks and they can decide.
 

It can't get any worse with discourse.

[Cd.K]

@TiddlyTweeter

For the first step of a migration, we don't need any approval because discourse is an open-source project.

If the TiddlyWiki Community can test discourse with its own forum data, there will certainly be no lack of votes for a migration anymore. 

We just need a resourceful web server for a limited time.

And even if, contrary to expectations, no migration should take place, the work would not have been in vain:

coda coder wrote:

But the thing I look forward to most, is the ability to turn a post into a wiki. That's something that TW users/helpers would find extremely useful.

We could turn important posts into wikis.   ( TonyM )

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

Folks,

• Some quick comments. We already have ways to integrate tiddlywikis with conversations using Disqus, Yammer and IntenceDebate. 
• I have being involved in discussions on all three of these with me offering a free Yammer network, 
• What I can tell you is despite us having these integrations very few have taken part in learning these and critically reviewing them. So it seems the problem can not yet be said to be the nature of any of these solutions, but the communities openness to try them. 

Some quick review comments of my own

Disqus

Successfully in use with gamers, has all the basic features but structures around simple groups, we would not want to increase too much in number. Has a TiddlyWiki client.

Yammer

Possibly the most interactive and most capable of collaborative documents, spawning special interest groups but whilst free access is available be granted it is on top of a proprietary Microsoft platform. One which ultimately we can't extend or replace should it go the way of the dodo (although we can export the data). Personally I have experience with 45,000 member Yammer groups and are very experienced with them. Integrates with Microsoft cloud solutions.

IntenceDebate

I like this because it comes from the same crowd as WordPress which is one of the best open platforms and means it can also integrate with many websites, open ID and and user management can be used, Has a TiddlyWiki client.

Discord

I need to learn more.

In general

Whatever the solution including GG we need to develop ways to move conversations to a "curated" reference information repository. To my mind the only platform that is conversation and repository is Yammer, so all the others need two solutions.

I would like to see Tiddlywiki be the curated repository so I think it is critical any solution can be integrated with independent tiddlywiki's. This is worthy of a thread of its own. 

My Personal view

A hybrid solution with TiddlyWiki's  on a PHP Server with wordpress and IntenceDebate however allowing any wiki to leverage any community discussion forum, as long as we know which is focused on what special interest area.Leverage the user backend to support edit access to online wikis, and build a repository of Tiddlywiki objects (this is the way to extract reference material from the conversations).

Valuable content could then be submitted to a community repository form all available forums and wikis and migrated to TiddlyWiki solutions as they become available because we have a repository.

Regards

Tony

[Cd.K]

 TonyM && coda coder

TonyM wrote

In general

Whatever the solution including GG we need to develop ways to move conversations to a "curated" reference information repository. To my mind the only platform that is conversation and repository is Yammer, so all the others need two solutions.

Discourse offers both two

• conversation
• repository (wiki posts)

And since it is open source, these repository capabilities can be extended according to the TiddlyWiki requirements.   

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

I am looking at discourse,

To me it looks promising because it allows an ecosystem around it rather than stand alone. 

What do I like the look of?

• I believe I can host it on my wholesale host account (I have never installed a ruby application)
• Integrations include
• Discord Chat (We have tiddleywiki client)
• Slack
• Analytics 
• Crowd funding With our Patreon and Memberful integrations
• GitHub integration

• translation

• Wordpress

• Zapier allows you to instantly connect Discourse with 1,500+ apps to automate + IFTTT
  
• Discourse supports popular social login methods as well as local logins, custom OAuth2, and SAML. You can also integrate Discourse with your website as a single sign-on provide - also with WordPress as a result.
  
• Has an app

Regards

Tony

[Mat]

This discussion is a waste of time.

The key component for such a system to be successful is not features. It is people.

Before setting up stuff etc etc the first thing to investigate is if the active people here are actually going to use it. And the "active people" are not necessarily the cheering individuals in this thread (who are just now thinking: "I hate that Mat guy, he is a party pooper. I would for sure change forums if it is better!"). The active users can be found here.

My own reply is: Unlikely. For me to change, there would first have to be a lot of people there. So it is a catch 22 situation. GG has a first mover advantage. even if we changed, most systems would not enable us to transfer the huge knowledge base that we have accumulated here so one would have to go back and forth. Ain't doin' it.

As I've said before when this pops up (...because it pops up every now and then, and I was once one of the enthusiastic ones) I can only see one realistic solution and that is TWederation, i.e a system that is basically integrated or at least connected with your own wiki. One subscribes to topics and shares tiddlers with information. There is an intrinsic incentive to use this system for obvious reasons.

