Potentially Useful Comparisons

[Michael Betancourt]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Internet_forum_software

[Michael Betancourt]

On Tuesday, February 2, 2016 at 6:25:07 PM UTC, Michael Betancourt wrote:
> https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Internet_forum_software

Flarum is in beta but it's pretty slick, see https://discuss.flarum.org for an example.

[Daniel Lee]

It doesn't separate it out sections into separate silos, which is what I think is a requirement.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

[Michael Betancourt]

How are separate pages any better than having a filter (like Flarum

does on the left sidebar)?  From a UX perspective they’re almost

equivalent.  Honestly I’m a little lost at exactly what everyone actually

wants in a forum/mailing list.

[Jonah Gabry]

Actually I like this Flarum thing better than anything else I've seen so far. And I agree that having a good filter like it does obviates the need for separate pages. And actually, they are pretty much separate pages, it's just that the first view you see aggregates the posts. Daniel, did you try clicking on one of the individual tags or on the "Tags" link (below "All Discussions")? I actually think it's a pretty nice interface.

[Daniel Lee]

Did you see their list of features they don't have yet? A decent search would be nice?

> On Feb 2, 2016, at 10:19 PM, Jonah Gabry <jga...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Actually I like this Flarum thing better than anything else I've seen so far. And I agree that having a good filter like it does obviates the need for separate pages. And actually, they are pretty much separate pages, it's just that the first view you see aggregates the posts. Daniel, did you try clicking on one of the individual tags or on the "Tags" link (below "All Discussions")? I actually think it's a pretty nice interface.
>

[Jonah Sol Gabry]

I didn't see that. But yeah, it hasn't really been released yet, so still missing stuff.

You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/stan-dev/9nzuF_cx-5E/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Michael Betancourt]

The existing search is pretty solid, but tag-specific search (and tag-specific email digests)

would indeed be nice.  It’s a shame it’s in beta and so many features on still on the horizon

because I don’t see anything that’s anywhere near this nice.

[Bob Carpenter]

I see two goals.

One is getting the right questions to the right people
to answer. And maybe keeping track of what needs to be
answered.

A second is tracking answers in a FAQ-like way so that
we don't have to keep answering the same thing again and again
and it's easier for users to find answers.

And we want to make it understandable to the users so
it doesn't just wind up being a monolithic list again.

That's why I was thinking something on the StackOverflow
model might be good. It's almost always a question
we're fielding and what's hard is a way to organize
the answers for reuse.

And I think it makes sense to separate out the interface
issues (install and API) from the Stan modeling issues.
Same for RStanARM and ShinyStan.

- Bob

[Jonah Sol Gabry]

Yeah, I agree with those goals.

Ok, especially since this Flarum thing is still in beta, maybe the StackOverflow model is the best option at this time.

Jonah

You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/stan-dev/9nzuF_cx-5E/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Daniel Lee]

Bumping this thread.

I think there's an intermediate solution: enable categories on Google Groups.

Google Groups only allows tags or categories, but not both. We are currently using tags.

I propose we switch to using categories. Each thread can only belong to one category at a time. On the board, Bob, Andrew, and I thought we should have this structure:

- modeling

- interfaces

  * CmdStan

  * RStan

  * PyStan

  * Stan.jl

  * StataStan

- rstanarm

Emails directly into the list are not categorized immediately -- someone would have to manually categorize it. We can continue to use emails to reply to threads. I'm not sure if we're going to be able to subscribe to categories, but I'm hopping we can.

Hopefully the users that use the web interface can categorize their own posts. I can categorize a handful a day.

Anyone oppose? Everything will stay the same for us that use email.

Daniel

[Ben Goodrich]

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 9:39:13 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

Bumping this thread.

I think there's an intermediate solution: enable categories on Google Groups.

Google Groups only allows tags or categories, but not both. We are currently using tags.

I think tags have not been very helpful, so it wouldn't take much for categories to be better.
 

I propose we switch to using categories. Each thread can only belong to one category at a time. On the board, Bob, Andrew, and I thought we should have this structure:

- modeling

- interfaces

  * CmdStan

  * RStan

  * PyStan

  * Stan.jl

  * StataStan

- rstanarm

I think "interfaces" is too vague. A lot of people post things like "I have a question about RStan: I am getting this parser error" without realizing they would get the same parser error from any of the interfaces. I would say the top-level category should be "installation" but I don't know if we need to subcategory installation problems by interface. Or maybe by "interfaces" you really mean "interface syntax", in which case subcategorization is probably appropriate but rstanarm would be a distinct interface from rstan in that scheme.
 

Emails directly into the list are not categorized immediately -- someone would have to manually categorize it.

That was one of the problem with tags. Can categories be made mandatory for new threads?

Ben

[Daniel Lee]

On Feb 8, 2016, at 9:49 PM, Ben Goodrich <goodri...@gmail.com> wrote:

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 9:39:13 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

Bumping this thread.

