Google groups and seabirds.net

[Scott A Hatch]

Hi All,

 

This week, Ben Best turned us on to Google Groups, which appears to provide a lot of functionality that can be incorporated directly into seabirds.net.  I'm just learning my way around the 'groups' interface.  It's like the old 'usenet' discussion groups of the '80s and '90s I guess, only web-based and dressier.This appears to be a very new development by the Google people, who are still ironing out the wrinkles.  [For instance, the self-photo upload (personal profile) appears not to be working yet, and this morning all discussion groups were "temporarily unavailable, please try again later"].  Nonetheless, this could be a great tool that saves us a lot of developmental work. 

 

It seems a top-level node for "Disscussion Groups" should be added to seabirds.net, where "snetters" (we may need to come up with a serviceable epithet [not that one] for those who participate in seabirds.net) can browse and join discussion groups pertaining to seabirds.  As of now, Ben has set a group up for seabird databases (seabird-data-dev), which I note already has about 50 members.

 

Grant, it would seem appropriate to set up another discussion group for  'seabirds.net', no?  Why don't you go ahead and do that, and start inviting those you think might be interested to join.

 

One of the advantages of using Google Groups will be that all the discussion threads are permanently archived (I assume) and stored on Google's servers at no cost.

 

The model for the personal profile on Google Groups will be (with enhancements) a good template to copy for the World Directory of Seabird Personnel on seabirds.net.  Rob & Shane (Axiom), what do you think?

 

By emailing seabird-...@googlegroups.com, I assume this message is going out to all 51 people who signed up  for the discussion group on seabird databases (while the discussion group itself is temporarily down), but we'll see.

 

Cheers,

 

Scottt

[Shane StClair (Axiom)]

Hi,

Good eye, Google Groups was actually created to preserve and access
the old newsgroups.

I agree that Groups provides a lot of functionality for free, and that
seabirds.net should leverage as much of these free services as
possible. The one problem that may come up is spam; in the past Google
Groups has been notoriously bad at handling spam, to the point of
losing some of their largest groups (see http://ejohn.org/blog/google-groups-is-dead/).
I'm not sure if these problems have been addressed or will be in the
near future, so this may be a non-issue. However, I'd recommend that
the moderators of both groups keep an eye out.

The Groups profile provides a fine template, and I actually think that
we should explore the possibility of the seabirds.net systems
leveraging existing profiles like Google accounts, OpenID, Facebook,
etc. This is a fairly common practice in modern applications would
allow us to focus on seabird specific profile elements rather than
name/place/picture oriented user management.

Thanks,
Shane

On Sep 25, 8:07 am, Scott A Hatch <sha...@usgs.gov> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
>  
>
> This week, Ben Best turned us on to Google Groups, which appears to provide a lot of functionality that can be incorporated directly into seabirds.net.  I'm just learning my way around the 'groups' interface.  It's like the old 'usenet' discussion groups of the '80s and '90s I guess, only web-based and dressier.This appears to be a very new development by the Google people, who are still ironing out the wrinkles.  [For instance, the self-photo upload (personal profile) appears not to be working yet, and this morning all discussion groups were "temporarily unavailable, please try again later"].  Nonetheless, this could be a great tool that saves us a lot of developmental work. 
>
>  
>
> It seems a top-level node for "Disscussion Groups" should be added to seabirds.net, where "snetters" (we may need to come up with a serviceable epithet [not that one] for those who participate in seabirds.net) can browse and join discussion groups pertaining to seabirds.  As of now, Ben has set a group up for seabird databases (seabird-data-dev), which I note already has about 50 members.
>
>  
>
> Grant, it would seem appropriate to set up another discussion group for  'seabirds.net', no?  Why don't you go ahead and do that, and start inviting those you think might be interested to join.
>
>  
>
> One of the advantages of using Google Groups will be that all the discussion threads are permanently archived (I assume) and stored on Google's servers at no cost.
>
>  
>
> The model for the personal profile on Google Groups will be (with enhancements) a good template to copy for the World Directory of Seabird Personnel on seabirds.net.  Rob & Shane (Axiom), what do you think?
>
>  
>

> By emailingseab...@googlegroups.com, I assume this message is going out to all 51 people who signed up  for the discussion group on seabird databases (while the discussion group itself is temporarily down), but we'll see.
>
>  
>
> Cheers,
>
>  
>
> Scottt