Jed is the one who has pushed this the furthest (he has a working solution for inter-wiki communication) but there is no actual system that could be used as a forum, at least not a good enough one. I am working on some UI matters for this but currently on a hiatus because it is complex and working on it is very demanding in many respects.

Anyone serious about changing forums should dig into TWederation, federation etc instead. Don't waste time on other software because, again, this is about people.... and TW.

<:-)

[Cd.K]

Mat

On Wednesday, October 2, 2019 at 12:23:02 PM UTC+2, Mat wrote:

Anyone serious about changing forums should dig into TWederation, federation etc instead. Don't waste time on other software because, again, this is about people.... and TW.

Am I in the right place?

https://ooktech.com/jed/ExampleWikis/TWederation/ 

It's not working:

There`s no upload happening. http://cddotk.tiddlyspot.com (password: cddotk) is unchanged. What am I doing wrong?

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

Mat

As one of those active members I feel your cynicism and understand where it comes from but are you not saying the same thing with twfederation. I think twfederation is a great initiative and should be persued but I do not think it the answer here, not yet but possibly not ever. I have recently investigated it and it is not mature and unlikely to give us what we expect to sustain community although it is very worthwhile.

No one expects a wholesale move to another platform. GG must remain our inbox. We do need to progress this. We are not sure how.

I can live with a little speculation.

Regards
Tony

[Mat]

@Cd.K and @TonyM

TonyM wrote:

[TWederation] I have recently investigated it and it is not mature

Exactly, as I said; it is not ready but the fundamental technology to transfer tiddlers inter wiki is there.

If one wants to investigate it, I think one can do a search in the forum and go with the later posts found.

 

No one expects a wholesale move to another platform. GG must remain our inbox. We do need to progress this. We are not sure how.

I'm obviously not telling anyone what they should or should not do. My "Don't waste your time" statement is a friendly recommendation - until you've ensured that enough of the active people are willing to go along. I just don't see how a "great tool" would be enough to persuade people. I'm happy to be proven wrong but do consider that we've walked down this road in the past.

<:-)

[TonyM]

Mat,

We are in furious agreement (again). 

I am tempted to use the blitzkrieg method, use my own experience with designing solutions, things learned from the discussions here, and build a community solution with all bells and whistles, then try and promote its adoption.

The only thing stopping me now is I should be earning money not focusing on my tiddlywiki obsession

I thought about crowd funding, but think it would fail due to people contesting my approach.

Regards

Tony

[TonyM]

FOlks,

Whilst Discourse looks QUite good technically, I am not so taken by the look and feel on the demo site, however I have learned that its only distribution is a docker container. Whilst I can host these locally on my synology I do not have an internet host on which I can host docker containers. AZUR has an option and I have an account but would eventually cost me more I believe.

Any suggestions? 

Rehards

Tony

On Wednesday, October 2, 2019 at 2:38:37 AM UTC+10, ILYA wrote:

[Stephen Wilson]

For me it's all about the numbers...I signed up for yammer, i signed up for the not-self discussion solution... I installed twederation...but all the interesting stuff happens in the google group....

[ILYA]

Hi,

Maybe it is just me but I don't understand the concern with numbers. Both GG and discourse have email integration. Which means that following strategy should work.

Step 1
- use one of the existent scripts to migrate archive from GG to discourse
- configure tiddl...@googlegroups.com to forward all email to additional email (fo...@tiddlywiki.com for example)
- bingo you would have two forums with the same content

Step 2
- have content curators who would tag interesting solutions
- maybe tag some of the old posts as well (use search stats to figure out what deserves the effort)

Step 3
- when all are happy announce deprecation of GG
- update links on tiddlywiki.com
- configure auto reply on tiddl...@googlegroups.com saying that people should use fo...@tiddlywiki.com (keep forwarding for 1 year)

Step 4
- after one year remove forwarding but keep auto reply

[@TiddlyTweeter]

Steve, great, and highly relevant, post!

Stephen Wilson wrote:

For me it's all about the numbers...I signed up for yammer, i signed up for the not-self discussion solution... I installed twederation...but all the interesting stuff happens in the google group....

This is a better and more succint version of an aspect of what both Mat & I were, in different ways, trying to get over.

This is why I wrote ... 

   ... Its a more difficult issue than it first looks like ...

• A better tech solution is one thing. 

• Getting people interested is another.

• I think getting BOTH optimal is NOT easy at all. 
  

I don't think its impossible. 

But I'd guess you'd need a full demonstrable solution to encourage MIGRATION, which is what I think the heft of the thread is about.

