Re: Say hello to Discourse! | KDE's new forum
Congratulations for making the switch. The new forum is a refreshing place. Thank you for creating this and for the efforts of the team in pushing this and testing it initially. Also thanks particularly to the KDE sysadmins. On मंगलवार, 4 अप्रैल 2023 2:41:46 PM IST Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss wrote: > Hello KDE community! > > As many of you know, KDE is now using Discourse as its forum. If you > haven't already, sign up and try it out here: > >https://discuss.kde.org/ > > The forum provides new opportunities for community building and sharing > information between contributors and across projects. Here developers > can brainstorm new ideas, plan new features, announce updates, > collaborate, recruit and onboard new contributors, banter, and generally > interact closely with the people who actively contribute to KDE, as well > as fellow users. It is a place to keep everyone, whether contributor or > user, informed about the exciting work you are doing at KDE. > > The previous forum is still available, but the archived contents are > read-only. Please note: this means we will need to replace references to > forum.kde.org in the KDE codebase soon so people reach the correct forum > (H/T fusionfuture): > > https://lxr.kde.org/search?%21v=kf5-qt5&_filestring=&_string=forum.kde.org > > As the internal communications project develops, Discourse may become a > key channel going forward. > > Cheers, > Joseph -- Raghavendra Kamath emblik.studio
Say hello to Discourse! | KDE's new forum
Hello KDE community! As many of you know, KDE is now using Discourse as its forum. If you haven't already, sign up and try it out here: https://discuss.kde.org/ The forum provides new opportunities for community building and sharing information between contributors and across projects. Here developers can brainstorm new ideas, plan new features, announce updates, collaborate, recruit and onboard new contributors, banter, and generally interact closely with the people who actively contribute to KDE, as well as fellow users. It is a place to keep everyone, whether contributor or user, informed about the exciting work you are doing at KDE. The previous forum is still available, but the archived contents are read-only. Please note: this means we will need to replace references to forum.kde.org in the KDE codebase soon so people reach the correct forum (H/T fusionfuture): https://lxr.kde.org/search?%21v=kf5-qt5&_filestring=&_string=forum.kde.org As the internal communications project develops, Discourse may become a key channel going forward. Cheers, Joseph -- Joseph P. De Veaugh-Geiss KDE Internal Communications & KDE Eco Community Manager OpenPGP: 8FC5 4178 DC44 AD55 08E7 DF57 453E 5746 59A6 C06F Matrix: @joseph:kde.org Generally available Monday-Thursday from 10-16h CET/CEST. Outside of these times it may take a little longer for me to respond. KDE Eco: Building Energy-Efficient Free Software! Website: https://eco.kde.org Mastodon: @be4foss@floss.social
Re: discourse testing
Good morning! Since my last email we've made various improvements as suggestions came in. If we forgot to action something please give @sitter or @carl a ping. We've now also enabled site-local registration as well as login using google, facebook, and github. Please give this a good testing if you intend to use one of those options. So far the reception was quite favorable, so we intend to conclude testing soon. This is your last call to tell us what you think of the new forum and what we maybe should be fixing still. As ever, feel free to use the forum to tell us :) There's also the not so trivial matter of how to migrate from one forum to the other and I'd greatly appreciate your input: https://discuss.kde.org/t/transition-from-old-forum/148 HS
Re: discourse testing
On Sunday, 1 January 2023 11:52:54 CET Harald Sitter wrote: > I'm actually not sure what that is about. Maybe Carl knows? > > On Sat, Dec 31, 2022 at 2:40 PM Grzegorz Szymaszek wrote: > > Hi, > > > > When trying to register, I’ve got the Email, Username and Name filled > > out from (most likely) Invent. The fourth field, Invent Profile, is > > empty. Could you explain what is the purpose of that field, what one is > > expected to type there? Thanks in advance! I just put in the URL of my public invent profile: https://invent.kde.org/paulb and it worked. Cheers Paul -- Promotion & Communication www: http://kde.org Mastodon: https://floss.social/@kde Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kde
Re: discourse testing
I'm actually not sure what that is about. Maybe Carl knows? On Sat, Dec 31, 2022 at 2:40 PM Grzegorz Szymaszek wrote: > > Hi, > > When trying to register, I’ve got the Email, Username and Name filled > out from (most likely) Invent. The fourth field, Invent Profile, is > empty. Could you explain what is the purpose of that field, what one is > expected to type there? Thanks in advance! > > > All the best > > -- > Grzegorz
Re: discourse testing
Hi, When trying to register, I’ve got the Email, Username and Name filled out from (most likely) Invent. The fourth field, Invent Profile, is empty. Could you explain what is the purpose of that field, what one is expected to type there? Thanks in advance! All the best -- Grzegorz signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: discourse testing
On Friday, 30 December 2022 12:12:42 CET Harald Sitter wrote: > Hello my dearies, > > at last; the day has come! We are testing discourse as new forum > software. Best. Xmas present. ever. -- Promotion & Communication www: http://kde.org Mastodon: https://floss.social/@kde Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kde
Re: discourse testing
<3 On Fri, Dec 30, 2022 at 11:13 AM Harald Sitter wrote: > Hello my dearies, > > at last; the day has come! We are testing discourse as new forum > software. I'd like to invite you to give it a bit of testing so we can > figure out problems or annoyances we have with it. This is currently > limited to people with an invent account while we do internal testing > - don't bother creating one if you don't have one, in due time we'll > allow easier to use login options. > > https://discuss.kde.org/ > > It'd be grand if you could maybe do some discussion, try the chat, > whatever else that comes to mind. You can start discussions on > problems you find in the site feedback category: > https://discuss.kde.org/c/site-feedback/2 > > I've also set you up with three discussions to have, it'd be lovely if > you could vote and throw in a comment or two: > > https://discuss.kde.org/t/leave-chat-enabled/21 > https://discuss.kde.org/t/import-old-forum/22 > > https://discuss.kde.org/t/evaluate-discourse-as-replacement-for-mailing-lists/23 > > Lastly, not all target features are currently enabled: > - mailing list-style use is not yet enabled > - direct registration and login via facebook,github,google accounts is > missing > > I'll keep you posted as things change. > > HS >
discourse testing
Hello my dearies, at last; the day has come! We are testing discourse as new forum software. I'd like to invite you to give it a bit of testing so we can figure out problems or annoyances we have with it. This is currently limited to people with an invent account while we do internal testing - don't bother creating one if you don't have one, in due time we'll allow easier to use login options. https://discuss.kde.org/ It'd be grand if you could maybe do some discussion, try the chat, whatever else that comes to mind. You can start discussions on problems you find in the site feedback category: https://discuss.kde.org/c/site-feedback/2 I've also set you up with three discussions to have, it'd be lovely if you could vote and throw in a comment or two: https://discuss.kde.org/t/leave-chat-enabled/21 https://discuss.kde.org/t/import-old-forum/22 https://discuss.kde.org/t/evaluate-discourse-as-replacement-for-mailing-lists/23 Lastly, not all target features are currently enabled: - mailing list-style use is not yet enabled - direct registration and login via facebook,github,google accounts is missing I'll keep you posted as things change. HS
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Sat, 13 Mar 2021, 11:25 am Ingo Klöcker, wrote: > On Freitag, 12. März 2021 21:44:09 CET Carl Schwan wrote: > > Le vendredi, mars 12, 2021 7:49 PM, Ben Cooksley a > > écrit : > > > It also isn't as simple as just adding more server resources, as in > some > > > cases the place something will be moving from is a donated machine, and > > > we prefer to ensure these are well utilised - meaning something needs > to > > > move back there in response. We also prefer to move services as little > as > > > possible to minimize downtime. If we were to simply add more machines, > > > then we would end up with empty donated machines - which is a waste of > > > the donation, as well as not the best use of eV resources. > > > > I'm not sure I fully understand your last point. If we add a new machine > for > > a new service this shouldn't create an empty donated machine. I'm not > > really an expert in things related to sysadmins but looking at the price > at > > for VPS in Hetzner that should be able to handle a service similar to > > krita-artists.org in term of storage shouldn't cost the e.V. more than > €15 > > a month. I think the e.V. can afford that to provide a lively place for > the > > community to ask questions and discuss things related to KDE. > The problem isn't that we don't have capacity within the existing systems - we do. It's just that the workloads are currently deployed in a manner that means Discourse isn't able to be deployed on the machines that do have capacity. With regards to my points above, we are currently in the process of moving scripty and l10n.kde.org to a new, bigger system. Following that the machine which was running them will be empty and available for redeployment, subject to fitting within the limits of that system (which is donated). If we were to get a machine specifically for this role, then we would leave that machine empty and unused. > I'm pretty sure that neither hardware nor money is the problem. The > problem is > that each additional server increases the maintenance burden/cost. And > since > we are applying for the Blauer Engel certification, we should also try to > minimize energy consumption and consumption of resources. > This as well - it is definitely preferrable to keep the number of systems we operate to a minimum. > Regards, > Ingo > Cheers, Ben >
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Freitag, 12. März 2021 21:44:09 CET Carl Schwan wrote: > Le vendredi, mars 12, 2021 7:49 PM, Ben Cooksley a > écrit : > > It also isn't as simple as just adding more server resources, as in some > > cases the place something will be moving from is a donated machine, and > > we prefer to ensure these are well utilised - meaning something needs to > > move back there in response. We also prefer to move services as little as > > possible to minimize downtime. If we were to simply add more machines, > > then we would end up with empty donated machines - which is a waste of > > the donation, as well as not the best use of eV resources. > > I'm not sure I fully understand your last point. If we add a new machine for > a new service this shouldn't create an empty donated machine. I'm not > really an expert in things related to sysadmins but looking at the price at > for VPS in Hetzner that should be able to handle a service similar to > krita-artists.org in term of storage shouldn't cost the e.V. more than €15 > a month. I think the e.V. can afford that to provide a lively place for the > community to ask questions and discuss things related to KDE. I'm pretty sure that neither hardware nor money is the problem. The problem is that each additional server increases the maintenance burden/cost. And since we are applying for the Blauer Engel certification, we should also try to minimize energy consumption and consumption of resources. Regards, Ingo signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Le vendredi, mars 12, 2021 7:49 PM, Ben Cooksley a écrit : > On Sat, Mar 13, 2021 at 3:39 AM Nate Graham wrote: > > > On 3/8/21 1:55 AM, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > > On Mon, Mar 8, 2021 at 2:55 AM Nate Graham > > I think doing GitLab stuff first makes sense in terms of usage of your > > > time. On that subject, I notice that both Jonathan and Carl (CC'd) > > >have > > > offered to handle setting up the test Discourse instance, or assist > > > with > > > it. Perhaps we can do them in parallel, and accomplish a bit of > > > Sysadmin > > > onboarding too. :) What do you think? > > > > > > > > > We'll need to investigate the capacity and capability of our servers > > > first to choose one that can potentially handle this (which as noted > > > earlier, is substantially constrained by the demand of the Discourse > > > developers to use Docker). > > > > Is that something that can only be done by you, or is anyone else > > available for it? Might this be a good onboarding opportunity? > > I'm afraid this is a task that can only be done by the existing members, as > it requires broad overview of a number of bits of information including: > - The current load base of our systems (ie. whether the system is currently > at capacity) > - The type of server in question (bare metal vs. virtual machine, along with > the type of the underlying hardware - HDD vs. NVMe SSD for instance) > - The nature of other workloads on the machine (both in terms of security, as > well as the load they generate as part of operating) > - The geographic location of the server in question (as we can't locate PII > outside of the EU) > > To use an example, all of the physical machines we rent from Hetzner are > deployed using LXC, and all run multiple workloads. As such, any new service > deployed on one of these servers must be both compatible with deployment > inside an LXC container, as well as compatible with the workloads on those > machines. As the Discourse developers demand the use of Docker, all of these > machines are incompatible and cannot be used for this. > > Looking at our other machines with sufficient resources, many of them have > other issues which limit them here. > > Often what we will need to do is rebalance workloads, shifting them around to > different servers in order to resolve the problem, which does mean it can > take longer than people would prefer to get things done. This is why many of > the issues I noted in my earlier email have dependencies