Discourse (A budding discussion platform)

[Vishal Verma]

I just came across:

http://www.discourse.org/about/

I thought this could be a very good discussion platform for a group like ours - we can host it right with our website.

If there is interest, I am willing to help set this up, maybe as a sandbox initially, so we can evaluate it.

[Jeff Cragg]

I'm a fan of forums - what do you like about this over all the other available forum software?

j.

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[Cody Daig]

I've been thinking about finding a forum to integrate into the website. I'm trying to find one that I can integrate seemlesly from the user stand point from design down to logging in. 

Cody

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Cody B. Daig

A Really Cool Guy

970.682.5346

[Chris Yoder]

I really dislike web forums, but that may be the old school in me.

If it will bidirectionally gateway to email, like google groups, then I'm in.

[Cody Daig]

Chris makes a great point. As much as I would love a forum for more structure, Google Groups has a great email integration system.

c

Cody B. Daig

A Really Cool Guy

970.682.5346

[Jeff Cragg]

I couldn't disagree more.  Mailing lists have their usefulness.  When you have a message that NEEDS to reach EVERYONE, mailing lists are a good tool. The beauty of Forums is that you don't have to wade through all the noise to get to the topics that interest you.  And if there IS a thread that interests you, you can mark it to notify you of updates via email, w/o having to get EVERYTHING else in your inbox. While Google Groups has some of the functionality of a Forum, it very much lacks the organization of the more sophisticated forums, and is really just a good mailing list tool.

j.

[Vishal Verma]

On Wednesday, September 11, 2013 5:18:53 PM UTC-6, Jeff Cragg wrote:

I couldn't disagree more.  Mailing lists have their usefulness.  When you have a message that NEEDS to reach EVERYONE, mailing lists are a good tool. The beauty of Forums is that you don't have to wade through all the noise to get to the topics that interest you.  

I agree with Jeff - Google groups are great for single purpose things - but we'd likely want to have different categories. I may want to keep tabs on what goes on in say Robotics, and 3D printing, but may not be so interested in say Music. With groups, you'd get emails for _everything_ and if you disable emails - the groups page itself won't be organized buy categories..

Forums give us that, and while they may not have the convenience of a bidirectional email gateway, they tend to be much better for storing the collective knowledge of the group and it's retrieval.

What I liked about discourse over conventional forums software is that they're trying to make a lot of changes in the way we use forums - for example you can @mention people and get notifications for your mentions, or replies to threads where you posted. They claim to 'remember' where you've read till and even sync that data across sessions. I don't know how well everything works, and how usable things are, but I guess the only way to find out is to try :)

I agree that this can become yet another thing people will have to 'poll', but I believe as we grow larger, most of us would end up preferring the largely polled method of forums v/s the largely interrupt driven method of emails.

[Scott Converse]

Lets stand it up and evaluate it.

There may be other packages we might want to look at as well.

S

--

[Tim Mensch]

On 9/12/2013 9:22 AM, Scott Converse wrote:

Lets stand it up and evaluate it.

There may be other packages we might want to look at as well.

Discourse seemed to have a lot of promise when I first heard about it. Forum software HAS stagnated for a long time, and it generally sucks at this point.

So they designed Discourse to be a Better Forum. But Jeff Atwood is behind Discourse, and he hates threaded discussions. [1]

I guess he hates Reddit, then? The Reddit style of discussion tree works really well for me, at least, and that would be the ideal I'd like to see in a New And Improved Forum.

Given that, you can always create /r/longmonthackerspace as a subreddit and get free discussion groups there. I don't recommend trying to RUN a Reddit of your own; the hardware requirements are somewhat insane.

If you do decide that threaded comments is a feature you want, but you don't want to use Reddit, then when I was searching I thought Phorum looked the most promising. [2] But if you want to do the search from the ground up based on your own preferences, you can check out forummatrix.org, which compares features in different packages. [3]

Tim

[1] http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2012/12/web-discussions-flat-by-design.html

[2] http://www.phorum.org/

[3] http://www.forummatrix.org/

[Scott Converse]

Hmmmm... a TinkerMill subreddit.  Had not thought of that.