Just thoughts

TT

[@TiddlyTweeter]

ILYA wrote:

Maybe it is just me but I don't understand the concern with numbers. Both GG and discourse have email integration. Which means that following strategy should work.

I like your enthusiasm for it! But you talk mostly about the tech involved not the numbers of people.

So lets look at NUMBERS via some simple questions ...

Step 1
- use one of the existent scripts to migrate archive from GG to discourse
- configure tiddl...@googlegroups.com to forward all email to additional email (fo...@tiddlywiki.com for example)
- bingo you would have two forums with the same content

Let's assume Discourse (it looks like a very neat system!). 

Okay some techie(s) are able to export all the archives and all the email addresses and whatnot so you have on ONGOING CLONE of GG (that would be a maqjor acheivement!).

But WHO will host it where? You? 

This GG was created by Mr. Ruston. So your approach needs a bit of thinking through about in terms of people in control of it.

Goggle Groups is free, easy setup & low maintenance. The OTHER way requires more maintenance, more manning, and likely a special server?

Step 2
- have content curators who would tag interesting solutions

HOW would you get them? HOW much work would it be for them? HOW many volunteers to do this do you think there would needs be?

BUT the existing GG has a relatively low number of active participants. My feeling is, which may be wrong, is there really is not a big enough pool.

You probably also likely need moderators to run Discourse well?

But do ask and see what the response is, to see if people may be interested help run it!

 

- maybe tag some of the old posts as well (use search stats to figure out what deserves the effort)

Step 3
- when all are happy announce deprecation of GG
- update links on tiddlywiki.com
- configure auto reply on tiddl...@googlegroups.com saying that people should use fo...@tiddlywiki.com (keep forwarding for 1 year)

Step 4
- after one year remove forwarding but keep auto reply

Sounds fine. So create a parrallel system and let's see what happens! :-)

What I DOUBT will happen is you would get unequivocal support in advance. Not enough people for it to be really clear!

But might be well worth trying.

Best wishes

TT

[Cd.K]

There may be a ready-made solution without hosting problems.

What if TiddlyWiki GG used github?

e.g.
https://github.com/TiddlyWiki/v5.1.21

Repositories could be created for each release.

You could create more repositories for discussions and anything you can imagine.

GG group          <=> github organisation

GG not featured <=> github repository

GG topic           <=> github issue
GG not featured <=> github project (board)
GG not featured <=> github wiki
GG not featured <=> github code
GG not featured <=> github insights

Advantages:
Finally, a working example under code can be created for an issue: topic completed  Everyone has access, everything can be found in one place.
The issue can be evaluated in Wiki. All documentation is in one place.
Every TiddlyWiki GG user can create his own repositories and thus exchange tiddlers.

Under code you can version anything. With github you can also create books / documentations in collaboration. It's just a question of how to set up a repository in the project board. 

And under code one `readme.md` is enough. You get the possibility to discuss a meta topic in the corresponding
issues.

You can receive issue posts by email, but I don't know if you can create them by email.  

Regards

Cd.K

[@TiddlyTweeter]

Ciao Cd.K

One major advantage of GitHub would be basic familiarity already to many users.

In my own case I still don't understand PR's well (I'm not tech). 

But the basic Issues are easily understood.

But is not quite the same as something like Discourse which I'd think much easier for a newbie.

But maybe a GH account could be tweaked to better serve that need?

Its an interesting thought.

Best wishes

TT

On Thursday, 3 October 2019 15:59:15 UTC+2, Cd.K wrote:

There may be a ready-made solution without hosting problems.

What if TiddlyWiki GG used github?

e.g.
https://github.com/TiddlyWiki/v5.1.21

Repositories could be created for each release.

You could create more repositories for discussions and anything you can imagine.

GG group          <=> github repository

[Cd.K]

I googled and found out that you can program github. There is an API: Github Developer REST API v3

In any case it is technically possible  to create issues and or posts by email.

The Google groups topics/posts could also be imported.

Regards

Cd.K

[Cd.K]

On Thursday, October 3, 2019 at 4:12:16 PM UTC+2, @TiddlyTweeter wrote: 

But maybe a GH account could be tweaked to better serve that need?

 

It`s possible with the REST API from github.

[Mark S.]

I'm could be wrong, but I'm guessing that only Jeremy could apply for the FREE discourse set up.

If it's not free, it's $100/month. Yipes.

But there are other discourse hosts that will set up at $10/month. Feasible. I imagine that someone is generously paying about that much for Tiddlyspot.

Asking that all the old GG be imported is unreasonable. Especially since much of it is fluff, and none of it is tagged or categorized. So, consider going forward only. People would have to sign up and add their own emails, rather than a mass migration.