between them. > > To use a recent example here, we've wanted for some time to shutdown Mimi - > which hosted our Python and Ruby web applications. The move of these > applications elsewhere however was blocked by compatibility issues > surrounding one of the Ruby applications, which was recently resolved. Once > that had been cleared, we then needed somewhere to move them. As another > machine, Hepta, was only hosting WebSVN (which took most of it's disk space, > preventing it from hosting anything else immediately) we opted to move WebSVN > to one of our US based servers (which due to being US based can't handle PII, > which our Ruby/Python apps have to be able to handle). Following that, we > were able to then move the Ruby/Python applications to Hepta. > > It also isn't as simple as just adding more server resources, as in some > cases the place something will be moving from is a donated machine, and we > prefer to ensure these are well utilised - meaning something needs to move > back there in response. We also prefer to move services as little as possible > to minimize downtime. If we were to simply add more machines, then we would > end up with empty donated machines - which is a waste of the donation, as > well as not the best use of eV resources. I'm not sure I fully understand your last point. If we add a new machine for a new service this shouldn't create an empty donated machine. I'm not really an expert in things related to sysadmins but looking at the price at for VPS in Hetzner that should be able to handle a service similar to krita-artists.org in term of storage shouldn't cost the e.V. more than €15 a month. I think the e.V. can afford that to provide a lively place for the community to ask questions and discuss things related to KDE. Cheers, Carl > > > > In the meantime, it will be interesting to see how the discussion plays > > > out in the issue as there has been some interesting commentary already. > > > > Seems like the discussion has tapered off with Discourse mostly being > > the preferred choice. Other alternatives brought up there seem to be too > > immature or not projected to fully meet our needs. > > > > Nate > > Cheers, > Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Sat, Mar 13, 2021 at 3:39 AM Nate Graham wrote: > On 3/8/21 1:55 AM, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > On Mon, Mar 8, 2021 at 2:55 AM Nate Graham > I think doing GitLab stuff first makes sense in terms of usage of > your > > time. On that subject, I notice that both Jonathan and Carl (CC'd) > have > > offered to handle setting up the test Discourse instance, or assist > > with > > it. Perhaps we can do them in parallel, and accomplish a bit of > > Sysadmin > > onboarding too. :) What do you think? > > > > > > We'll need to investigate the capacity and capability of our servers > > first to choose one that can potentially handle this (which as noted > > earlier, is substantially constrained by the demand of the Discourse > > developers to use Docker). > > Is that something that can only be done by you, or is anyone else > available for it? Might this be a good onboarding opportunity? > I'm afraid this is a task that can only be done by the existing members, as it requires broad overview of a number of bits of information including: - The current load base of our systems (ie. whether the system is currently at capacity) - The type of server in question (bare metal vs. virtual machine, along with the type of the underlying hardware - HDD vs. NVMe SSD for instance) - The nature of other workloads on the machine (both in terms of security, as well as the load they generate as part of operating) - The geographic location of the server in question (as we can't locate PII outside of the EU) To use an example, all of the physical machines we rent from Hetzner are deployed using LXC, and all run multiple workloads. As such, any new service deployed on one of these servers must be both compatible with deployment inside an LXC container, as well as compatible with the workloads on those machines. As the Discourse developers demand the use of Docker, all of these machines are incompatible and cannot be used for this. Looking at our other machines with sufficient resources, many of them have other issues which limit them here. Often what we will need to do is rebalance workloads, shifting them around to different servers in order to resolve the problem, which does mean it can take longer than people would prefer to get things done. This is why many of the issues I noted in my earlier email have dependencies between them. To use a recent example here, we've wanted for some time to shutdown Mimi - which hosted our Python and Ruby web applications. The move of these applications elsewhere however was blocked by compatibility issues surrounding one of the Ruby applications, which was recently resolved. Once that had been cleared, we then needed somewhere to move them. As another machine, Hepta, was only hosting WebSVN (which took most of it's disk space, preventing it from hosting anything else immediately) we opted to move WebSVN to one of our US based servers (which due to being US based can't handle PII, which our Ruby/Python apps have to be able to handle). Following that, we were able to then move the Ruby/Python applications to Hepta. It also isn't as simple as just adding more server resources, as in some cases the place something will be moving from is a donated machine, and we prefer to ensure these are well utilised - meaning something needs to move back there in response. We also prefer to move services as little as possible to minimize downtime. If we were to simply add more machines, then we would end up with empty donated machines - which is a waste of the donation, as well as not the best use of eV resources. > > > In the meantime, it will be interesting to see how the discussion plays > > out in the issue as there has been some interesting commentary already. > > Seems like the discussion has tapered off with Discourse mostly being > the preferred choice. Other alternatives brought up there seem to be too > immature or not projected to fully meet our needs. > > > Nate > Cheers, Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 3/8/21 1:55 AM, Ben Cooksley wrote: On Mon, Mar 8, 2021 at 2:55 AM Nate Graham I think doing GitLab stuff first makes sense in terms of usage of your time. On that subject, I notice that both Jonathan and Carl (CC'd) have offered to handle setting up the test Discourse instance, or assist with it. Perhaps we can do them in parallel, and accomplish a bit of Sysadmin onboarding too. :) What do you think? We'll need to investigate the capacity and capability of our servers first to choose one that can potentially handle this (which as noted earlier, is substantially constrained by the demand of the Discourse developers to use Docker). Is that something that can only be done by you, or is anyone else available for it? Might this be a good onboarding opportunity? In the meantime, it will be interesting to see how the discussion plays out in the issue as there has been some interesting commentary already. Seems like the discussion has tapered off with Discourse mostly being the preferred choice. Other alternatives brought up there seem to be too immature or not projected to fully meet our needs. Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Mon, Mar 8, 2021 at 2:55 AM Nate Graham wrote: > On 3/6/21 10:35 PM, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 3:51 AM Nate Graham > <mailto:n...@kde.org>> wrote:> > > Ben, can we get Discourse added to the Sysadmin task queue? Again, no > > pressure regarding schedule, but can we get it added there just for > > work-tracking purposes? > > > > > > I've now added https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/31 > > <https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/31> for this. > > > In terms of scheduling it is currently behind [stuff] > > > Thanks Ben! Much appreciated. > > I think doing GitLab stuff first makes sense in terms of usage of your > time. On that subject, I notice that both Jonathan and Carl (CC'd) have > offered to handle setting up the test Discourse instance, or assist with > it. Perhaps we can do them in parallel, and accomplish a bit of Sysadmin > onboarding too. :) What do you think? > We'll need to investigate the capacity and capability of our servers first to choose one that can potentially handle this (which as noted earlier, is substantially constrained by the demand of the Discourse developers to use Docker). In the meantime, it will be interesting to see how the discussion plays out in the issue as there has been some interesting commentary already. > > Nate > Cheers, Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 3/6/21 10:35 PM, Ben Cooksley wrote: On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 3:51 AM Nate Graham <mailto:n...@kde.org>> wrote:> Ben, can we get Discourse added to the Sysadmin task queue? Again, no pressure regarding schedule, but can we get it added there just for work-tracking purposes? I've now added https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/31 <https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/31> for this. In terms of scheduling it is currently behind [stuff] Thanks Ben! Much appreciated. I think doing GitLab stuff first makes sense in terms of usage of your time. On that subject, I notice that both Jonathan and Carl (CC'd) have offered to handle setting up the test Discourse instance, or assist with it. Perhaps we can do them in parallel, and accomplish a bit of Sysadmin onboarding too. :) What do you think? Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 3:51 AM Nate Graham wrote: > On 3/6/21 6:54 AM, Clemens Toennies wrote: > > Maybe it's an indication that putting monetary resources into these > > infrastructure projects (especially in light of KDE's current job hire > > initiative) would be a good idea? > > > > To be clear, this is not to say anything about the imo outstanding jobs > > of the current voluntaries. > > I've suggested it the past, and I believe this thread suggests that the > amount of work exceeds the available resources by a significant margin, > which reinforcing the proposal. > > Ben, can we get Discourse added to the Sysadmin task queue? Again, no > pressure regarding schedule, but can we get it added there just for > work-tracking purposes? > I've now added https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/31 for this. In terms of scheduling it is currently behind: - https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/23 (Retirement of Micrea) - https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/28 (Replacement of l10n servers) - https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/30 (Overhaul work on transactional email and our DNS infrastructure) - https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/27 (Transferring some services around) Most of those items should be fairly straight forward and completed within the next two weeks, although three of those are reliant on external parties responding to us promptly. Once those items are completed, we'll likely be focusing on Gitlab CI (represented by #10, #9 and #7). At this point I had expected our queue to be reasonably empty of bigger tasks, however unfortunately Nextcloud have forced our hand with their requirement of MySQL 8 in Nextcloud 21 (tracked in https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues/25). While seeming straight forward, the required change to MySQL 8 by Nextcloud will necessitate a complete system rebuild for three of our servers - Nicoda, Edulis and Komaci, which between them host the vast majority of our sites including www.kde.org, dot.kde.org, forum.kde.org, userbase.kde.org, krita.org and bugs.kde.org. This is not something we had planned to do so soon, but regretfully we will be forced to do so by Nextcloud as we need to have this completed before Nextcloud 20 goes End of Life in October 2021 (suffice to say, i'm extremely displeased with Nextcloud as the warning notice for this only appeared in the last month - this being on top of them not yet having a solution to the issues we had with the realtime text editor during Akademy 2020) > > Nate > Cheers, Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 3/6/21 6:54 AM, Clemens Toennies wrote: Maybe it's an indication that putting monetary resources into these infrastructure projects (especially in light of KDE's current job hire initiative) would be a good idea? To be clear, this is not to say anything about the imo outstanding jobs of the current voluntaries. I've suggested it the past, and I believe this thread suggests that the amount of work exceeds the available resources by a significant margin, which reinforcing the proposal. Ben, can we get Discourse added to the Sysadmin task queue? Again, no pressure regarding schedule, but can we get it added there just for work-tracking purposes? Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Maybe it's an indication that putting monetary resources into these infrastructure projects (especially in light of KDE's current job hire initiative) would be a good idea? To be clear, this is not to say anything about the imo outstanding jobs of the current voluntaries. On Feb 23, 2021 23:53, "Ben Cooksley" wrote: > On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 11:26 AM Nate Graham wrote: > >> Hello faithful Sysadmins (with kde-community and Adam CCd), >> > > Hi Nate, > > >> >> I would like to formally request that a KDE discourse instance be set up >> as a testbed for now, with the ultimate goal of replacing the somewhat >> moribund forums.kde.org if people prefer it. >> >> Over the years I've seen this suggested multiple times by multiple >> people, but without much movement. Since then, the Krita people have set >> up a Discourse instance themselves, outside of KDE infrastructure. Many >> other FOSS communities already use Discourse, including Debian, Ubuntu, >> Fedora, Manjaro, GNOME, and Mozilla. >> >> I think it's time for us to follow suit and set up an official discourse >> instance on KDE Infrastructure. >> >> Last I heard, there was an objection based on the fact that its >> deployment mechanism requires Docker. I don't care much for Docker >> myself, but if it's the only way to set up Discourse, I think it's time >> to bite the bullet and use it despite reservations, so we can facilitate >> this longstanding request from the KDE community. >> > > May I take this as a formal request from yourself that Gitlab CI is > deprioritised and delayed? > > Based on the extremely frequent requests we get concerning it in > #kde-sysadmin I am not sure if your request here is in line with general > community consensus. > > Also, be aware that Sysadmin currently has other infrastructure level > projects underway needed to get us off Ubuntu 16.04, which are currently > delayed because we haven't had anyone volunteer to assist us with adding > support for OAuth2/MyKDE to Reimbursements. > Based on the above, I assume you are also requesting that we delay this, > and accept the corresponding security issues that will accompany it when > Ubuntu 16.04 loses support in the coming months in order to get this > actioned? > > >> >> Nate >> > > Regards, > Ben >
