Dear all,
Brief Summary: BioKlatch (http://www.BioKlatch.com) is a new web forum meant to supplement mailing lists. It uses software that's popular with mathematicians and software developers on http://mathoverflow.com and http://stackoverflow.com. A post can be given multiple tags such as "crystallography", "protein-purification", and "immunology". It's easy to see which questions have not been answered, and then users can step up to answer them. It's easy to search, and the system automatically looks for similar questions before a new one is posted. The word "klatch" comes from German, and in English means "an informal gathering". Typically it's used in the phrase "coffee klatch". It's the closest synonym to "forum" I could find which wasn't taken. It's nearly impossible finding a domain name in 2010. Details: BioKlatch isn't about replacing mailing lists. Among other things, it's meant to give a home to questions which don't fit within the scope of existing lists. For example, a lot of protein purification questions are posted to ccp4bb. Nobody seems to mind (I like seeing them), but my hunch is that a lot of people don't ask questions because they don't want to be off-topic. BioKlatch also attempts to increase participation by the community. There certainly are a lot more crystallographers in the world than those who participate on ccp4bb. On BioKlatch, you can post questions and give answers without even signing up for the site. There are no hoops to jump through to make a simple post. It uses software popular in the mathematics, astronomy, and software development communities. It's been quite a success in those fields, and I wish I had written the software myself. I merely set it up. It's different from other forum software out there and is generally very well liked. Here are questions tagged "crystallography" that I pulled from a list of unanswered questions on ccp4bb, with permission granted by the original authors: http://www.bioklatch.com/questions/tagged/crystallography Key points: ** When you post a new question, it automatically searches for previously asked questions. This avoids duplicates. ** It's easy to see which questions haven't already been answered. People may then step up to provide an answer. ** Questions can be given relevant tags. You only have to pay attention to tags which interest you, and tags can be followed by RSS readers like Google Reader. ** Questions can be edited by power users for clarity. ** Good answers and good posts are awarded points by other users, which seems to encourage quality. At least where this software is used elsewhere, certain users enjoy trying to accumulate as many points as possible. See http://mathoverflow.net/users. ** Greek letters are supported for equations. Other non-English letters are supported for that matter. See http://bit.ly/6bc4YF. ** Program output can be formatted and offset from the text of your post. See http://bit.ly/6RhRct. ** Email addresses are never made public. Spammers cannot get your email address from BioKlatch. The Great Leap Forward is that BioKlatch uses OpenID to sign on. You can post to the site without signing up, but an account gives you capabilities such as creating new tags. If you don't want to use an existing OpenID account (Google, Yahoo, etc.), then you can easily create one on http://www.myopenid.com. Then use that account to sign onto BioKlatch. If you're not familiar with it, OpenID lets you use one account to sign onto thousands of participating sites without sharing your password with them. The NIH uses OpenID in a pilot program, so if you're a researcher in the US you may need one in the future anyhow. It takes a few brain cycles to see the light about OpenID, but the benefits soon become apparent. The software is not open source, so I can't make any changes to it. It's also not free, so at some point when the beta period ends I'll have to come up with a way to defray the cost, perhaps through a sponsorship or ads. I'm told that's what the other scientific communities plan on doing. Feel free to take a look and let me know of any comments. Also feel free to post something you've had on your mind, but for whatever reason haven't sent to a mailing list. Again, you don't even need an account for that. Nearly all of the posts up there were unanswered on ccp4bb. Some authors received responses via private email, but said they wouldn't mind getting a few more answers. So, any answers given would likely be much appreciated. If you see a useful question or answer, give it an up vote. Most of all, have fun with it. Regards, Matt P.S. The first few posts were made to just test the system out and have been already discussed at length on ccp4bb (e.g. http://bit.ly/7yw2cy).