Maybe we need one of those survey things: How many people would use Discourse if available?

Personally, I think unless the alternative site is promoted at TiddlyWiki.com, it won't go anywhere. There's almost zero activity on the reddit forum, and people actually have reasons to visit reddit. If reddit were promoted as "the" place to go for answers, there might be activity.

[@TiddlyTweeter]

Mark S. wrote:

Personally, I think unless the alternative site is promoted at TiddlyWiki.com, it won't go anywhere. There's almost zero activity on the reddit forum, and people actually have reasons to visit reddit. If reddit were promoted as "the" place to go for answers, there might be activity.

https://www.reddit.com/r/TiddlyWiki5/

The Reddit was created by Riz. I think about 3 years ago? 

I thought it was a really good attempt to address GG limitations; Reddit having discussion threads and additional resource bases.

It emerged from debate not disimilar to this one,

It illustrates, I think, the problem with the inertia / centripetal force of GG. Its hard to maintain regular usage elsewhere.

For instance, in my own case, I really don't want have to follow another general group unless it *replaces* this one. 

Even though Reddit is better on discussion it didn't run through everything here, so very quickly it fell back to my second focus. 

I think that is part of the puzzle. 

IF you do a half step it will likely fail. 

But going all the way would definitely need a lot of agreed co-cordination to have a chance.

My 2 Cents

TT

[Mark S.]

It's not linked on the "HelloThere" page. If you know to look for it, you can search for it on TiddlyWiki. But that's not how things work.

I don't think Discourse would do any better unless it was linked on the HelloThere page.

[TonyM]

Some quick points

Any new solution starts with 1 user and the numbers must build.

If numbers using a new system do not grow then perhaps its not Google groups fault but the new system. This is only true if people Actualy give the new solution a fair try. 20+ people joined hammer but only 3 sent one or more messages.

We can use Google groups and chew gum. I keep an eye on disquis even now.

Discourse looks promising but only having docker hosting is a disadvantage and I am still not sure its everyday use is effective.

I will post another interpretation of our circumstances soon.

Regards
Tony

[Cd.K]

Hi TonyM

I'm already testing my GitHub idea.

GitHub is a serious alternative.

Take a look at this:  

ProBot Framework to automate and improve your github workflow

It would also be possible to create the posts (issues) directly with tiddlers from the user's TiddlyWikis.

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

Cd K

Keep up the research. I am however a Strong believer in a meta community site that can oversee whatever content and methods we use.  Past Personal and forum posts suggests GitHub can be a barrier to interaction, however since we are committed for the core repository we should embrace it. How much we embrace it is a living question.

I have a site as a demonstration I am still working on that captures my ideas of what can be in a community and how to go about it. I can see embedding github, tiddlywiki sites and resources and even Discourse are reasonably easy thing to achieve.

However for long term viability I believe it should be customised to address the management of what I call tiddlywiki objects, wiks, editions, plugins, macros, servers, themes etc... as I result I am exploring the use of custom post types and additional metadata. This would allow a Wiki edition to reference the plugins it contains, and a plugin can reference the editions its used in etc...

Have a look to see some of my ideas reflected in the site itself.

http://www.colabteam.net/tiddlywiki/

Regards

Tony

[Cd.K]

TonyM

Looks very good.

Do you know that this design can also be created with github pages and Jekyll? And github hosts it.  It's all integrated.

Here a Jekyll Showroom:
especially the first: Spotify for Developer (structured Documentation)
 
Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

Cd K

I know WordPress very well, I am not sure how easy it would be to use theses others.

Regards

Tony 

[Cd.K]

Hi,

TonyM wrote

 

Keep up the research ...

 

Do you have an account at github or can you sign up?

I would like to invite you to join my team for a collaboration simulation.

I'm testing out the github possibilities.

Regards

Cd.K

[Cd.K]

TiddlyTweeter wrote:

 

 But maybe a GH account could be tweaked to better serve that need?

 

I`ve invited you to join my GitHub team for a collaboration simulation.

I'm testing out the GitHub possibilities.

Regards

Cd.K

[ILYA]

Would you mind inviting me as well https://github.com/iilyak

[Cd.K]

 DONE

[TonyM]

AnthonyMuscio

Above is gut hub user ID, otherwise if you do not have my PSaT.com.au email address send me a personal message and I will reply with it.

Tony

[TonyM]

I just looked am overview of wiki posts in discourse. I am afraid they are really basic and would disappoint most tiddlywiki users. There access is more by search than browse. Sad.