Doable?  Attractive?  Price is certainly right.

Scott G. Converse

Phone: 303.875.1243

email: scott.c...@gmail.com

--

[Mike]

I'm curious about it. I've been posting general info to the /r/Longmont group for some time.

I'll look into it.

Mike

[Ron Thomas]

I first learned about TinkerMill from a post on /r/Longmont.

[Scott Converse]

What would normally happen next is someone would say:

"Hey.. I can set up X'

X being the /r/tinkermill reddit 'forum', and/or a test run of the Discourse SW Vishal's suggesting.

Yep.  That would be cool.

s

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[Vishal Verma]

I'll work on Discourse tonight - stay tuned :)

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[Tim Mensch]

OK, I've created /r/tinkermill. Took me about 45 seconds. :)

Now someone post something. Or message me about becoming a mod.

http://www.reddit.com/r/tinkermill/

One thing: We might want an "automoderator" to be hooked up to it. Sometimes when someone posts their post will get stuck in a mod queue. I'm already checking such queues at least once every day or two, but if we want it to be more or less constant, there are bots you can hook up to your subreddit to do it for you.

Tim

[Scott Converse]

Tell us more about the automodder. 

I like the idea, if it's not highjackable by spambots.

Can I be a mod?

s

[Vishal Verma]

Ok, I've created http://tinkermill.stellarhopper.com

It took me a few hours :)

You can hit "Log in" and there will be options to create an account. I haven't tested the 'Login using..." options, but the native account works.

We can use this as a testing ground, and if we decide to go ahead with this on the website, I can either transfer the current database or start from scratch.

I've created a few boilerplate categories, but I can certainly make more.

Feel free to get back to me with any feedback!

-Vishal

[Tim Mensch]

https://github.com/Deimos/AutoModerator

You can run your own instance or just configure your site to use theirs. Depends on how much work you want to do -- and how much you trust them not to mess with your sub. :)

Tim

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[Troy]

This looks really cool. I miss threading is my only complaint. Looks like you can upload images and there some formatting options. All in all pretty neat.

Just to make Cody mad I'm going to suggest another one: P2 by WordPress:

http://wordpress.org/themes/p2

I've tried for years to find a place for P2, so I'm not sure this is it, but I thought I'd throw it out there as another something to look at.

Troy

[Troy]

Let's revive this.

I think discourse is really cool. In my opinion if we go for it, it's probably just fine where it's hosted. If we'd rather host it under tinkermill I set up a subdomain of forum.tinkermill.org.

The only weakness I saw people bring up with discourse is its lack of threading. Along those lines I installed wordpress' p2 theme at forum.tinkermill.org. It's a discussion theme for WP that allows threaded comments (4 deep I think) to posts. Outside of that I think P2 lacks a few features discourse has.

Vishal if we go with Discourse and you'd rather it under the tinkermill.org subdomain I'll get you access and you can install.

Troy

[Mike]

Don't forget about not having SSL on those sites (if even necessary)

Mike

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[Cody Daig]

There are also plans to incorporate a forum into the new website. However, that is a couple months down the road. 

My thought is if Google Groups can work for a couple months, we will have our own custom forum that will incorporate "groups" as well as discussion threads. i am working out a more exact plan of how this will work, but I think it will be a better fit that a general forum, but only if it can wait.

Cody B. Daig

A Really Cool Guy

970.682.5346

[Troy]

Something you wish to hide, Brother?

(kidding)

you bring up a good point though. I don't think the current cert we have is a wildcard so we'd be out of luck unless we put it under www.tinkermill.org.

> email to longmonthackerspace+unsub...@googlegroups.com.