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 2/28/21 3:17 AM, Ben Cooksley wrote: I've now filled in most of the items i'm aware of at https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues <https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues> Ah nice. Can we get Discourse added to that task list? As Eike said earlier, this would not imply prioritization, but it would be good to have it written down somewhere as planned work. Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Greetings, Thank you for bringing this up Nate. The previous decade surely hasn't been phpBB's best. I must thank Eike for his wise reply. I also fail to see anything unacceptable about Nate's request. But I will still thank everyone for avoiding further damage, and because you all inspired me - albeit likely involuntarily - to blog a geekultural essay which I hope will make this "diskourse" (pun intended) even more konstruktive. I'm attaching here its essence, an algorithm in the form of pseudo-Java. Coming back to Nate's request, I've never used Discourse yet, but I'm confident that Discourse and phpBB are currently the 2 best free software forum engines available. And the wind has clearly turned in Discourse's favor. That being said, to my knowledge Debian does *not* use Discourse. In fact, at this time, Debian does not even *package* Discourse (although to be fair, it no longer packages phpBB neither - it hasn't since the previous stable release). One tool I do know is Docker, and I do agree that if Discourse has an absolute dependency on a tool of that maturity, we have an orange flag. I've never noticed any other application with an intentional absolute dependency on Docker. But the worst flag I can see is that Discourse seems to have no ITS. Of course, that's not the case for phpBB, so I would consider that as a red flag for an actual migration. Such a lack would obviously be a huge issue per se, but also speak quite poorly about Discourse's maturity. Anyway, if you think this deserves being duly evaluated at this point, the proper way to formulate such requests is via our ITS. In this case, you can file a ticket against the sysadmin product, or against forums.kde.org, which I believe is best if the goal is indeed to change that site's engine. There are 2 ways to do that: 1. Report each issue which you find problematic in forums.kde.org (phpBB) and which Discourse would solve or alleviate 2. Report an issue about forums.kde.org using a sub-optimal engine, a bit like https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=417941. It is important to formulate such tickets carefully though - failing that, they are particularly likely to be mishandled. I would say none of these is clearly better than the other. #1 can be considered cleaner / more useful, but #2 will likely require less time if your efforts truly result in a quick migration. It's also possible to combine both. It would be a shame to do that without cross-referencing the relevant tickets. Bugzilla offers a "Blocks" relationship between tickets, which would enable us to mark #1 issues as blocked by the ticket from #2, except for the fact that there are in fact many more ways to fix each individual issue than migrating. Jira offers a much more less restrictive (and much vaguer) "relates to" relationship. Having that on bugs.kde.org would be helpful... but meanwhile, relations can be mentioned in the text. P.S. It seems you forgot to Cc whoever "Adam" is. Le 2021-02-23 à 19:34, Eike Hein a écrit : Hey, This all sounds much too confrontational :-). Come on everyone, we can do this much better. Ben, I don't think Nate's request implies prioritization. For folks outside a particular team it can be difficult to follow what the team has on their plate at the moment; you probably also wouldn't know the same about Nate's VDG/QA space. Everyone knows that sysadmin is working hard all the time, but it has to still be possible to do roadmap planning. In fact it's one of the best ways to avoid getting overcommitted in the future. Declaring a goal and/or agreeing to work on it in the abstract doesn't mean it has to be done straight away or rushed, but it e.g. allows attracting contributors to the goal to get the work done, as also seen in the thread already. The idea of adopting Discourse as a replacement for the old forums has been around for a number of years, and I would say it's probably become more compelling with time. KDE Forums hasn't seen a lot of work and Discourse has risen 8n popularity and familiarity. It's at least worth investigating with an open mind now. If the investigation finds road blocks (capacity, technical, others) we can discuss them further - constructively, without being strangely afraid others will make decisions without them. The only way that happens is by not communicating. I would suggest making a rough proposal on what this really means operationally. How would we migrate, how would we sundown, what sort of work would Discourse need, what sort of setup and infra are required. Sysadmin should ideally provide input there based on experience, implementation policy, etc. Then we know what we need, what we don't have, and what we think we should do about it. Cheers, Eike On February 24, 2021 1:21:14 AM GMT+01:00, Nate Graham wrote: On 2/23/21 4:07 PM, Nate Graham wrote: On 2/23/21 3:53
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 2:49 PM Nate Graham wrote: > On 2/23/21 5:34 PM, Eike Hein wrote: > > Hey, > > > > This all sounds much too confrontational :-). Come on everyone, we can > > do this much better. > > > > Ben, I don't think Nate's request implies prioritization. For folks > > outside a particular team it can be difficult to follow what the team > > has on their plate at the moment; you probably also wouldn't know the > > same about Nate's VDG/QA space. > > > > Everyone knows that sysadmin is working hard all the time, but it has to > > still be possible to do roadmap planning. In fact it's one of the best > > ways to avoid getting overcommitted in the future. Declaring a goal > > and/or agreeing to work on it in the abstract doesn't mean it has to be > > done straight away or rushed, but it e.g. allows attracting contributors > > to the goal to get the work done, as also seen in the thread already. > > Yes, Ben has made me aware that I don't actually have a good sense of > what the sysadmin team is working on at any point in time. I'd love to > be able to see at a glance which tasks are queued up in front of the > things I'm eager to see done. Even something simple like a wiki page > would be nice. It could even list ways for interested and technically > competent people to help. That would be cool. > I've now filled in most of the items i'm aware of at https://invent.kde.org/sysadmin/task-queue/-/issues Of notable absence is everything relating to Gitlab, including both the CI and Tasks migration (which once complete allows for the shutdown and archival of Phabricator). It also misses longer term goals around MyKDE and the decommissioning of Identity. I'll look at adding the items relating to Gitlab tomorrow. Those items aren't in any particular order, but my current area of focus is getting Mimi/Seleno/Micrea sorted out, as they are leftovers from the big Maps/Storage move which took place several months back. Sorting these should help reduce the ongoing maintenance cost we incur. I expect that the Gitlab backups and the LXR/Pycno moves should be resolved while that takes place as well. Sorting out the Gitlab backups is a prerequisite to sorting out Gitlab CI, as the container currently running Replicant is intended to be used to store the artifacts produced by our CI scripts (while we investigated it, it appears that the packages functionality in Gitlab won't meet our needs for dependency resolution, etc) Depending on how critical things get with Nextcloud and scripty, those may then need to be addressed, but otherwise Gitlab CI will be next, which will pave the way for the shutdown of Charlotte and the decommissioning of Anepsion (sorting scripty itself likely being a prerequisite for the decommissioning of Anepsion) > Nate > Cheers, Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On miércoles, 24 de febrero de 2021 2:49:28 (CET) Nate Graham wrote: > On 2/23/21 5:34 PM, Eike Hein wrote: > > Hey, > > > > This all sounds much too confrontational :-). Come on everyone, we can > > do this much better. > > > > Ben, I don't think Nate's request implies prioritization. For folks > > outside a particular team it can be difficult to follow what the team > > has on their plate at the moment; you probably also wouldn't know the > > same about Nate's VDG/QA space. > > > > Everyone knows that sysadmin is working hard all the time, but it has to > > still be possible to do roadmap planning. In fact it's one of the best > > ways to avoid getting overcommitted in the future. Declaring a goal > > and/or agreeing to work on it in the abstract doesn't mean it has to be > > done straight away or rushed, but it e.g. allows attracting contributors > > to the goal to get the work done, as also seen in the thread already. > > Yes, Ben has made me aware that I don't actually have a good sense of > what the sysadmin team is working on at any point in time. I'd love to > be able to see at a glance which tasks are queued up in front of the > things I'm eager to see done. Even something simple like a wiki page > would be nice. It could even list ways for interested and technically > competent people to help. That would be cool. From Promo's point of view, a Discourse instance would be helpful: As on of our goals is to increase the number of community members, directing them to a Discourse instance makes the onboarding easier than sending them to a harder to navigate forum or a mailing list, a technology many younger users may find unfamiliar. Which brings me to the next point: Over the last few weeks I have had to ask for some things from sysadmin and become very aware of how stretched you are. But, maybe in the long run, running a Discourse instance may alleviate the workload somewhat, as Discourse can substitute both the forum and mailing lists. According to this: https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-vs-email-mailing-lists/54298 Discourse can take on a lot of the functionality of mailing lists, apart from its own particular features. And according to this: https://meta.discourse.org/t/what-is-mailing-list-mode/46008 Users who still prefer mailing lists, can interact with Discourse over email. So, although the initial migration will be hard (as migrations tend to be), maybe sysadmin could end up maintaining one service (Discourse) instead of two (forum and mailing list). Cheers Paul -- Promotion & Communication www: http://kde.org Mastodon: https://mastodon.technology/@kde Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kde
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 2/23/21 5:34 PM, Eike Hein wrote: Hey, This all sounds much too confrontational :-). Come on everyone, we can do this much better. Ben, I don't think Nate's request implies prioritization. For folks outside a particular team it can be difficult to follow what the team has on their plate at the moment; you probably also wouldn't know the same about Nate's VDG/QA space. Everyone knows that sysadmin is working hard all the time, but it has to still be possible to do roadmap planning. In fact it's one of the best ways to avoid getting overcommitted in the future. Declaring a goal and/or agreeing to work on it in the abstract doesn't mean it has to be done straight away or rushed, but it e.g. allows attracting contributors to the goal to get the work done, as also seen in the thread already. Yes, Ben has made me aware that I don't actually have a good sense of what the sysadmin team is working on at any point in time. I'd love to be able to see at a glance which tasks are queued up in front of the things I'm eager to see done. Even something simple like a wiki page would be nice. It could even list ways for interested and technically competent people to help. That would be cool. Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Hey, This all sounds much too confrontational :-). Come on everyone, we can do this much better. Ben, I don't think Nate's request implies prioritization. For folks outside a particular team it can be difficult to follow what the team has on their plate at the moment; you probably also wouldn't know the same about Nate's VDG/QA space. Everyone knows that sysadmin is working hard all the time, but it has to still be possible to do roadmap planning. In fact it's one of the best ways to avoid getting overcommitted in the future. Declaring a goal and/or agreeing to work on it in the abstract doesn't mean it has to be done straight away or rushed, but it e.g. allows attracting contributors to the goal to get the work done, as also seen in the thread already. The idea of adopting Discourse as a replacement for the old forums has been around for a number of years, and I would say it's probably become more compelling with time. KDE Forums hasn't seen a lot of work and Discourse has risen 8n popularity and familiarity. It's at least worth investigating with an open mind now. If the investigation finds road blocks (capacity, technical, others) we can discuss them further - constructively, without being strangely afraid others will make decisions without them. The only way that happens is by not communicating. I would suggest making a rough proposal on what this really means operationally. How would we migrate, how would we sundown, what sort of work would Discourse need, what sort of setup and infra are required. Sysadmin should ideally provide input there based on experience, implementation policy, etc. Then we know what we need, what we don't have, and what we think we should do about it. Cheers, Eike On February 24, 2021 1:21:14 AM GMT+01:00, Nate Graham wrote: >On 2/23/21 4:07 PM, Nate Graham wrote: >> On 2/23/21 3:53 PM, Ben Cooksley wrote: >>> May I take this as a formal request from yourself that Gitlab CI is >>> deprioritised and delayed? >>> >>> Based on the extremely frequent requests we get concerning it in >>> #kde-sysadmin I am not sure if your request here is in line with >>> general community consensus. >>> >>> Also, be aware that Sysadmin currently has other infrastructure level >>> projects underway needed to get us off Ubuntu 16.04, which are >>> currently delayed because we haven't had anyone volunteer to assist us >>> with adding support for OAuth2/MyKDE to Reimbursements. >>> Based on the above, I assume you are also requesting that we delay >>> this, and accept the corresponding security issues that will accompany >>> it when Ubuntu 16.04 loses support in the coming months in order to >>> get this actioned? >> >> Hmm, I don't see where I suggested any of those things. >> >> If you folks are really that overloaded, we need to figure out how to >> fix that. A workload that exceeds available resources doesn't help >> anyone. The last time this came up, people called for additional >> volunteers to assist. Did that end up bearing any fruit? > >Anyway I apologize if my tone was off. I wasn't meaning to accuse >sysadmins of anything, and I guess I didn't realize how overloaded the >team is right now. > >That being what it is, perhaps a more productive line of discussion >would be to ask: "what do you need from us so that these things that >need to happen, and that we all want, can reach fruition faster?" You >don't have to suffer in silence! :) > >Nate > -- Sent from my Android device with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 2/23/21 4:07 PM, Nate Graham wrote: On 2/23/21 3:53 PM, Ben Cooksley wrote: May I take this as a formal request from yourself that Gitlab CI is deprioritised and delayed? Based on the extremely frequent requests we get concerning it in #kde-sysadmin I am not sure if your request here is in line with general community consensus. Also, be aware that Sysadmin currently has other infrastructure level projects underway needed to get us off Ubuntu 16.04, which are currently delayed because we haven't had anyone volunteer to assist us with adding support for OAuth2/MyKDE to Reimbursements. Based on the above, I assume you are also requesting that we delay this, and accept the corresponding security issues that will accompany it when Ubuntu 16.04 loses support in the coming months in order to get this actioned? Hmm, I don't see where I suggested any of those things. If you folks are really that overloaded, we need to figure out how to fix that. A workload that exceeds available resources doesn't help anyone. The last time this came up, people called for additional volunteers to assist. Did that end up bearing any fruit? Anyway I apologize if my tone was off. I wasn't meaning to accuse sysadmins of anything, and I guess I didn't realize how overloaded the team is right now. That being what it is, perhaps a more productive line of discussion would be to ask: "what do you need from us so that these things that need to happen, and that we all want, can reach fruition faster?" You don't have to suffer in silence! :) Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On 2/23/21 3:53 PM, Ben Cooksley wrote: May I take this as a formal request from yourself that Gitlab CI is deprioritised and delayed? Based on the extremely frequent requests we get concerning it in #kde-sysadmin I am not sure if your request here is in line with general community consensus. Also, be aware that Sysadmin currently has other infrastructure level projects underway needed to get us off Ubuntu 16.04, which are currently delayed because we haven't had anyone volunteer to assist us with adding support for OAuth2/MyKDE to Reimbursements. Based on the above, I assume you are also requesting that we delay this, and accept the corresponding security issues that will accompany it when Ubuntu 16.04 loses support in the coming months in order to get this actioned? Hmm, I don't see where I suggested any of those things. If you folks are really that overloaded, we need to figure out how to fix that. A workload that exceeds available resources doesn't help anyone. The last time this came up, people called for additional volunteers to assist. Did that end up bearing any fruit? Nate
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 11:26 AM Nate Graham wrote: > Hello faithful Sysadmins (with kde-community and Adam CCd), > Hi Nate, > > I would like to formally request that a KDE discourse instance be set up > as a testbed for now, with the ultimate goal of replacing the somewhat > moribund forums.kde.org if people prefer it. > > Over the years I've seen this suggested multiple times by multiple > people, but without much movement. Since then, the Krita people have set > up a Discourse instance themselves, outside of KDE infrastructure. Many > other FOSS communities already use Discourse, including Debian, Ubuntu, > Fedora, Manjaro, GNOME, and Mozilla. > > I think it's time for us to follow suit and set up an official discourse > instance on KDE Infrastructure. > > Last I heard, there was an objection based on the fact that its > deployment mechanism requires Docker. I don't care much for Docker > myself, but if it's the only way to set up Discourse, I think it's time > to bite the bullet and use it despite reservations, so we can facilitate > this longstanding request from the KDE community. > May I take this as a formal request from yourself that Gitlab CI is deprioritised and delayed? Based on the extremely frequent requests we get concerning it in #kde-sysadmin I am not sure if your request here is in line with general community consensus. Also, be aware that Sysadmin currently has other infrastructure level projects underway needed to get us off Ubuntu 16.04, which are currently delayed because we haven't had anyone volunteer to assist us with adding support for OAuth2/MyKDE to Reimbursements. Based on the above, I assume you are also requesting that we delay this, and accept the corresponding security issues that will accompany it when Ubuntu 16.04 loses support in the coming months in order to get this actioned? > > Nate > Regards, Ben
Re: Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Le mardi, février 23, 2021 11:25 PM, Nate Graham a écrit : > Hello faithful Sysadmins (with kde-community and Adam CCd), > > I would like to formally request that a KDE discourse instance be set up > as a testbed for now, with the ultimate goal of replacing the somewhat > moribund forums.kde.org if people prefer it. > > Over the years I've seen this suggested multiple times by multiple > people, but without much movement. Since then, the Krita people have set > up a Discourse instance themselves, outside of KDE infrastructure. Many > other FOSS communities already use Discourse, including Debian, Ubuntu, > Fedora, Manjaro, GNOME, and Mozilla. > > I think it's time for us to follow suit and set up an official discourse > instance on KDE Infrastructure. > > Last I heard, there was an objection based on the fact that its > deployment mechanism requires Docker. I don't care much for Docker > myself, but if it's the only way to set up Discourse, I think it's time > to bite the bullet and use it despite reservations, so we can facilitate > this longstanding request from the KDE community. I second that and would be happy to take care to set it up. Cheers, Carl > Nate
Formal request to set up a KDE Discourse instance
Hello faithful Sysadmins (with kde-community and Adam CCd), I would like to formally request that a KDE discourse instance be set up as a testbed for now, with the ultimate goal of replacing the somewhat moribund forums.kde.org if people prefer it. Over the years I've seen this suggested multiple times by multiple people, but without much movement. Since then, the Krita people have set up a Discourse instance themselves, outside of KDE infrastructure. Many other FOSS communities already use Discourse, including Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, Manjaro, GNOME, and Mozilla. I think it's time for us to follow suit and set up an official discourse instance on KDE Infrastructure. Last I heard, there was an objection based on the fact that its deployment mechanism requires Docker. I don't care much for Docker myself, but if it's the only way to set up Discourse, I think it's time to bite the bullet and use it despite reservations, so we can facilitate this longstanding request from the KDE community. Nate
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
On Thu, Oct 24, 2019 at 2:58 AM Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > How can we progress with this? > > It was discussed at Akademy and everyone seemed in favour > https://phabricator.kde.org/T11675 > > The issues we had with it seem to have useful responses from Discourse > developers > https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-setup-for-kde/128193 > > I'm very happy to help lead if empowered to do so by sysadmins. If we could delay this for a little bit so we've got some time to complete the migration of the Git repositories (and thus code review) to Gitlab that would be appreciated. We're currently in the middle of preparing to move it to the final production server (hoping to do that this weekend) > > Jonathan > Cheers, Ben > > > On Wed, 19 Jun 2019 at 16:44, Jonathan Riddell wrote: >> >> I've set up a Discourse server for a trail to see if it's something we >> should add to KDE's infrastructure. >> >> Discourse is a modern Free Software web forum and mailing list app. >> >> Give it a trial now at http://discuss.kde.org.uk/ >> >> If you want to be an admin do ask me. >> >> If you want a new Category (equivalent to a forum topic or mailing list) do >> ask me. >> >> There's no integration with identity (yet) so you'll need to set up a new >> account. >> >> If you want to use it as a mailing list replacement you need to Watch the >> category. Categories will need to have an e-mail address added to be able >> to start new threads on from e-mail so ask if you want that. To get a >> mailing list experience turn it on in Preferences -> emails -> Enable >> mailing list mode >> >> Eventually I would like to see this replace forum.kde.org and allow projects >> to move their mailing lists over to it as they wish. >> >> Jonathan >>
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
How can we progress with this? It was discussed at Akademy and everyone seemed in favour https://phabricator.kde.org/T11675 The issues we had with it seem to have useful responses from Discourse developers https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-setup-for-kde/128193 I'm very happy to help lead if empowered to do so by sysadmins. Jonathan On Wed, 19 Jun 2019 at 16:44, Jonathan Riddell wrote: > I've set up a Discourse server for a trail to see if it's something we > should add to KDE's infrastructure. > > Discourse is a modern Free Software web forum and mailing list app. > > Give it a trial now at http://discuss.kde.org.uk/ > > If you want to be an admin do ask me. > > If you want a new Category (equivalent to a forum topic or mailing list) > do ask me. > > There's no integration with identity (yet) so you'll need to set up a new > account. > > If you want to use it as a mailing list replacement you need to Watch the > category. Categories will need to have an e-mail address added to be able > to start new threads on from e-mail so ask if you want that. To get a > mailing list experience turn it on in Preferences -> emails -> Enable > mailing list mode > > Eventually I would like to see this replace forum.kde.org and allow > projects to move their mailing lists over to it as they wish. > > Jonathan > >
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
On 7/1/19 9:02 AM, Valorie Zimmerman wrote: > Hi all, > > On Sun, Jun 30, 2019 at 10:48 AM Luigi Toscano <mailto:luigi.tosc...@tiscali.it>> wrote: > > Nate Graham ha scritto: > > On 6/29/19 4:04 PM, Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: > >> Hi Jonathan, > >> Thank you for setting this up! > >> I've recently had the opportunity to experience Discourse in > action in > >> another community, and found it to fulfill most of the things we > found > >> lacking in both of our current forum and mailing list software (which > >> makes sense given that they're both age-old and haven't seen much > - if > >> any - exciting feature development in years). > >> So I (personally, not speaking for the board) would really like us to > >> test it out and see if we can replace first our forum and > hopefully some > >> day Mailman with Discourse. > >> Thanks, > >> Thomas > >> > > > > +1, I'm also quite in favor of this. Having used it in other > communities, I > > find that it works well as a sort of half-forum-half-mailing-list > tool that > > can succeed in replacing both. > > I may have already asked this: do we have a plan to evaluate also > hyperkitty > (mailman 3 frontend) before completely replacing also the mailing > lists? It > provides a forum-like interface. > > -- > Luigi > > > I'm using the Mailman 3/hyperkitty for genealogy mail lists at > Rootsweb.com. I was not in on the setup, which IMO is not done very well > at Rootsweb, so maybe these comments are unfair. > > So far though, I Do Not Like MM3, or hyperkittly. If there is a way to > administer lists via the commandline, as we have now with Listadmin, > I've not found it. Hyperkitty (besides being an extraordinarily bad > name) is not a good forum replacement at ALL. The search barely works, > for starters. True, the way our KDE list archives is set up is bad as well. > > That said, I'm not sold on Discourse. I've tried the one ubuntu has set > up [1], and have not yet figured out how to get the email interface to > work correctly. Aha, while clicking around in it I see that they didn't > enable that feature. I find Discourse hard to move around it. I keep > having to mess with the URL to get back to Home. So far, old mailman > lists + IRC/T/Matrix wins. > > Whether Discourse could replace our KDE forums is an open question. I haven't really tried Discourse's mailing features yet (apart from getting digests of new forum messages), all I can say is that the forum part is far better than our current forum (which isn't even mobile-friendly at all). That's why I said "forum first, mailman maybe at some point in the future".