Tony

[@TiddlyTweeter]

I'm happy to comment in it when I can see something. Just don't expect me to grasp exactly how you build it or help that. 

I'm tech ignorant. 

I'm best commenting retrospectively when I can see function and test it.

Best 

TT

[Cd.K]

@TiddlyTweeter

ILYA

TonyM

@TiddlyTweeter wrote:

I'm happy to comment in it when I can see something. Just don't expect me to grasp exactly how you build it or help that. 

I'm tech ignorant. 

I'm best commenting retrospectively when I can see function and test it.

 

 

Each of us brings different points of view into this simulation and I hope that in this way a sustainable and attractive offer towards the TiddlyWiki community can be developed. 

Or it turns out that it doesn't work that way. Then at least we would have tried it.

Next step is to set up our first meta-discussion "kickoff" in the simulation

Regards

Cd.K

[Cd.K]

Hello coda coder,

Are you interested in joining the simulation: "GitHub as TiddlyWiki forum?

• Cd.K
• @TiddlyTweeter
• ILYA
• TonyM

If so, give me your github name and I will invite you.

I'd be pleased if you would join the team!

Regards

Cd.K

On Tuesday, October 1, 2019 at 10:02:30 PM UTC+2, coda coder wrote:

On Tuesday, October 1, 2019 at 2:47:18 PM UTC-5, @TiddlyTweeter wrote:

The issue would be TRANSITION. The problem is HOW would you move such a large group that have both web users and email users and a large archive to a better forum?

 

Its a more difficult issue than it first looks like IMO.

 

It can be done.

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/julia-users/Ov1J6MOVly0

https://opendatakit.org/2017/06/important-moving-from-google-groups-to-discourse-on-friday/

https://developers.bloomreach.com/blog/2018/moving-the-forum-from-google-groups-to-discourse.html

Others projects using it:

https://blog.discourse.org/2017/05/discourse-for-developer-communities/

 

[Cd.K]

@TiddlyTweeter

From another topic @TiddlyTweeter wrote:

Cd.K wrote:

This topic is finished, but I am not offered a close button although I have created the topic. I can close foreign topics partially, but not always.

Can someone explain the logic behind the close?

As far as I understand it the ORIGINATOR of a thread can't "Mark a thread as complete" but anyone else can.

I have NO idea why that is the case. It makes no sense to me.

In any case the flag of "Complete" does nothing. You can still post into the thread.

Just as an idea there could be different types of topics.

Depending on the type, different workflows could be triggered.

• discussion
• question => workflow e.g. similar to StackExchange
  
• information
• action => find volunteers/contributors
  
• vote
• plugin announcement => workflow registration
  
• ?
  

[Cd.K]

TonyM wrote:

 

 I just looked am overview of wiki posts in discourse. I am afraid they are really basic and would disappoint most tiddlywiki users. There access is more by search than browse. Sad.

 

Isn't this all a question of how you configure WikiPosts in discourse?

In principle, it should also be possible to be a (static) tiddler. It's all HTML/CSS!

[Suzanne McHale]

For myself, I am fine with Google Groups (and the Reddit TW forum as a backup) - I'd be wary of moving to Discourse; how long will they be around? GG is fairly well-established as is the TW group here.

On Wednesday, October 2, 2019 at 2:38:37 AM UTC+10, ILYA wrote:

Hello,

I know that there is a parallel discussion thread is ongoing about GG.
However it was mentioned there that alternative solutions are off topic. I do believe that there are better alternatives. One of which is discourse (but there are others). One example of a forum powered by discourse is https://forums.foundationdb.org. Discourse has tagging support which would allow us to find information easier. The software itself is open source and has API to access it programmatically. The discourse.org offers free service for open source projects. In comparison to GG we can backup the forums data and restore it on different hosting if we decide to leave.

Best regards,
iilyak

[coda coder]

On Saturday, October 5, 2019 at 10:33:38 AM UTC-5, Cd.K wrote:

Hello coda coder,

I'd be pleased if you would join the team!

Codacodr (that's not a typo)

[Thanks for the nudge, Josiah.]

[coda coder]

Just wanted to add this thought...

The problem faced by anyone wanting to advocate a move from GG to A.N.Other system is one of inertia and momentum. Tiddlywiki on GG has a ton of history (inertia) and is well documented (on Tiddlywiki.com). It has all the positive inertia and momentum. I don't know how to create momentum out of nothing (physics itself would deny it). I can't convince anyone to make the move - not even by saying "I've used Discourse daily for almost two years and love it." It means nothing to anyone unconvinced about moving or changing.