I think there's an intermediate solution: enable categories on Google Groups.

Google Groups only allows tags or categories, but not both. We are currently using tags.

I think tags have not been very helpful, so it wouldn't take much for categories to be better.
 

I propose we switch to using categories. Each thread can only belong to one category at a time. On the board, Bob, Andrew, and I thought we should have this structure:

- modeling

- interfaces

  * CmdStan

  * RStan

  * PyStan

  * Stan.jl

  * StataStan

- rstanarm

I think "interfaces" is too vague. A lot of people post things like "I have a question about RStan: I am getting this parser error" without realizing they would get the same parser error from any of the interfaces. I would say the top-level category should be "installation" but I don't know if we need to subcategory installation problems by interface. Or maybe by "interfaces" you really mean "interface syntax", in which case subcategorization is probably appropriate but rstanarm would be a distinct interface from rstan in that scheme.

Sure. We can just have an installation section. 

 

Emails directly into the list are not categorized immediately -- someone would have to manually categorize it.

That was one of the problem with tags. Can categories be made mandatory for new threads?

Yes, for the web users. If we allow direct email into the list, then new email threads are not categorized. 

Ben

[Ben Goodrich]

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 9:58:33 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

 

Emails directly into the list are not categorized immediately -- someone would have to manually categorize it.

That was one of the problem with tags. Can categories be made mandatory for new threads?

Yes, for the web users. If we allow direct email into the list, then new email threads are not categorized. 

That sounds good. I think there are not so many people who create a new thread by email, but we should try to create a norm that the thread starter should categorize through the web interface after the fact.

Ben

[Ben Goodrich]

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 9:58:33 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

I think "interfaces" is too vague. A lot of people post things like "I have a question about RStan: I am getting this parser error" without realizing they would get the same parser error from any of the interfaces. I would say the top-level category should be "installation" but I don't know if we need to subcategory installation problems by interface. Or maybe by "interfaces" you really mean "interface syntax", in which case subcategorization is probably appropriate but rstanarm would be a distinct interface from rstan in that scheme.

Sure. We can just have an installation section. 

Where should questions about interface syntax go? Right now, there is no category for them.

Ben

[Daniel Lee]

rstanarm has its own section. what else are you talking about?

[Ben Goodrich]

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 10:27:56 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

rstanarm has its own section. what else are you talking about?

I was saying originally that there should be a like a syntax category with subcategories for the interfaces. For example, where would a question like "How do I sample in parallel?" go.

Ben

[Daniel Lee]

Also, you should have the ability to change things around.

[Daniel Lee]

I'm thinking we should have an overall list with specific "installation" and "rstanarm" sections that are separate. Those are the only two big topics that flood the list that aren't really relevant to other conversations.

[Daniel Lee]

I switched it to:

- general

- installation

- rstanarm

[Ben Goodrich]

On Monday, February 8, 2016 at 10:34:03 PM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

I'm thinking we should have an overall list with specific "installation" and "rstanarm" sections that are separate. Those are the only two big topics that flood the list that aren't really relevant to other conversations.

We have had a single digit number of rstanarm threads. But I can see questions involving

1. How do I install $INTERFACE?
2. What is the syntax for something in $INTERFACE?
3. I am using $INTERFACE to estimate a model and I don't understand something

The third is often more of a modeling issue or at least one where the answer has relevance regardless of $INTERFACE. I don't see why (2) and (3) go into the same category unless it $INTERFACE == rstanarm.

[Ben Goodrich]

Who is making the category rstanarm & shinystan? Those are almost completely unrelated sets of questions and even more unrelated answers.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to stan-dev+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.

[Daniel Lee]

That wasn't me. I just called it "rstanarm."

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.

To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Jonah Sol Gabry]

I don't know, but I don't think they should be the same category.

You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/stan-dev/9nzuF_cx-5E/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Ben Goodrich]

On Tuesday, February 9, 2016 at 1:11:04 AM UTC-5, Daniel Lee wrote:

That wasn't me. I just called it "rstanarm."

Then who the fuck is unilaterally changing the global settings for stan-users in the middle of the night?

[Daniel Lee]

Great question. 

[Jonah Sol Gabry]

Probably (hopefully) someone with legit access who's just tinkering around fiddling with the new settings?

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the Google Groups "stan development mailing list" group.
To unsubscribe from this topic, visit https://groups.google.com/d/topic/stan-dev/9nzuF_cx-5E/unsubscribe.
To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to stan-dev+u...@googlegroups.com.

[Ben Goodrich]

On Tuesday, February 9, 2016 at 1:47:10 AM UTC-5, Jonah Gabry wrote:

Probably (hopefully) someone with legit access who's just tinkering around fiddling with the new settings?

Who with legit access would not be aware of the fact that we don't make important Stan decisions without a consensus?
 

[Jonah Sol Gabry]

I don't know, but who without legit access would care enough to change any of it?

--