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
Hi all, On Sun, Jun 30, 2019 at 10:48 AM Luigi Toscano wrote: > Nate Graham ha scritto: > > On 6/29/19 4:04 PM, Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: > >> Hi Jonathan, > >> Thank you for setting this up! > >> I've recently had the opportunity to experience Discourse in action in > >> another community, and found it to fulfill most of the things we found > >> lacking in both of our current forum and mailing list software (which > >> makes sense given that they're both age-old and haven't seen much - if > >> any - exciting feature development in years). > >> So I (personally, not speaking for the board) would really like us to > >> test it out and see if we can replace first our forum and hopefully some > >> day Mailman with Discourse. > >> Thanks, > >> Thomas > >> > > > > +1, I'm also quite in favor of this. Having used it in other > communities, I > > find that it works well as a sort of half-forum-half-mailing-list tool > that > > can succeed in replacing both. > > I may have already asked this: do we have a plan to evaluate also > hyperkitty > (mailman 3 frontend) before completely replacing also the mailing lists? It > provides a forum-like interface. > > -- > Luigi > I'm using the Mailman 3/hyperkitty for genealogy mail lists at Rootsweb.com. I was not in on the setup, which IMO is not done very well at Rootsweb, so maybe these comments are unfair. So far though, I Do Not Like MM3, or hyperkittly. If there is a way to administer lists via the commandline, as we have now with Listadmin, I've not found it. Hyperkitty (besides being an extraordinarily bad name) is not a good forum replacement at ALL. The search barely works, for starters. True, the way our KDE list archives is set up is bad as well. That said, I'm not sold on Discourse. I've tried the one ubuntu has set up [1], and have not yet figured out how to get the email interface to work correctly. Aha, while clicking around in it I see that they didn't enable that feature. I find Discourse hard to move around it. I keep having to mess with the URL to get back to Home. So far, old mailman lists + IRC/T/Matrix wins. Whether Discourse could replace our KDE forums is an open question. Valorie 1. https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ -- http://about.me/valoriez - pronouns: she/her
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
Nate Graham ha scritto: > On 6/29/19 4:04 PM, Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: >> Hi Jonathan, >> Thank you for setting this up! >> I've recently had the opportunity to experience Discourse in action in >> another community, and found it to fulfill most of the things we found >> lacking in both of our current forum and mailing list software (which >> makes sense given that they're both age-old and haven't seen much - if >> any - exciting feature development in years). >> So I (personally, not speaking for the board) would really like us to >> test it out and see if we can replace first our forum and hopefully some >> day Mailman with Discourse. >> Thanks, >> Thomas >> > > +1, I'm also quite in favor of this. Having used it in other communities, I > find that it works well as a sort of half-forum-half-mailing-list tool that > can succeed in replacing both. I may have already asked this: do we have a plan to evaluate also hyperkitty (mailman 3 frontend) before completely replacing also the mailing lists? It provides a forum-like interface. -- Luigi
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
On 6/29/19 4:04 PM, Thomas Pfeiffer wrote: Hi Jonathan, Thank you for setting this up! I've recently had the opportunity to experience Discourse in action in another community, and found it to fulfill most of the things we found lacking in both of our current forum and mailing list software (which makes sense given that they're both age-old and haven't seen much - if any - exciting feature development in years). So I (personally, not speaking for the board) would really like us to test it out and see if we can replace first our forum and hopefully some day Mailman with Discourse. Thanks, Thomas +1, I'm also quite in favor of this. Having used it in other communities, I find that it works well as a sort of half-forum-half-mailing-list tool that can succeed in replacing both. Nate
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
On 6/19/19 5:44 PM, Jonathan Riddell wrote: > I've set up a Discourse server for a trail to see if it's something we > should add to KDE's infrastructure. > > Discourse is a modern Free Software web forum and mailing list app. > > Give it a trial now at http://discuss.kde.org.uk/ > > If you want to be an admin do ask me. > > If you want a new Category (equivalent to a forum topic or mailing list) > do ask me. > > There's no integration with identity (yet) so you'll need to set up a > new account. > > If you want to use it as a mailing list replacement you need to Watch > the category. Categories will need to have an e-mail address added to > be able to start new threads on from e-mail so ask if you want that. To > get a mailing list experience turn it on in Preferences -> emails -> > Enable mailing list mode > > Eventually I would like to see this replace forum.kde.org > <http://forum.kde.org> and allow projects to move their mailing lists > over to it as they wish. > > Jonathan Hi Jonathan, Thank you for setting this up! I've recently had the opportunity to experience Discourse in action in another community, and found it to fulfill most of the things we found lacking in both of our current forum and mailing list software (which makes sense given that they're both age-old and haven't seen much - if any - exciting feature development in years). So I (personally, not speaking for the board) would really like us to test it out and see if we can replace first our forum and hopefully some day Mailman with Discourse. Thanks, Thomas
Re: Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
Il giorno Wed, 19 Jun 2019 16:44:19 +0100 Jonathan Riddell ha scritto: > Eventually I would like to see this replace forum.kde.org and allow > projects to move their mailing lists over to it as they wish. You may want to test somewhere if you can import existing threads from f.k.o. Last time this was mentioned I think someone mentioned an importer of some kind. -- Luca Beltrame GPG key ID: A29D259B pgpSWSNT9ldzD.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Testbed Discourse Server For Trial discuss.kde.org.uk
I've set up a Discourse server for a trail to see if it's something we should add to KDE's infrastructure. Discourse is a modern Free Software web forum and mailing list app. Give it a trial now at http://discuss.kde.org.uk/ If you want to be an admin do ask me. If you want a new Category (equivalent to a forum topic or mailing list) do ask me. There's no integration with identity (yet) so you'll need to set up a new account. If you want to use it as a mailing list replacement you need to Watch the category. Categories will need to have an e-mail address added to be able to start new threads on from e-mail so ask if you want that. To get a mailing list experience turn it on in Preferences -> emails -> Enable mailing list mode Eventually I would like to see this replace forum.kde.org and allow projects to move their mailing lists over to it as they wish. Jonathan
Re: Discourse
I asked Alan the Ubuntu community manager if he had insights into their setup and security concerns, he said: In short, do what upstream supports. I setup a discourse recently which I did using digitialocean and the upstream install process, which indeed is inside docker ( I haven't read that thread yet, just voicing what I did recently ) If you want support when things break, it's best to install the way upstream recommend, which is docker Also, tiny tidbit, the Ubuntu Desktop team completely shutdown the ubuntu desktop mailing list and moved to discourse. We get so much more engagement with the community now. Especially as we use Ubuntu SSO for sign on.
Re: Discourse
I asked Greg from Fedora who has led their change away from mailing lists onto Discourse. gwmngilfen: over in KDE land the discussion about Discourse continues with queries about whether running in a Docker is a good idea (seems ideal to me but sysadmins disagree) and if there's any security concerns any insight? i'm largely with you it does make things very easy to manage with respect to rebuilding the app if needed, and i'm not sure what your security implications might be, assuming the box is appropriately secured (we only open 443, 22, and 25 to recieve mail) also if discourse itself is compromised, does it not follow that docker would be more secure, since you;d also have to escape the container? -*- gwmngilfen doesn't know that for certain but it seems logical
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Dec 4, 2018 at 1:31 PM Luca Beltrame wrote: > > Il giorno Tue, 4 Dec 2018 12:48:48 +0100 > Harald Sitter ha scritto: > > > OTOH I also don't understand how the current spam protection works. Do > > we maintain a list of blacklisted words? Because from what I > > understand discourse has that built in. Along with blocking by IP. > > Yeah, it works something like that. I don't know if it is connected to > stopforumspam (nor if stopforumspam actually exists anymore), but it > does "flag" messages on words, number of posts, etc. Moderators then > can inspect the flagged messages. > > The current nice thing (but that's to workaround a huge deficiency of > the UI in phpBB - perhaps it has changed in recent versions) is that it > also offers a one-click ban that bans the user and wipes all the posts > by the same user in one fell swoop. If there's nothing additional I think all of what we have currently is already supported out of the box in discourse: - filters - easy nuking; looks like this apparently: https://meta.discourse.org/t/new-user-deleted-for-spam-posts/53647/2 On top of that I also found something else: limited new user abilities through a trust level system; I would actually encourage forum staff to read up on this feature [1] as it sounds like something that could be super nice in practice. It also plays a part in the spam protection story. (also see wiki page for some info on that entire feature set [2]) [1] https://blog.discourse.org/2018/06/understanding-discourse-trust-levels/ [2] https://community.kde.org/Infrastructure/Evaluation/Discourse#Anti-Spam HS
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Tue, 4 Dec 2018 12:48:48 +0100 Harald Sitter ha scritto: > OTOH I also don't understand how the current spam protection works. Do > we maintain a list of blacklisted words? Because from what I > understand discourse has that built in. Along with blocking by IP. Yeah, it works something like that. I don't know if it is connected to stopforumspam (nor if stopforumspam actually exists anymore), but it does "flag" messages on words, number of posts, etc. Moderators then can inspect the flagged messages. The current nice thing (but that's to workaround a huge deficiency of the UI in phpBB - perhaps it has changed in recent versions) is that it also offers a one-click ban that bans the user and wipes all the posts by the same user in one fell swoop. pgpRravQAkewA.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
I've started a wiki page. I encourage people to chip in. https://community.kde.org/Infrastructure/Evaluation/Discourse HS
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Dec 4, 2018 at 12:03 PM Luca Beltrame wrote: > > Il giorno Tue, 4 Dec 2018 11:58:27 +0100 > Harald Sitter ha scritto: > > > > Is it Akismet in name, or uses the service? > > I am not sure what that means I am afraid. > > Akismet is a (non-Free) antispam service used originally by > Wordpress.com, optionally self-hosted WP, but now used also by other > software. It looks, from the name, that this plugin interrogates > Akismet. IIRC only "personal" usage used to be free (but I haven't been > checking in years, so this might be all wrong). Aha! "Akismet is a well known service that has an algorithm for detecting spam. Akismet is NOT free for commerical use, but can be for personal use. To use this plugin you will need an Akismet API key. You can get a key by starting out here." https://github.com/discourse/discourse-akismet So, yeah, no goody. OTOH I also don't understand how the current spam protection works. Do we maintain a list of blacklisted words? Because from what I understand discourse has that built in. Along with blocking by IP. HS
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Tue, 4 Dec 2018 11:58:27 +0100 Harald Sitter ha scritto: > > Is it Akismet in name, or uses the service? > I am not sure what that means I am afraid. Akismet is a (non-Free) antispam service used originally by Wordpress.com, optionally self-hosted WP, but now used also by other software. It looks, from the name, that this plugin interrogates Akismet. IIRC only "personal" usage used to be free (but I haven't been checking in years, so this might be all wrong). pgpuK2filTJe7.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
On Thu, Nov 29, 2018 at 5:41 PM Luca Beltrame wrote: > > Can you describe these workflows a bit? > > There is this https://www.discourse.org/plugins/akismet.html not sure > > Is it Akismet in name, or uses the service? I am not sure what that means I am afraid. > > it's sufficient though. One could always opt to write custom plugins > > The idea would be, if possible, to prevent the mistake made in the past > and use custom stuff only if absolutely necessary (that's what got us > in the current mess in the first place). I think we can all agree on not wanting anymore unmaintained code :) HS
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Thu, 29 Nov 2018 11:32:12 +0100 Harald Sitter ha scritto: > with the current forums? Do we have the original evaluation of how we > ended up with phpbb somewhere? Originally it was MyBB[1] (just open sourced), then we started hitting some limitations there, and it was decided to move to phpBB[2]. The migration plan was done semi-informally on IRC: there used to be a comprehensive list of changes over MyBB, but when writing the Dot story it came out a little too confrontational, so we (me, Ingo, Ben, and Sayak at the time) decided to tone it down. > Which customizations are there, what do they do, where is their code > and who maintains them currently? websites/forum.kde.org on git. No one maintains them at all at the moment. Some inclusions there are Brainstorm and the gallery modification used by Krita. In addition, there is the "Anti Spam" mod which is used, among other things, to one click ban spammers. > In fact, I am also not sure why everyone seems to consider importing > 10 year old forum posts a given requirement here. We migrated away Boud has already given an example. > Can you describe these workflows a bit? > There is this https://www.discourse.org/plugins/akismet.html not sure Is it Akismet in name, or uses the service? > it's sufficient though. One could always opt to write custom plugins The idea would be, if possible, to prevent the mistake made in the past and use custom stuff only if absolutely necessary (that's what got us in the current mess in the first place). [1] https://www.kde.org/announcements/forum.php [2] https://dot.kde.org/2009/06/29/new-look-and-features-kde-community-forums pgpt7PAw_rGov.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