[Jeff Cragg]

What it the benefit of rolling your own forum?  There are a lot of forum options out there (I am liking Discourse, but I know there are others as well), and a lot of custom projects lined up for the website already.  What's the point of a custom forum?

j.

[Cody Daig]

The main object was for total integration. We're having a hard enough time getting people to crreate an account on the website. Now were asking them to create another account on a different part of the website.

Cody B. Daig

A Really Cool Guy

970.682.5346

[Mike]

Out of pure curiosity (not asking for names or anything). How many
people have signed up between last night at 7PM and now?

Mike

--
Mike

[Jeff Cragg]

That's a good point.

j.

[Jeff Cragg]

One, maybe two.

j.

[Troy]

To expand on what Cody said we in the Web Dev team see the site as its own maker project. We use some off-the shelf parts, like the operating system and the mail server, but we really do want to enjoy the process of building it as much as we can. Short term if we need a forum to tide us over until we can build one we'll grab something that already exists and put it up.

Troy

j.

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[Scott Converse]

We need a forum.

It should be integrated or at least easily linked to the website.

What it is doesn't much matter to me (Discourse, google groups, WP forums, custom, etc.).  2 months is too far out though.  This is how we communicate.

My order of preference, today, would be:

1) Integrate Google Groups with a link or somehow fake a tab that iframes it in.  We already use it and it's got our content on it now.

2) Discourse, integrated into the existing site (forum.tinkermill.com).

3) Wordpress threaded forums integrated into existing website.

If we could have a custom forum today, I'd go with that, but, we can't yet.

Last thought:  It is a project.  We do make things.  Learning how to do things should be part of this so I'm not at all adverse to a custom site. 

BUT only if it doesn't limit us.  If it limits us, we need to treat it like what it is: a content collection and distribution system with communication capabilities, which means:  get it off the shelf.

Can you build AND maintain a custom site without limiting us?

s

Scott G. Converse

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[Vishal Verma]

I'm ok with either something off the shelf like Discourse or rolling our own custom forum.

If we go with the latter - How would integration with Google groups work?

My main driving point for not using groups was that with groups - everyone gets blasted with everything, and there is no organization.

With any forums software, you get categories/subforums, which you could choose to dedicate more/less attention to as you wish.

And I haven't looked but is groups even API friendly? - I kinda doubt it but I could be totally wrong.

Troy - if we go with Discourse for a longer term, I would like to set it up on a Tinkermill server/VM - the current one is currently running on my VPS, for which I have other plans :)

-V

On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 3:39 PM, Troy <you...@troyvit.com> wrote:

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[Troy]

The good news is we already have something in place. It isn't perfect but it functions. That gives us time to decide what we want to do.

Embedding off-the-shelf (OTS) software into any site is a big project and as such lands squarely in the "features" category. All features on the current site are frozen.

Throwing up an OTS forum at forum.tinkermill.org leaves the existing site untouched and so the WebDev team is OK with that. That means we just need to unify on what we pick. I put up a poll:

http://s1.troyvit.com/poll.html

What does everybody think?

I'll keep this poll up until October 13 when I'm back in town. If there's a clear winner before hand it can always be discussed at this Tuesday's meeting (I'll be out of town). If nobody votes then we can just keep using google groups *grin*.

If the poll is missing a key option let me know and I'll re-roll it.

Troy

j.

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[Scott Converse]

Want to put this email out to a larger group than just the google groups crowd?  We can do an email blast to everyone.  

Scott G. Converse

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[Troy]

Good idea. Is the most comprehensive list inside tinkermill.org's database? I want to add one more option to the poll anyway (bbpress - 'cause I'm a WordPress fanboy).

Troy

[Scott Converse]

I'd do it through meetup.  Hits everyone (115 ish people) that has showed interest.

s

Scott G. Converse

Phone: 303.875.1243

email: scott.c...@gmail.com

[Cody Daig]

Another thing to clarify as well though with the voting is if we stick with Google Groups through the end of the year, we can then start using our own custom built forum with the new website.