Confession:

I'm biased. I distrust Google. I distrust Microsoft (GitHub) a little less. It's true - Microsoft (in various guises/ways) has provided me a living for 30+ years.

I love open source. Tiddlywiki is open source. Discourse is open source. #JustSayin

[Cd.K]

Discourse costs money, GitHub doesn't.

Discourse is partly dependent on GitHub.

Unlike GitHub, GG doesn't develop any further. 

Many communities have made the jump from GG.

GG was top at its time but not anymore today.

[ILYA]

> Discourse costs money, 
- it is free for open source
- it is open source and can be hosted anywhere. In this case the hosting wouldn't be free of cause.

> GitHub doesn't
Github is not a forum. It a very limited issue tracker. Even as an issue tracker it is very hard to use for big teams and complex projects.
- it doesn't support nested issues
- it doesn't support splitting the issue into two
- there is only one issue template
- checklists not always work (you need to edit the comment manually)
- no support for custom anchors to create links to a portion of content (there is a hack which relies on markdown corner case)
- the 'project' feature drops new tickets at the top. So ordering of tickets is a waste of time.
- the 'project card' is not an 'issue' by default
- no support for deadline for issues
- no support for priorities
- search doesn't support multiple conditions

I think it would be hard to use it as a community knowledge base. It doesn't mean we shouldn't try, though.

I think we shouldn't mix different use cases.
We have multiple:
- 1. as a user I want to be able to search old questions
- 2. as a community contributor I want to be able to collaborate on ecosystem enhancements projects
- 3. as a developer I want to be able to share designs and code with all decision makers
- 4. as a content developer I should be able easily contribute to tiddlywiki.com website
- 5. as a designer I should be able to easily demo my solutions and register them on a common catalog
- 6. as a translator it should be easy for me to contribute to non English content on tiddlywiki.com and tiddlywiki codebase
- 7. As a content curator I should be able to vote and promote good questions to a status of an article

I feel like we (people on this thread) have different goals in mind. So it would help a lot if we would agree on what we want to achieve.
I do believe that there is no software which would cover all our use cases I mentioned above. Discourse is good for #1, github is good for #3, new solution based on tiddlywiki itself might be a good fit for project management portion of #2.



Best regards,
iilyak

On 5 October 2019 20:22:46 GMT-07:00, "Cd.K" <CdD...@yandex.com> wrote:

Discourse costs money, GitHub doesn't.

Unlike GitHub, Google Groups doesn't develop any further. 

Many communities have made the jump from GG.

GG was top at its time but not anymore today.

[Cd.K]

ILYA wrote:

 

> Discourse costs money, 
- it is free for open source
- it is open source and can be hosted anywhere. In this case the hosting wouldn't be free of cause.

 

Here are a few facts:

Discourse pricelist

You give $100/mo and get 100k monthly page views and 10 GB storage.

Next option: $300/mo 500k 50 GB

We have 2.5 GB data (without TiddlyWikiDocs and I think excluding images, attachments ...) see Jeremy Ruston's statement

Could we go with the limit of 100k page views per month? Maybe Jeremy knows about that, too. 

Since google is known for its statistics, it should be possible to find out. 

Free limited web hosting: FREEHOSTING 10 GB storage

Free and unlimited web hosting: InfinityFree

To install Discourse you need Docker: github discourse/docs/INSTALL.md (Docker is also open source). 

And here a quote from a post about "Does InfinityFree support Docker?"

Docker can’t be used in any shared hosting environment. There are only a handful of companies in the world who provide hosted Docker services (and they are all rather pricey).

chipthrasher Feb 2018 

Perhaps we can find a project Discourse without Docker or we could do it ourselves.

ILYA wrote:

 
... as a user I want to be able to search old questions
 

Import GG in GitHub repository or GitHub wiki

On the surface, GitHub offers a rather modest search, but there are options:

• grep / grepWin (Stefans Tools) 
  
• Search Repositories GitHub Developer API
  
• Searching issues and pull requests
• Going Beyond grep for Searching Source Code — Zoekt
  
• chrome web store: Wiki Search for GitHub
  
• Stackoverflow answer from RayLuo May 2018 to: Is there a way to search github wiki pages?

(source: Ray Luo)

 

The central question here is whether it is possible to make the features hidden in GitHub available to the user UI by using the open source  Probot Framework. 

ILYA wrote:

 
.. new solution based on tiddlywiki itself might be a good fit for project management portion of #2.
 

=> Can you link TiddlyWiki and Probot?  

What new perspectives could this open up? e.g. in the way of thinking of TWederation?  