On Thu, Nov 29, 2018 at 11:54 AM Boudewijn Rempt wrote: > > On donderdag 29 november 2018 11:32:12 CET Harald Sitter wrote: > > > In fact, I am also not sure why everyone seems to consider importing > > 10 year old forum posts a given requirement here. We migrated away > > from reviewboard with zero data migration, and the data that is in > > reviewboard is largely much more relevant than posts on why changing > > the wallpaper in Plasma 4.0 didn't work IMHO. > > I would for sure hate losing all those years of history and discussion for the > Krita forums. Posted artwork, discussions, development suggestions, answers to > questions. FWIW an approach I proof-of-concepted for reviewboard and which may also work for phpbb is to simply crawl a html snapshot and host that instead. i.e. one would still be able to view the content without having to maintain the software setup. Mind you, I fully appreciate that losing history is terrible no matter the data, my point is that dragging the data along into other software may not be the most efficient course of action. It's hard to say what, if any, excess technical requirements we have to migrate our current database, which is why I asked so many question :). Just migrating threads and attachments is something discourse can do just fine apparently, so if we need nothing else it's probably fairly cheap to pull the data along, if not we'll need to be flexible. HS
Re: Discourse
On donderdag 29 november 2018 11:32:12 CET Harald Sitter wrote: > In fact, I am also not sure why everyone seems to consider importing > 10 year old forum posts a given requirement here. We migrated away > from reviewboard with zero data migration, and the data that is in > reviewboard is largely much more relevant than posts on why changing > the wallpaper in Plasma 4.0 didn't work IMHO. I would for sure hate losing all those years of history and discussion for the Krita forums. Posted artwork, discussions, development suggestions, answers to questions. I do know that when blenderartists migrated to discourse, they needed a kickstarter to fund that: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1072051946/ blenderartists-20-were-moving-to-discourse . That's a much bigger community, of course. -- https://www.krita.org signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
On Thu, Nov 29, 2018 at 9:03 AM Ben Cooksley wrote: > > On Wed, Nov 28, 2018 at 5:25 AM Lays Rodrigues wrote: > > > > Let's not go in that way. > > As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern web. At > > least in my point of view, I really think that using old stuff doesn't > > attract new people. In that I have a few ideas for some KDE websites go > > modern, but that is a project for the future. > > Discourse is a way to do that. I don't have much idea on how is the cost to > > maintain such an application, but in the field to setup it, I don't > > think that is hard since we just need docker and Postgres. > > Before we look into deployment, has an initial evaluation been done to > determine how individual communities around specific applications > would work with Discourse? How would one best go about evaluating? Do we know what communities do with the current forums? Do we have the original evaluation of how we ended up with phpbb somewhere? > Usually these communities only want to look at posts for their > specific application, and in some cases we have customisations to > support their specific usecases - which our existing forum supports > (see https://forum.kde.org/viewforum.php?f=276 for instance). Which customizations are there, what do they do, where is their code and who maintains them currently? > Once we're satisfied that's all okay and can accommodate everything we > need, we then can look into deployment. At this point we'd: > > 1) Look into the actual technology stack they use (seems to be Rails > based in this case) to make sure there aren't any potential snags > there > 2) Evaluate what support it has for authentication options (Identity > requires LDAP at the moment, but will move to OAuth2 at some point > using a custom API) I've just had a look... Writing auth plugins is insanely easy. As in: I probably spent magnitudes more time on our jenkins oauth plugin than it would take to write any auth plugin for discourse ^^ > 3) Determine what's needed to import existing data we have A full phpbb database dump from starters. Beyond that I am not sure what existing data actually entails? In fact, I am also not sure why everyone seems to consider importing 10 year old forum posts a given requirement here. We migrated away from reviewboard with zero data migration, and the data that is in reviewboard is largely much more relevant than posts on why changing the wallpaper in Plasma 4.0 didn't work IMHO. Data migration is hugely expensive in both human and computer time; it's easy to say we want this, it's another thing to actually practically make it happen. In fact, I know of a semi-recent forum migration where a company that heavily relied on forums for user interaction migrated by having users manually replicate threads they wanted to keep into the new forum and after a couple of months threw the old forum away. Often times the cost-benefit is just super poor for data migration in general and most kinds of forums in particular. That being said, if data can be easily migrated I say hooray. Whether it deserves to be a requirement I am not so sure about. > 4) Ascertain how best to structure things to make it easy for > end-users to work with > 5) Investigate what anti-spam options are available and how > maintainable any customisations we need to support KDE specific > workflows will be Can you describe these workflows a bit? There is this https://www.discourse.org/plugins/akismet.html not sure it's sufficient though. One could always opt to write custom plugins if necessary, that really depends on what we need though. AFAIK discourse also has a fairly comprehensive REST API, so one could possibly also approach it from the other end and have a micro service hit spammers with a ban hammer after the fact. > My main one here is the lack of any options for installation other > than Docker which makes no sense for a Rails application. Looking into > their Docker image installation script I see that they build both > Nginx and Imagemagick themselves (and stepping outside of package > repositories is generally a bad idea). Imagemagick is of grave concern > as this project has had numerous security advisories in the past and I > see the version they're using isn't the latest one. I have further > concerns for Nginx as they include a third party compression module, > Brotli, whose codebase hasn't been touched in 2 years (plus it's a > compression method, so you have the risk of CRIME/BREACH attacks) https://github.com/discourse/discourse/blob/master/docs/SECURITY.md HS
Re: Discourse
On Wed, Nov 28, 2018 at 5:25 AM Lays Rodrigues wrote: > > Let's not go in that way. > As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern web. At > least in my point of view, I really think that using old stuff doesn't > attract new people. In that I have a few ideas for some KDE websites go > modern, but that is a project for the future. > Discourse is a way to do that. I don't have much idea on how is the cost to > maintain such an application, but in the field to setup it, I don't > think that is hard since we just need docker and Postgres. Before we look into deployment, has an initial evaluation been done to determine how individual communities around specific applications would work with Discourse? Usually these communities only want to look at posts for their specific application, and in some cases we have customisations to support their specific usecases - which our existing forum supports (see https://forum.kde.org/viewforum.php?f=276 for instance). Once we're satisfied that's all okay and can accommodate everything we need, we then can look into deployment. At this point we'd: 1) Look into the actual technology stack they use (seems to be Rails based in this case) to make sure there aren't any potential snags there 2) Evaluate what support it has for authentication options (Identity requires LDAP at the moment, but will move to OAuth2 at some point using a custom API) 3) Determine what's needed to import existing data we have 4) Ascertain how best to structure things to make it easy for end-users to work with 5) Investigate what anti-spam options are available and how maintainable any customisations we need to support KDE specific workflows will be At a very quick 15 minute glance, I already have immediate concerns on point 1 of the above. My main one here is the lack of any options for installation other than Docker which makes no sense for a Rails application. Looking into their Docker image installation script I see that they build both Nginx and Imagemagick themselves (and stepping outside of package repositories is generally a bad idea). Imagemagick is of grave concern as this project has had numerous security advisories in the past and I see the version they're using isn't the latest one. I have further concerns for Nginx as they include a third party compression module, Brotli, whose codebase hasn't been touched in 2 years (plus it's a compression method, so you have the risk of CRIME/BREACH attacks) > > So Ben and other sysadmins, > Ben, you had some concerns that others answered on this thread. > What do you think? > > Also, I found this ansible to deploy discourse with and without docker, that > can be a starting point: > https://github.com/jamielinux/ansible-discourse > > Let's think about how this can help all the KDE users, and push our community > forward. If we have old stuff that is hard to maintain, and it is outdated, > we should move forward. > > ** My opinions can be simple, because I think that the situation is simple, > also because I may not have a macro view of everything** > > > Cheers, Cheers, Ben > > > > On Mon, Nov 26, 2018 at 7:04 PM Ingo Klöcker wrote: >> >> On Montag, 26. November 2018 18:03:55 CET Martin Flöser wrote: >> > Am 2018-11-26 09:23, schrieb Ilmari Lauhakangas: >> > > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I >> > > don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the >> > > current forums. >> > >> > And that's good! Do you want that developers spend time answering simple >> > support questions any other user could answer or do you want developers >> > to code? No company would put their expensive developers on the front >> > line for support. >> >> No company would publish their precious IP (aka source code) as Free >> Software. >> Luckily, KDE is not a company but a community of people where everybody, even >> the most precious developers, can be at the front line for support if they >> want to be there. >> >> Regards, >> Ingo > > > > -- > Lays Rodrigues > KDE > Atelier - atelier.kde.org > Fundraising WG > http://lays.space > Telegram: @lays147
Re: Discourse
On Tuesday, 27 November 2018 22:32:40 PST Luca Beltrame wrote: > Il giorno Tue, 27 Nov 2018 14:25:06 -0200 > > Lays Rodrigues ha scritto: > > As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern > > web. At least in my point of view, I really think that using old > > Then someone needs to do it: as you are well aware, that's how most of > the stuff in KDE is born. And I do not only mean the actual setup + > deployment, but have someone willing to "commit" to it (quotes because > even the forum was relatively low maintenance when we still had people > working on it - if it's continuous, the burden is not so heavy). > > > community forward. If we have old stuff that is hard to maintain, and > > it is outdated, we should move forward. > > Replacing one solution (unmaintained) with another than then it's > forgotten because "it works" would not be an improvement. IOW, it would > make little sense to update to $new_platform if then there's no one > maintaining it. With this said, it still requires things like blessings from whomever controls domain name access and updating links to push people to use it. -- Jacky Alcine Work: https://black.af Blog: https://jacky.wtf/weblog/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Mon, 26 Nov 2018 10:23:42 +0200 Ilmari Lauhakangas ha scritto: > step to recruit someone to upgrade the existing forum to the latest > version of phpBB (which has evolved during all this time after all)? The main pain problem because it's not a "one click" update is mainly because the forum has quite a bit of custom code: - So called "mods" that would need to get replaced (older phpBB mods replaced files directly, but now there's a plugin structure) - A whole swath of in house code, like Brainstorm etc. (in hindsight, doing that much extra stuff on top wasn't the best idea, but again hindsight is 20/20). - The theme (which would need an overhaul anyway) So upgrading is the "easy" step. Upgrading without too much breakage is far harder. > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I > don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the > current forums. In the past, it happened more than once. Aside very vibrant forums like Krita's, I've personally poked people to answer in the forums (and they did). -- Luca Beltrame - KDE Forums team GPG key ID: A29D259B pgp0RaAnjTmRk.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Tue, 27 Nov 2018 14:25:06 -0200 Lays Rodrigues ha scritto: > As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern > web. At least in my point of view, I really think that using old Then someone needs to do it: as you are well aware, that's how most of the stuff in KDE is born. And I do not only mean the actual setup + deployment, but have someone willing to "commit" to it (quotes because even the forum was relatively low maintenance when we still had people working on it - if it's continuous, the burden is not so heavy). > community forward. If we have old stuff that is hard to maintain, and > it is outdated, we should move forward. Replacing one solution (unmaintained) with another than then it's forgotten because "it works" would not be an improvement. IOW, it would make little sense to update to $new_platform if then there's no one maintaining it. -- Luca Beltrame - KDE Forums team GPG key ID: A29D259B pgpe8ssI533xU.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
