Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

EarlSmith · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 13:54 Post subject: Survey -- Usergroups

The top of the Forum Page has a usergroups area. Is anyone interested in forming usergroups to allow us to help Barry develop new programs in specific areas?

My specific area of interest is business applications. You may have other interest.

Is anyone else interest in Business applications?

Other groups like Programming, Multimedia, Education, etc. may also like to form user groups. Then not only could we have a discussion area but might be able to take some load off Barry.

Lobster · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 14:04 Post subject:

What is the difference between a topic and a User Group? Embarassed

EarlSmith · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 14:12 Post subject:

Seems to me Lobster, if you had a topic for every usergroup you could end up with a long list of topics. I think of Topics as general areas and usergroups as specific interest areas. Like in my business interest area, you would have all the business interest posts.
I assume that is what the Usergroups area is for.

Flash · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 20:05 Post subject:

Lobster, we won't know what usergroups are or if they might be useful until we try them. Based on what the forum FAQ has to say about them, my guess is they are basically a sub-forum, with moderator(s) appointed by JohnM to control membership and posting privileges for each usergroup. I think they could make the forum much more useful and efficient, especially for the developers.

Pizzasgood · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 21:03 Post subject:

So basically, the big-boys' club. Only the people who are allowed to can post stuff in the club's section. They can also be hidden from other people. That way, the moderators can have their own private sections to devise the cruel and usual punishments for random people. Or plan surprise parties. Or have serious discussions without me and Lobster popping in and offering the peanut gallery's opinions. Smile

Personally, I think they're great for administration, but not for organization. That's what categories and topics are for. Why make it so Joe can't see what's going on, or so Pedro can't comment on it? I want to see everything, but I don't want to have to sign up for twelve usergroups. I just want to come to the forum and check the new stuff. So do Joe and Pedro. Even if the groups are free admission, it still costs time. We have little time to spare. Joe is building a workout room in a centrefuge, Pedro is running for president, and I have homework. Rolling Eyes

Anyway's, do what you like. Maybe I'm missing something that makes them extraordinary. Forums are not my area of expertise.

Flash · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 21:44 Post subject:

Pizza, it depends on how JohnM set them up. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who wanted could join any usergroup - at least until the other group members voted him out. Kind of like "Survivor." Laughing

I thought they might be worth a try. If they cause resentment then they would be counterproductive.

EarlSmith · Posted: Wed 31 Aug 2005, 23:55 Post subject:

Ok, Ok, Ok, I see all of your points. I never wanted a closed, controlled grouping. I only wanted a place to put all the postings that concerned a special interest. One of the problems I have is forgetting where I last saw a certain interesting post. I alway look at all the new posts since my last visit and would like that feature to continue. So maybe we just need a special topic named sub-topics. Can you have sub-topics in topics?

klhrevolutionist · Joined: 08 Jun 2005 Posts: 1124

The wiki can be used in the same way.
All you have to do is scroll down to the bottom and add a comment.
On this page specifically you have to be registered to edit
So if you have registered with the wiki you can edit page also.

BusinessPuppy: http://www.goosee.com/puppy/wikka/BusinessPuppy

So please visit BusinessPuppy
and add comments.
This will aslo help in keeping clutter down in the forum!!!

raffy · Joined: 25 May 2005 Posts: 4636 Location: Manila

Seems like you're voluntering to collect items into a specific category. You can of course create a forum and the categories of that forum. The topics then become the subtopics you refer to. PHPBB is a free feature of budget hosting, so you'll find it easy to put up one. Or you can put up a blog and link to items in this forum that interests you. Blog scripts also come with budget hosting packages.

Lobster · Posted: Thu 01 Sep 2005, 01:15 Post subject:

OK - if you want to try a usergroup then write to John Murga who will set up a user group.

The Power Puppy topic came out of a private group (which I codenamed the "a team") which was devoted to promoting Puppy using marketing expertise.

It had its own exclusive forum. It was this exclusive nature and the approach that prompted us to bring it back into the public arena. There are two other forums that we could develop but to what advantage except to split . . .

For example we used this briefly before this forum was set up
http://puppy.mypunbb.com/

From what people say I see no reason why a topic called "business computing" or whatever can not be started and added to . . .

User groups just seem like a thread and this is why I ask how they are different - it may be that trying them is the best way to answer this.

Flash · Posted: Thu 01 Sep 2005, 01:58 Post subject:

Ian · Posted: Thu 01 Sep 2005, 02:22 Post subject:

Using the old PunBB forum for development ideas might not be a bad idea.

The forum is there, it is open to the public, it does not get much use and is separate from this one.

We could give it a go and see what happens.

I think just starting a new post and then announcing what it is all about on this forum should bring in the people who are interested.

Starting a new section on this forum could lead to unwanted querys about other subjects.

We tried to do something similar in the Wiki but it is not really the proper platform for this kind of thing as it only has a comments section whereas a forum is more usable.

Lobster · Posted: Thu 01 Sep 2005, 03:50 Post subject:

Totally agree with Ian - if the older forum (I think we used it for about 5 days) is used and found useful all well and good. Relevant information and calls for ideas can still be posted here and redirected. Just as the essence of the forum (sans the interaction required to get the knowledge) appears on the wiki.

The wiki is undergoing some radical and welcome shift in emphasis - check out the featured page:

Site Map
http://www.goosee.com/puppy/wikka/SiteMap

Ian · Posted: Thu 01 Sep 2005, 05:34 Post subject:

Ok, I've started a post in the old PunBB forum for developers.

I have put an announcment in the Announcements section in PunBB and a post to start discussion in the Misc section of PupBB.

http://puppy.mypunbb.com/index.php

I have also put an announcement in this forum in the Announcement section.

ozboomer · Posted: Sat 03 Sep 2005, 21:58 Post subject:

Even though it may be a little late in the discussion, I'd like to see some focused discussions over in the 'other' forum.

For example, there might be a 'Desktop' Forum, which is for people interested in the window managers, customization of the desktop using Rox panels, pinboards, etc... and a 'stream of interest' would be a 'topic' within the 'Desktop' forum. So, we might have a 'Window managers: FVWM95' topic in the 'Desktop' forum. We could have a 'Menu Maintenance' topic in there as well.

The idea is the development of Puppy is kept distinct from the 'normal' forums, which are basically for user-to-user discussion, whilst the 'other' forum system is for the developers/contributors to how Puppy works.

One of the problems I've had with this 'new' forum is that there's far too much 'stuff' going on now (all the better for Puppy tho!) and I can't keep-up anymore. However, if we had 'targetted' discussions... or if the idea of 'sub-topics' were possible, users would be able to keep track of discussions going-on in the areas of interest to them. So, if someone was keen on 'Office Products', there might be a forum for that but 'word processing' discussions would be under that as a topic that had many postings... I might want to look at Multimedia > MIDI -type things but couldn't care less about video codecs, etc. I wouldn't have to plough through all of those discussions.

I 'spose it boils down to how much hierarchy we want/can use in the forum software we use... and if people are disciplined enough to keep to using it.

Sorry for the scatterbrained thinking on this post... but I hope you get the idea Smile