> From: "Curtis L. Olson" > <snip> (this is a general response to already quoted a few times thread :-))
Hi Curt, PhpBB is one I've heard a lot about and have probably used, but not run. I think it runs on Postgres and others. The Ideal Forum software: It seems to me that the ideal forum software would support both email distribution and email posting, so that folks could use the web interface or their favorite email systems. I've used a very low traffic forum (phpwebsite module) at http://pbpgsql.spiderbark.com (note that spiderbark.com was neglected and just now renewed so it'll be a few hours yet before this site is "up" again). Like many it'll send out email notices of thread updates, but it doesn't allow posting from smtp, and I do not know of any that do. Wouldn't there be one somewhere? In general there are more things I don't like about web forums than things I do like. More than likely it is just short comings in the software I've used. Pluses: - It is nice to view a discussion a page at a time (e.g. non-outline modes). - I use a web based client, but for those that don't it provides access from any Internet connected device with a browser. - It gets high traffic lists out of your inbox. Minuses: - A common thing with forums is that they just keep track of messages new or threads updated since your the visit. I want to see which messages are unread. This would require that the forum software keeps a list of what threads each user has opened and when they opened them. This is the number one problem with web forums in my view. - I guess I'd add to the previous post that the forum should keep usage information in the database, so that I don't get the same old threads showing as updated again when I switch to a different computer. - Search capabilities are usually poor. - The asynchronous nature of mailing lists make them more robust and reliable. If the forum server or anything in between is down you can't read anything and you can't reply to messages. On the other hand you can reply to a mailing list post even if the destination is unreachable (message queues are good). - In-line quoting is pretty much a hassle. - For some reason it appears that posting to the wrong forum occurs more frequently. - For some reason it appears that objectionable postings occur more frequently (greater anonymity?). - Maybe not all that important, but forums usually create a central storage of historical conversation where mailing lists tend to get spread around, so if for some reason a chunk of mail ling list history gets lost, it can more often be found. On the spam thing, I take it you have tried using the usual (e.g. spam assassin) techniques? I can certainly understand the frustration with spam. I'm pretty comfortable and have no problems with the mail myself. On the other hand some others on the list might disagree with my assessment of my personal experience, since a bug in my client is currently failing to send in-reply-to headers. Sorry about the broken threads :-) Best, Jim _______________________________________________ Flightgear-devel mailing list Flightgear-devel@flightgear.org http://mail.flightgear.org/mailman/listinfo/flightgear-devel 2f585eeea02e2c79d7b1d8c4963bae2d