ILYA wrote:

 
... GitHub ... there is only one issue template
 

At least GitHub has an issue template builder: GitHub Help. Maybe Probot and/or the GitHub Developer REST API v3 offers a way to make the templates selectable.    

I think, It is all a question of defining and setting up the workflows, so that everyone gets the view of TiddlyWiki corresponding to his role. 

• as a user
  
• as a community contributor 
  
• as a developer 
  
• as a content developer 
  
• as a designer
  
• as a translator
  
• as a content curator 
  

Regards

Cd.K

[Mark S.]

There's discourse hosting available with 5gb and 100k views at $10/month. (nodechef)

If there isn't $10/month interest, maybe there's not enough interest.

It really doesn't seem necessary to me to bring over all the archives. Maybe the last 3 years.

A lot of material before that will be irrelevant.

Doing the other things, connecting to GH, seems overly ambitious.

[coda coder]

And this, if it hasn't been posted before:

https://blog.discourse.org/2018/11/free-hosting-for-open-source-v2/

[ILYA]

Discourse hosting is free for open source projects (50k monthly page views).

https://blog.discourse.org/2018/11/free-hosting-for-open-source-v2/

In regards to hosting ourselves there are few options:
- every big cloud provider supports docker images (the cheapest is around $10/month)
- every big cloud provider has hosting for kubernetes containers (the cheapest is around $10/month)
- convert docker image to vm image (would be more expensive to host (around $60/month))
- someone from community donates compute resources

- https://www.alibabacloud.com/product/ecs?spm=a3c0i.7938564.220486.1.77812aecW5JYp9
- https://cloud.ibm.com/gen1/infrastructure/provision/vs $25/month

- https://cloud.google.com/compute/all-pricing
- https://www.ibm.com/cloud/container-service/pricing

- https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot/pricing/

On 6 October 2019 07:42:53 GMT-07:00, "Cd.K" <CdD...@yandex.com> wrote:

ILYA wrote:

 

> Discourse costs money, 
- it is free for open source
- it is open source and can be hosted anywhere. In this case the hosting wouldn't be free of cause.

 

Here are a few facts:

Discourse pricelist

You give $100/mo and get 100k monthly page views and 10 GB storage.

Next option: $300/mo 500k 50 GB

We have 2.5 GB data (but I think without images, attachments ...) see here 

Free and unlimited web hosting: InfinityFree

To install Discourse you need Docker: github discourse/docs/INSTALL.md

And here a quote from a post about "Does InfinityFree support Docker?"

Docker can’t be used in any shared hosting environment. There are only a handful of companies in the world who provide hosted Docker services (and they are all rather pricey).

Regards

Cd.K

[Mark S.]

Have you tried it? I'm pretty sure that only Jeremy will be authorized for the free site. They're offering a resource

valued at $1200/yr, so I imagine they're going to be picky.

[Cd.K]

ILYA wrote: 

 
Discourse hosting is free for open source projects (50k monthly page views).
https://blog.discourse.org/2018/11/free-hosting-for-open-source-v2/
In regards to hosting ourselves there are few options:
- every big cloud provider supports docker images (the cheapest is around $10/month)
- every big cloud provider has hosting for kubernetes containers (the cheapest is around $10/month)
- convert docker image to vm image (would be more expensive to host (around $60/month))
- someone from community donates compute resources
- https://www.alibabacloud.com/product/ecs?spm=a3c0i.7938564.220486.1.77812aecW5JYp9
- https://cloud.ibm.com/gen1/infrastructure/provision/vs $25/month
- https://cloud.google.com/compute/all-pricing
- https://www.ibm.com/cloud/container-service/pricing
- https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/spot/pricing/

 

Installation demands discourse: 

Hardware Requirements

• modern single core CPU, dual core recommended

• 1 GB RAM minimum (with swap)

• 64 bit Linux compatible with Docker

• 10 GB disk space minimum

Software Requirements

• Postgres 10+

• Redis 2.6+

• Ruby 2.5+ (we recommend 2.5.2 or higher)

(github discourse/discourse INSTALL.md)

This reduces the selection in the 5/10 $ range.

We need to know if TiddlyWiki can get by on 50k monthly page views. 

(Discourse's "free" hosting for open source projects in the range of a bandwidth from 50k to 100 k costs 1/2 of standard price i.e. 50$ monthly)

And if so, what could happen next?

Regards

Cd.K

[Cd.K]

Discourse free hosting open source project apply formular:

[Cd.K]

@TiddlyTweeter wrote:

 

... GitHub ... is not quite the same as something like Discourse which I'd think much easier for a newbie.

But maybe a GH account could be tweaked to better serve that need?

Its an interesting thought.