On dinsdag 27 november 2018 17:30:13 CET Martin Flöser wrote: > I don't want to tell developers to not do user support. If they want to > do that, it's fine. But currently our infrastructure forces it on us. > And that's a problem and won't scale in the long run. Let's see how the ask.krita.org experiment works out. I intend to not add answers myself for a couple of weeks to see what happens... -- https://www.krita.org signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
Lays Rodrigues kirjoitti 27.11.2018 klo 18.25: Let's not go in that way. As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern web. At least in my point of view, I really think that using old stuff doesn't attract new people. In that I have a few ideas for some KDE websites go modern, but that is a project for the future. Discourse is a way to do that. I don't have much idea on how is the cost to maintain such an application, but in the field to setup it, I don't think that is hard since we just need docker and Postgres. So Ben and other sysadmins, Ben, you had some concerns that others answered on this thread. What do you think? Also, I found this ansible to deploy discourse with and without docker, that can be a starting point: https://github.com/jamielinux/ansible-discourse Let's think about how this can help all the KDE users, and push our community forward. If we have old stuff that is hard to maintain, and it is outdated, we should move forward. The old stuff is not hard to maintain. Everything is hard to maintain, if you lack maintainers. The Ansible setup you linked to is from 2015, but this is fresh: https://github.com/xpeppers/ansible-discourse Ilmari
Re: Discourse
Am 2018-11-26 22:04, schrieb Ingo Klöcker: On Montag, 26. November 2018 18:03:55 CET Martin Flöser wrote: Am 2018-11-26 09:23, schrieb Ilmari Lauhakangas: > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I > don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the > current forums. And that's good! Do you want that developers spend time answering simple support questions any other user could answer or do you want developers to code? No company would put their expensive developers on the front line for support. No company would publish their precious IP (aka source code) as Free Software. Luckily, KDE is not a company but a community of people where everybody, even the most precious developers, can be at the front line for support if they want to be there. Of course that is not what I meant. Currently we have the problem that user support is completely handled by over qualified developers. Just check bugs.kde.org in the product KWin. It's me, David and Vlad doing the user support. That is such a waste of resources. If we wouldn't do it, nobody would do it. I don't want to tell developers to not do user support. If they want to do that, it's fine. But currently our infrastructure forces it on us. And that's a problem and won't scale in the long run. Cheers Martin
Re: Discourse
Let's not go in that way. As a ~new person~ on KDE, 3 years only, we need to move to a modern web. At least in my point of view, I really think that using old stuff doesn't attract new people. In that I have a few ideas for some KDE websites go modern, but that is a project for the future. Discourse is a way to do that. I don't have much idea on how is the cost to maintain such an application, but in the field to setup it, I don't think that is hard since we just need docker and Postgres. So Ben and other sysadmins, Ben, you had some concerns that others answered on this thread. What do you think? Also, I found this ansible to deploy discourse with and without docker, that can be a starting point: https://github.com/jamielinux/ansible-discourse Let's think about how this can help all the KDE users, and push our community forward. If we have old stuff that is hard to maintain, and it is outdated, we should move forward. ** My opinions can be *simple*, because I think that the *situation* is simple, also because I may not have a *macro* view of everything** Cheers, On Mon, Nov 26, 2018 at 7:04 PM Ingo Klöcker wrote: > On Montag, 26. November 2018 18:03:55 CET Martin Flöser wrote: > > Am 2018-11-26 09:23, schrieb Ilmari Lauhakangas: > > > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I > > > don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the > > > current forums. > > > > And that's good! Do you want that developers spend time answering simple > > support questions any other user could answer or do you want developers > > to code? No company would put their expensive developers on the front > > line for support. > > No company would publish their precious IP (aka source code) as Free > Software. > Luckily, KDE is not a company but a community of people where everybody, > even > the most precious developers, can be at the front line for support if they > want to be there. > > Regards, > Ingo > -- *Lays Rodrigues* *KDE* *Atelier - atelier.kde.org <http://atelier.kde.org>* *Fundraising WG* *http://lays.space <http://lays.space>* *Telegram: @lays147*
Re: Discourse
On Montag, 26. November 2018 18:03:55 CET Martin Flöser wrote: > Am 2018-11-26 09:23, schrieb Ilmari Lauhakangas: > > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I > > don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the > > current forums. > > And that's good! Do you want that developers spend time answering simple > support questions any other user could answer or do you want developers > to code? No company would put their expensive developers on the front > line for support. No company would publish their precious IP (aka source code) as Free Software. Luckily, KDE is not a company but a community of people where everybody, even the most precious developers, can be at the front line for support if they want to be there. Regards, Ingo signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
Martin Flöser kirjoitti 26.11.2018 klo 19.03: Am 2018-11-26 09:23, schrieb Ilmari Lauhakangas: The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I don't think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the current forums. And that's good! Do you want that developers spend time answering simple support questions any other user could answer or do you want developers to code? No company would put their expensive developers on the front line for support. The thread started with: "I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman". Support questions were not what I had in mind. Ilmari
Re: Discourse
On maandag 26 november 2018 09:23:42 CET Ilmari Lauhakangas wrote: > The main problem in any case will be getting enough engagement. I don't > think I have ever received a reply from a KDE developer in the current > forums. I've made over 4100 forum posts, and I'm certainly a KDE developer. -- https://www.krita.org signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Sun, 25 Nov 2018 21:58:48 -0200 Lays Rodrigues ha scritto: > So, is it possible to add Discourse for KDE? Given the burden on Sysadmin already, there needs to be someone willing to shoulder this work (and go past their objections, like the use of Postgres), at least for evaluation work. Saying "is it possible" means it'll take a long time, or possibly never occur. Saying "I'll do it" and following up (note: generic "I", not addressing you in particular) has a higher chance. -- Luca Beltrame - KDE Forums team GPG key ID: A29D259B pgpDaBOYGGdmW.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
So, is it possible to add Discourse for KDE? Because this discussion is dead for almost a month now =/ On Sun, Nov 25, 2018 at 1:24 PM Lays Rodrigues wrote: > So, is it possible to add Discourse for KDE? > > Because this discussion is dead for almost a month now =/ > > On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 12:46 PM Eike Hein wrote: > >> >> >> On 10/29/18 1:31 PM, Jonathan Riddell wrote: >> > More coverage on last week's LWN >> > https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ >> > >> > Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use >> > Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap >> > there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than >> > mailing lists overlapping. >> >> When I read that LWN article some time ago, it struck me that the Python >> and Fedora communities are very different from ours in that they were >> still doing most of their development discussions on mailing lists, >> whereas we've migrated nearly all of the ones we don't have in chats >> anyway to Phabricator. That means the need for Discourse isn't quite the >> same, and it also does mean to me that Phabricator and Discourse might >> end up stepping on each others' toes and cause more fragementation. I >> prefer a single thing over two things, I guess. >> >> On the users forums replacement angle I can't really comment. >> >> >> >> > Jonathan >> >> Cheers, >> Eike >> > > > -- > > *Lays Rodrigues* > *Intern at Rede Globo* > *Software Developer at KDE* > *Information Systems student at Federal Fluminense University* > *http://lays.space <http://lays.space>* > *Telegram: @lays147* > -- *Lays Rodrigues* *KDE* *Atelier - atelier.kde.org <http://atelier.kde.org>* *Fundraising WG* *http://lays.space <http://lays.space>* *Telegram: @lays147*
Re: Discourse
On 10/29/18 1:31 PM, Jonathan Riddell wrote: > More coverage on last week's LWN > https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ > > Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use > Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap > there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than > mailing lists overlapping. When I read that LWN article some time ago, it struck me that the Python and Fedora communities are very different from ours in that they were still doing most of their development discussions on mailing lists, whereas we've migrated nearly all of the ones we don't have in chats anyway to Phabricator. That means the need for Discourse isn't quite the same, and it also does mean to me that Phabricator and Discourse might end up stepping on each others' toes and cause more fragementation. I prefer a single thing over two things, I guess. On the users forums replacement angle I can't really comment. > Jonathan Cheers, Eike
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 6:50 AM Paul Adams wrote: > On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 11:42, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > If you're running 10,000+ microservice instances, then you can have > > the teams of people needed to maintain the necessary overhead > > This is true. Also not your original point: you claimed that Docker > containers were generally unsuitable for production > The overhead is generally not that huge: you build, sign and upload > your images to registry you run. This is no different than when you > build, sign and upload your custom-built distro packages. > > Yes, running something like Openstack cause some additional overhead. > > > We delegate management of sites to people who look after them (where > > it makes sense) as it helps people get things done. > > They are essentially the "admin" of that specific site/service, but > > won't have root on the actual server that runs it. > > Good approach. It is by no means incompatible with running services in > a container. > You can give specific system users membership of a docker group, > allowing them to start/stop/deploy etc. You then control which > containers the user is actually allowed to manipulate in registry > config. > > Perhaps I am missing something? > Care would have to taken to insure such users can only use specific pre defined option sets. Otherwise the ability to run docker is equivalent to root access to the real file system via. --mount or --volumes. Probably other routes as well. Not hard to mitigate with the right setup. > > -- > Paul J. Adams > PhD MIEEE MBCS CITP > > GPG: 07DD 0812 Paul James Adams >
Re: Discourse
I do think that we should consider to move to discourse. One thing that I've learned with the agile method is to discover the 'pain' of my user and try to cure it. What i see from this thread is the 'pain' of maintaining this kind of infrastructure, that I think that using tools of automations like Ansible or Kubernetes for the orquestration and management of containers would aliviate that kind of pain. But I could be wrong, since I don't know any idea of the work that the kde sysadmins have. I love automation and how that makes my life easier at work. I agree over Paul Adams comments, and I think that if we want to go forward on this, we need to study it, find the poins of 'pain' and come up with solutions that can be good for everyone. For me, all the movements that want to bring KDE to a modern web are valid... to be studied and maybe implemented. On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 7:50 AM Paul Adams wrote: > On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 11:42, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > If you're running 10,000+ microservice instances, then you can have > > the teams of people needed to maintain the necessary overhead > > This is true. Also not your original point: you claimed that Docker > containers were generally unsuitable for production > The overhead is generally not that huge: you build, sign and upload > your images to registry you run. This is no different than when you > build, sign and upload your custom-built distro packages. > > Yes, running something like Openstack cause some additional overhead. > > > We delegate management of sites to people who look after them (where > > it makes sense) as it helps people get things done. > > They are essentially the "admin" of that specific site/service, but > > won't have root on the actual server that runs it. > > Good approach. It is by no means incompatible with running services in > a container. > You can give specific system users membership of a docker group, > allowing them to start/stop/deploy etc. You then control which > containers the user is actually allowed to manipulate in registry > config. > > Perhaps I am missing something? > > -- > Paul J. Adams > PhD MIEEE MBCS CITP > > GPG: 07DD 0812 Paul James Adams > -- *Lays Rodrigues* *KDE* *Atelier - atelier.kde.org <http://atelier.kde.org>* *Fundraising WG* *http://lays.space <http://lays.space>* *Telegram: @lays147*
Re: Discourse