Cody

[Scott Converse]

Soooooooooooo....

where did we finally come down on this?

s

[Vishal Verma]

I think if we plan to roll our custom forum, there is no point switching from groups for the meanwhile - that'd just mean too much (unnecessary) switching.

[Troy]

Is that the final verdict? I dropped the ball on asking Mike to publicize the forum poll we set up on Meetup (where the bulk of our peole seem to get their information). Just in case here's the results of that poll so far:

http://s1.troyvit.com/poll.html

Troy

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[Zancas Dearana]

On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 3:17 PM, Troy <you...@troyvit.com> wrote:

Something you wish to hide, Brother?

(kidding)

  Glad you were kidding...  because that's always the wrong question!!   (In My Ever So Humble Opinion)   Ask me why I think that, and I'll probably not stop babbling for hours....    so perhaps we should have some tasty beverages at hand before launching on any such discussion.

 

you bring up a good point though. I don't think the current cert we have is a wildcard so we'd be out of luck unless we put it under www.tinkermill.org.

 

  BTW, props to whomever set up SSL for the tinkermill.org site.

 

On Wednesday, October 2, 2013 3:06:41 PM UTC-6, Mike Harris wrote:

Don't forget about not having SSL on those sites (if even necessary)

Mike

Sooo....    Mike...   why can't we have SSL?  For which sites?   Are you saying that the discourse forum application somehow breaks TLS?   (Totally plausible, I'm just wondering if that's what's being discussed here.)

--
-- ظ

[Mike]

On Fri, Jan 24, 2014 at 9:59 AM, Zancas Dearana
<zan...@leastauthority.com> wrote:
>>
>> On Wednesday, October 2, 2013 3:06:41 PM UTC-6, Mike Harris wrote:
>>>
>>> Don't forget about not having SSL on those sites (if even necessary)
>>>
>>> Mike
>
>
> Sooo.... Mike... why can't we have SSL? For which sites? Are you
> saying that the discourse forum application somehow breaks TLS? (Totally
> plausible, I'm just wondering if that's what's being discussed here.)

Don't exactly remember this whole conversation. I think I was just
pointing out that we only have SSL certs for tinkermill.org and
www.tinkermill.org. We don't have an SSL cert for
forums.tinkermill.org.



--
Mike

[Zancas Dearana]

Point One (Cody and Troy):

"""
To expand on what Cody said we in the Web Dev team see the site as its own maker project. We use some off-the shelf parts, like the operating system and the mail server, but we really do want to enjoy the process of building it as much as we can. Short term if we need a forum to tide us over until we can build one we'll grab something that already exists and put it up.

Troy
"""

Point Two (Scott):

"""

If we could have a custom forum today, I'd go with that, but, we can't yet.

Last thought:  It is a project.  We do make things.  Learning how to do things should be part of this so I'm not at all adverse to a custom site. 

BUT only if it doesn't limit us.  If it limits us, we need to treat it like what it is: a content collection and distribution system with communication capabilities, which means:  get it off the shelf.

Can you build AND maintain a custom site without limiting us?

s

"""

The Win - Win resolution...    Discourse is open source!

Here it is:   https://github.com/discourse/discourse

So we can hack the crap out of it!

--
-- ظ

[Zancas Dearana]

OK..   well shall we get one?

--
-- ظ

[Mike]

Seeing as I'm slowly working my way out of the group, this question should be aimed at other members of the web development group.

[Vishal Verma]

On Fri, Jan 24, 2014 at 10:16 AM, Zancas Dearana
<zan...@leastauthority.com> wrote:
> The Win - Win resolution... Discourse is open source!
>
> Here it is: https://github.com/discourse/discourse
>
> So we can hack the crap out of it!

That is what we're already running at forum.tinkermill.org :)

-V