On Tue, Mar 31, 2009 at 02:38:21AM +0200, Nikos Alexandris wrote: > One thing that is not that good in MLs are LONG threads as the current > one. It's hard to follow sometimes and people tend to post irrelevant > stuff on a ML-thread or change the subject of it so a new thread starts > when it's not required.
Sound like a deficiency in your mail client. Having a certain Subject is not a criteria for being a thread, that's what Message-Id and References are made for. With mailing lists, the client have all the power to filter, sort, whatever. With forums, you are at the mercy of the forum admin. If he deeems sorting unimportant, well, then you can't sort. Period. > In addition, it's not possible to mark ML-threads as SOLVED. The > latter is, in my humble opinion, a big drawback. Again, a deficiency in the mail client you use. (Esc t D in mutt e.g.) > Fora require more energy to maintain but provide means to organize > information better. On the contrary. In a forum you are bound to use whatever the forum provides, and you have to change habits if you go to another forum. With mails, you can decide what client to use, and there are dozens if not hundreds of them. And they will behave on every mailing list the same. > Of course, the LyX-wiki is very good which fulfills > most of what the ML doesn't satisfy. > > That said, I think a ML + Wiki are enough. Without the wiki, the forum > would be a "must-have". We survived more than a decade without wiki and forum rather well. (And lucky us got a wiki, not a forum later ;-}) All in all I have the impression that Forums are hyped nowadays because people lost the ability to choose (and configure...) mail clients or live in a "the net is a browser world". When I think about it, I might have lost that ability, too. But I keep copying my mail client setup to new machines ;-) Andre'
