Hi On 10 Jun 2009 at 15:14, Scott Haneda wrote:
> Let's see if we can bring this around into something constructive. > > Currently we have: > This mailing list > + Mailing lists provide users a familiar way > to get support > - Does not seem like there is that much support > on this list Who do you expect to get support from? Usually questions are answered by other users or sometimes by developers. The range and complexity of the various combinations of OS and configuration options mean that the questioner may be the only person with that issue. This is a problem in itself, but one that's almost inevitable on a project with a smallish number of active users. > Development mailing list > ~ For developers only Where do you get that from? The only criteria I know of is that if you want to ask questions about the beta versions, it should be on the developers list (previously called the 'testing' list). There's no entry restriction. > + Seems active > - Users will begin to call anything a bug > in order to get support since they can not on > the users list > New Forums > + SF.net login is unlike most other forums > + Confusing login system > + SF.net concerns me with privacy, I can not > delete my data I don't understand the issues you have with the login. I use many online services with similar logins. Privacy is always a concern, but I don't think SF behaves any differently to many other services out there. What particular 'data' are you worried about? Not your list messages or forum postings I hope. > Old Forums > - Convoluted, which forums do I use There are no old forums in operation. There are the 'original' SF forums which have always run alongside the mailing lists, and where any new postings are directed to the new phpBB forums. Then there were were Kevin and Micheal's asspsmtp.org forums - busy and useful, which lasted a bit over a year until they were suddenly shut down last autumn. No trace of those can be accessed now. > ASSP is an amazing tool, the 1.5 branch is one day going to probably > become so darn stable, focus will move to the 2.x branch entirely, and > only bug and security issues will be dealt with. 2.x is also a > different beast. 1.5 has a ton of life in it, and is really ideal for > most users needs. Agreed about assp in general, but I would like the single threaded version (version 1.x) to continue to be developed. > Do we really need to "fork" support? As that is the only weakness I > see with ASSP. Do not get me wrong, I understand this is a group > project, and volunteer driven. How can anyone ask for more free work > from the developers? I certainly am not. It's only us, the users of assp, who can give support to one another. > What I am asking, is that if this is a group project, that > responsibility be dished out by those in the power to do so. Who made > the above decisions on the lists and forums? Particularly on a project like this, developers come and go. As do active users. Look at the credits in the opening block of assp.pl to see how many. With each new arrival a different emphasis begins, and new preferences in the area of support and new releases. Fritz has done great work incorporating many new features, but he prefers not to use SF for cvs or bug tracking. That's his choice. > Why chose such a > fragmented method, one that is hostile to the end user getting the > support they need. This is very much a two way street, without the > users, no bugs would be found, no bugs would be fixed, and ASSP would > have to die. No one wants that. Is it fragmented or does it just offer a choice? Some prefer mailing lists while others like forums. We have just had a month when the main developer has not been on this list (for one reason or another), and you are questioning the viability of the project because of that! Surely a bit OTT. > One problem I see, is it will not be long, before someone does a > little fork of their own, of the 1.5 branch. Buys a 1U server case, > stuffs it with a few GB of memory, a SSD, installs some linux distro > on it, and sells a Barracuda killer. It very much would kill the > Barracuda in how well it works. This person only need provide > technical support. So you charge 400.00 for the hardware, and 500.00 > a year for technical support. This is not unreasonable, and many > people would pay. I'm not sure what point this makes. > ASSP can not move forward unless people feel they > can get support. No matter how good it is (software), there are many > companies that need to know there is support. ASSP will miss those > that need official support, but there are more than enough that can > look at the support activity, and feel safe in using it. Looking at > that support activity now, one may be a little worried. > > This is so easily solved, someone with the power just needs to > delegate to someone here and give them the ability to help. Are you saying that supporting a project like assp is an easy task? > 1) Merge the forums and mailing list. I suggest moving it to google > groups. They offer mailing lists that are transparent, and appear to > the casual user as a forum *or* a mailing list. You need not use a > gmail account, you can use any email you like. You can use it as a > forum, and get the help of the forum and the mailing list, or you can > use it as a mailing list and get the help of those using it as a > forum. This merges all forums and mailing lists for end users into > one place. Done. This has been discussed before. > Google groups allows an entry page to contain links and other data. > This could be a good place to store links to the downloads, and > whatever else a user may need access to. > > Having a stronger community, will for sure, inspire more people to > stick around and help others. Just make sure that the other admins > have the admin control on the google mailing list, so