 

Personally, I don't like the design of the GitHub user interface either and I was looking for ways to change it.

I came across topics like GitHub Marketplace, GitHub REST API v3, GitHub GraphQL API v4 and Probot Framework. You can achieve a lot with these, but now I have come up with a much simpler alternative:

How about a browser AddOn to redesign the user interface of GitHub? 

For a first test, I'll try to create one that simply renames "Issues" to "Topics" on a GitHub page.

The "TiddlyWiki community" AddOn.

If this should work, we can consider integrating the roles seen by ILYA:

I think we shouldn't mix different use cases.

 We have multiple:
- 1. as a user I want to be able to search old questions
- 2. as a community contributor I want to be able to collaborate on ecosystem enhancements projects
- 3. as a developer I want to be able to share designs and code with all decision makers
- 4. as a content developer I should be able easily contribute to tiddlywiki.com website
- 5. as a designer I should be able to easily demo my solutions and register them on a common catalog
- 6. as a translator it should be easy for me to contribute to non English content on tiddlywiki.com and tiddlywiki codebase
- 7. As a content curator I should be able to vote and promote good questions to a status of an article

 

 

Regards

Cd.K

[coda coder]

On Monday, October 7, 2019 at 1:48:21 PM UTC-5, Cd.K wrote:

Personally, I don't like the design of the GitHub user interface either and I was looking for ways to change it. 

but now I have come up with a much simpler alternative:

How about a browser AddOn to redesign the user interface of GitHub? 

Ha! Nice outside-the-box thinking.

Do you think a dedicated Tampermonkey script might work? I imagine it could get complicated...

[Cd.K]

coda coder wrote:

 

 Do you think a dedicated Tampermonkey script might work? I imagine it could get complicated...

 

I don't (yet) know "Tampermonkey". I will have a look at it. Thanks for the tip.

I'm actually looking for a Firefox Development Extension that allows me to edit/update and debug an add-on

and look what I just found by chance:  Github List Bugzilla Bugs AddOn

This addon will search through all of the visible and hidden commit messages on a Github compare view, extract all of the bug IDs (e.g. "bug 12345"), and add a link to each unique one just above the commits list. It will also add a link that will open all of the discovered bugs in new tabs.

 

That's the kind of thing I'm imagining. Now I have a template.

Regards

Cd.K

[Cd.K]

@TiddlyTweeter wrote:

 

 In my own case I still don't understand PR's well (I'm not tech).

 

Take a look YouTube Mario Pietsch part 06 tw5 development PULL-REQUEST workflow

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

I love the creative thinking here. Keep it up.

If I may state some sage advice, which you may already be aware of.

Creativity, remember not to have such an "open mind that it all falls out". When considering such solutions, after the initial exploration try and define a scope, what part of community participation it will support?. There is no use in developing a solution if people do not understand why it exists and when it is used. 

Experienced in Information and Knowledge management a key way to have a successful solution is to ensure you can explain its purpose so people can know when it is the best solution.

Questions

Will this 

• support the current issues thread
• Create a better community conversation
• Tie into pull requests
• Be a parallel system?
• who is the audience ?
• etc...

Love you work

Tony

[Cd.K]

TonyM wrote:

 

... after the initial exploration try and define a scope, what part of community participation it will support? ...

 

That's a good clue.
To find out what the community really needs and can handle, I will probably start with a browser add-on, which manipulates the result of the GG Filter's view "set up" dialog:

Exactly here I would like to revise the google groups filter result on the basis of the emojis in the topics, i.e. GG returns all topics and I suppress the topics that do not meet the from the user's in the add-on given criteria, e.g.

• a to-do list: 📝 (at the far left)
• questions not yet answered: ❓ (at the far left)
• ...

The users pick from given combinations by ticking a box.

What do you think?

Would that bring an advantage to the community? However, everyone who wants to use this advantage, must do something too.

Regards

Cd.K

[TonyM]

Sounds interesting. 

Currently issues and pull requests are separate from discussions and questions (as they are in GG) you would have to divide the github issues that way. But a whole new github repository could be fine.

Your PNG image inclusions are broken for me !

Tony

[Cd.K]

TonyM wrote:

 

Your PNG image inclusions are broken for me !

 

I write my posts online in google groups in the Grammarly Editor, which is around classes better than the google groups mini window editor.

Sometimes there are problems with the images, so they don't go out in emails, but are displayed correctly in the forum.

Everything's fine here.

And your reply contains the image.

Cd.K

[TonyM]

C D K

The only thing broken was the display of images such as 09-10-_2019_01-09-02.png inside the post. I see the icons in the forum list.

Regards

tony