no one can run > off with it. It would be owned by the ASSP project. > > 2) Look at what can be done to SF.net to help users. If that means > finding a way to get them to create a policy by which users can delete > their account, then we must do so. Data privacy is a concern to many, > and a barrier. If they do not cooperate, or do not have plans for > openID, or some other way to give me, the user, control of my own > data, we must look to another provider. Please take this up with SF - they have their own discussion areas covering all projects. The 'apps' section, which the forum and the wiki use, is quite new, and there's no reason why your suggestions couldn't be welcomed. There are also wordpress and other apps available. And incidentally, they were one of the first with openID. > Great example: > http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=69172 > Click download, takes me to some page, where there is a an options > box. Is my download happening? No, so I click on the zip link, and > am jumped around all over the place. 20 seconds later, my download > starts. I am far from the only person to say this SF.net download > page is terrible. Bit of a cheap shot isn't it? Sure it has its problems, but SF has to be all things to all projects. And there are a lot of them. Some have different binaries for different platforms, so need possibilities after clicking the download link. It's mirrored all round the world as well. assp is fortunate to be a single file release. I'm not a mod, but I don't think there's much anyone can do to ease the project pages - again, open a dialog direct with SF about this. > 3) Bug tracker. If I am wrong, and there is one, ignore this. If > there is not one, why? This is mandatory. Right now, I have no idea > where to report bugs. I have posted them here, I have emailed them in > directly. I had a semi-long talk about a bug in private email. The > bug came up on the dev mailing list, and was accepted as new and not > known about. But I already spent time reporting it in the past. > Email to a developer that I randomly chose off the Project Member page > is not a bug reporting system. It is a poor way to manage but > reports, and wastes developer time. There's no reason why you shouldn't post here and email Fritz. Post here any response too. > Users should report bugs, users should test and confirm those bugs. > Once users do their part, a developer can look into the tracker, and > list all confirmed by users bugs, and work on those, not wasting time > with new users who do not know the difference from a bug and a config > error. > > 3a) Changelogs, are there any, or are updates always fire and forget, > hope for the best? Fritz posts changelogs on his site with beta releases. He also mention major bugs which have been sorted. These should get transferred to the SF site when releases are made. > 4) iworld.de/homes/assp/ > What is this place? There is a beautiful wiki, this data needs to > move to there, where users can maintain it. This is more of the > fragmentation I talked about earlier, and it is so simple to solve. That is where Fritz posts beta versions. There's no need to go there if you are not after the latest version. I have no problem with that. > 5) Home page ( http://assp.sourceforge.net/ ) > Let's talk about nuking this, and putting it front and center in the > wiki, and moving the wiki into that url. Or get a assp url for all > this stuff. This is again, more fragmentation. Wiki's are made for > users to be able to contribute, it works, it removes burden from the > developers. Please contribute to the wiki. Pages need contributors and maintainers, and the project page is no different. Post specific suggestions - it could do with a makeover. It's almost as if someone took the colour out of it as a challenge to the rest of us to improve it! > //// > I looked into RSS on the phpBB forums, it is not turned on or the > SF.net version does not have it. I see now way of consolidating that > data. There is not really that much data in there. I would bet, a > small handful of us passionate users would be more than willing to re- > post it through to a google groups list. I would bet a small script > parsing over the database dump could do it as well. > > I think that sums up most of my issues in a constructive way. The > biggest problem, I have no idea who I even ask to see if the above > ideas are something that can be tried. I can take it on my own, and > fragment even more, in the hopes that my fragmentation becomes the > main source, but I sure as heck would love to avoid that, and just > allow users to help. Thanks for the ideas. I think the forums are too new to be discarded already without giving them a chance and it's a fair bet that not everyone would be keen to move everything to google groups. The main issue is trying to beef up support on the users' list for those who don't like or are unhappy with the forums. I know Fritz has tried to find someone to take on his role on the list, and I presume so far without success. I try to help when I can, but I'm not always able to keep up with all the traffic. Others may be able to help, but like Fritz, don't have english as their first language and are put off. So whatever happens, can we all try to help one another, and give some slack to those who may seem a bit sharp or struggle with the language. It's still a great project. paul ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Crystal Reports - New Free Runtime and 30 Day Trial Check out the new simplified licensing option that enables unlimited royalty-free distribution of the report engine for externally facing server and web deployment. http://p.sf.net/sfu/businessobjects _______________________________________________ Assp-user mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/assp-user