On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 11:42, Ben Cooksley wrote: > If you're running 10,000+ microservice instances, then you can have > the teams of people needed to maintain the necessary overhead This is true. Also not your original point: you claimed that Docker containers were generally unsuitable for production The overhead is generally not that huge: you build, sign and upload your images to registry you run. This is no different than when you build, sign and upload your custom-built distro packages. Yes, running something like Openstack cause some additional overhead. > We delegate management of sites to people who look after them (where > it makes sense) as it helps people get things done. > They are essentially the "admin" of that specific site/service, but > won't have root on the actual server that runs it. Good approach. It is by no means incompatible with running services in a container. You can give specific system users membership of a docker group, allowing them to start/stop/deploy etc. You then control which containers the user is actually allowed to manipulate in registry config. Perhaps I am missing something? -- Paul J. Adams PhD MIEEE MBCS CITP GPG: 07DD 0812 Paul James Adams
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 10:59 PM Paul Adams wrote: > > On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 07:28, Ben Cooksley wrote: > > Sorry, Docker might be a wonderful way to test applications, but it's > > totally unsuitable for production workloads. > > That's a bold claim. At Zalando we have 10,000s of microservices in > production and each one of them is running inside a Docker container. > this has been our deployment vector for years > > We are far from alone in this. If you're running 10,000+ microservice instances, then you can have the teams of people needed to maintain the necessary overhead, which you go into below... We're completely different in scale - there wouldn't even be 10,000 processes (or even 5,000 to be honest) across all of the KDE servers combined. At our level of scale, having to run all the instrumentation layers you go into below actually creates more work than the benefit to be gained from it. > > > First, the contents of that Docker image can be confirmed how exactly? > > You build the image yourself, sign it and upload to your own private registry. > > > Second, it's impossible for Sysadmin to delegate management of a > > Docker container to anyone. > > There are third party tools to support this and Docker itself supports > delegation of signing and deployment. > Each team at Zalando has full autonomy to start/stop/update/deploy and > reassign their running services (and therefore the container). > > This is handled by an open source tech we have released called STUPS: > https://stups.io/ > > Sadly, this is AWS-centric, but I am sure there are other solutions > that solve the same problem. Openstack? So to make all of this work (securely), I count: 1) A private Docker registry 2) An orchestration system to manage your Docker cluster, complete with access control around who can do what 3) A system to build and sign the images you work with, and corresponding setup on your workers to validate those keys on your images. That's quite a bit of overhead. Openstack itself is quite a heavy bit of software too. > > > This means if anything goes wrong with it a Sysadmin would have to be > > the one to take a look > > Genuine comment: > Unless you are doing devops, when *anything* goes wrong I would expect > the sysadmin to be the first to react. > If you /are/ doing devops, then of course it is the deploying team who reacts. We delegate management of sites to people who look after them (where it makes sense) as it helps people get things done. They are essentially the "admin" of that specific site/service, but won't have root on the actual server that runs it. Regards, Ben > > -- > Paul J. Adams > PhD MIEEE MBCS CITP > > GPG: 07DD 0812 Paul James Adams
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 8:38 AM Boudewijn Rempt wrote: > > On maandag 29 oktober 2018 19:31:54 CET Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a > > marked increase in engagement. > > > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > > with queries before the report a bug. > > I don't think it's really comparable. Discourse might be a good alternative > for mailing lists and forums, where people have discussions, but it doesn't > look like a good alternative for a solution where people who have a problem, > ask about it, and get a (semi-automatic) answer because it's been asked a > hundred times before. It's the latter we really need :-) Yeah, I don't think it's really suitable for a help desk. Specifically since for a help desk you want the software to assist you in seeing unresolved and unanswered tickets and easily fire canned responses, so it very much needs special software. HS
Re: Discourse
Hi all, from what I get from the documentation, discourse has a mailing list mode which can, from a end user point of view, be used the same as a mailing list. As in: in a mail client, without additional config that would not be needed with a ML as well. So assuming we have 1) Sysadmins who are willing to install, configure and host this 2) A migration path for 2a) existing conversations 2b) our mailing lists and, more important, whether public or private and who should be subscribed I don't see why not. If it doesn't have the mailing list mode or if it doesn't work as I suspect it to, I'd be between very hesitant and against it, because I most definitely prefer my e-mail client over yet another crappy web app that is placed in a view and sold as client. If we don't have the migration path I'd be hesitant as well, unless we have a decent solution to - have continuity and not a sudden break / change, as there are ongoing conversations (and running both in parallel is very bad) - make sure we have the manpower and plan to migrate lists and their permissions over Kind regards, Christian PS: on the side discussion of docker: I am not against docker, we use it in (soon to be) production, we orchestrate it with OpenShift. But I do have to say that it is something entirely different and thus needs people willing and able to manage it, and this also needs planning on how to integrate it in already existing infrastructure, also security wise. So if we don't have infra people already comfortable with docker, do plan some extra time to build that up. PPS: I am still not terribly fond of the argumentation "we have to move to $some_fancy_new_shit_software or otherwise people will leave us". If people are contributing to / be with KDE just because of our choice of infra software, we are most definitely doing something wrong. But I already went on about that during the anti-IRC discussion.
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Tue, 30 Oct 2018 08:38:28 +0100 Boudewijn Rempt ha scritto: > As for the forum, it would be good to replace that with something > more modern. We get a lot of traffic on the forums, People don't I don't want to sound overly negative, but that's a common feeling also for those who handle(d) the forums. The problems are: 1. Keeping the old posts 2. Ensuring the alternative (or the upgraded variant, e.g. to the latest phpBB) is maintained Upgrades have been considered but there's quite a lot of custom code there and no one in the staff actually can handle PHP that well. Also (like I said elsewhere) someone needs to have both time and motivation for it. pgpzMQrXTUr01.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 07:28, Ben Cooksley wrote: > Sorry, Docker might be a wonderful way to test applications, but it's > totally unsuitable for production workloads. That's a bold claim. At Zalando we have 10,000s of microservices in production and each one of them is running inside a Docker container. this has been our deployment vector for years We are far from alone in this. > First, the contents of that Docker image can be confirmed how exactly? You build the image yourself, sign it and upload to your own private registry. > Second, it's impossible for Sysadmin to delegate management of a > Docker container to anyone. There are third party tools to support this and Docker itself supports delegation of signing and deployment. Each team at Zalando has full autonomy to start/stop/update/deploy and reassign their running services (and therefore the container). This is handled by an open source tech we have released called STUPS: https://stups.io/ Sadly, this is AWS-centric, but I am sure there are other solutions that solve the same problem. Openstack? > This means if anything goes wrong with it a Sysadmin would have to be > the one to take a look Genuine comment: Unless you are doing devops, when *anything* goes wrong I would expect the sysadmin to be the first to react. If you /are/ doing devops, then of course it is the deploying team who reacts. -- Paul J. Adams PhD MIEEE MBCS CITP GPG: 07DD 0812 Paul James Adams
Re: Discourse
On Mon, Oct 29, 2018 at 7:32 PM Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a marked > increase in engagement. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > with queries before the report a bug. I love using discourse and am totally in favor of using it. It has so much more enjoyable UX than just about any other forum software I've ever had to use. And the ability to bridge the divide between what developers use (email) and what users use (forum) is a dream come true! HS
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 7:28 AM Ben Cooksley wrote: > thanks to Docker's lack of user namespaces Docker has user namespacing. At blue systems we've been using it since September 2016 https://docs.docker.com/engine/security/userns-remap/ HS
Re: Discourse
On 2018-10-30 08:38, Boudewijn Rempt wrote: On maandag 29 oktober 2018 19:31:54 CET Jonathan Riddell wrote: Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a marked increase in engagement. I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people with queries before the report a bug. I don't think it's really comparable. Discourse might be a good alternative for mailing lists and forums, where people have discussions, but it doesn't look like a good alternative for a solution where people who have a problem, ask about it, and get a (semi-automatic) answer because it's been asked a hundred times before. It's the latter we really need :-) If you need *both* discussion and Q support, there is this plugin for Discourse: https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-solved-accepted-answer-plugin/30155. It doesn't make it as good as I find StackExchange or AskBot, but it is something. But when it comes to mailing lists and forums... kimages...@kde.org basically only gets used for announcements. All discussions happen on Phabricator or on IRC. Almost nobody with a question subscribes to the mailing list. The only thing that gets less used than the mailing list is the FAQ. At a glance, the FAQ is looking good in terms of legibility: https://docs.krita.org/en/KritaFAQ.html, how have you come to the conclusion that it is so unpopular? We also do get user support questions on IRC, through the web interface, but it's clear that it confuses people horribly. They come, ask and leave, or don't know what to do once they're in the channel. Much as it pains me, for user support, IRC is the wrong tool. It's still find for project collaboration, though. As for the forum, it would be good to replace that with something more modern. We get a lot of traffic on the forums, People don't understand the layout of the forums, but because there's only an RSS feed, no email integration, I miss a lot of questions, and it's often very unclear what the current questions are. And the process of registering and logging in to the forum confuses people a lot, too. Can you not subscribe to https://forum.kde.org/viewforum.php?f=136 to get e-mail notifications? Is it the identity.kde.org feature that makes registering difficult? Could this be alleviated by allowing for OAuth2? -- Best regards, Hans "totte" Tovetjärn to...@chakralinux.org 0xEB5A95EC99421F98
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 8:38 PM Boudewijn Rempt wrote: > > On maandag 29 oktober 2018 19:31:54 CET Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a > > marked increase in engagement. > > > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > > with queries before the report a bug. > > I don't think it's really comparable. Discourse might be a good alternative > for mailing lists and forums, where people have discussions, but it doesn't > look like a good alternative for a solution where people who have a problem, > ask about it, and get a (semi-automatic) answer because it's been asked a > hundred times before. It's the latter we really need :-) > > But when it comes to mailing lists and forums... > > kimages...@kde.org basically only gets used for announcements. All discussions > happen on Phabricator or on IRC. Almost nobody with a question subscribes to > the mailing list. The only thing that gets less used than the mailing list is > the FAQ. > > We also do get user support questions on IRC, through the web interface, but > it's clear that it confuses people horribly. They come, ask and leave, or > don't know what to do once they're in the channel. Much as it pains me, for > user support, IRC is the wrong tool. It's still find for project > collaboration, though. > > As for the forum, it would be good to replace that with something more modern. > We get a lot of traffic on the forums, People don't understand the layout of > the forums, but because there's only an RSS feed, no email integration, I miss > a lot of questions, and it's often very unclear what the current questions > are. And the process of registering and logging in to the forum confuses > people a lot, too. The login and registration experience is something that is being worked on. Regards, Ben > > -- > https://www.krita.org
Re: Discourse
On maandag 29 oktober 2018 19:31:54 CET Jonathan Riddell wrote: > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a > marked increase in engagement. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > with queries before the report a bug. I don't think it's really comparable. Discourse might be a good alternative for mailing lists and forums, where people have discussions, but it doesn't look like a good alternative for a solution where people who have a problem, ask about it, and get a (semi-automatic) answer because it's been asked a hundred times before. It's the latter we really need :-) But when it comes to mailing lists and forums... kimages...@kde.org basically only gets used for announcements. All discussions happen on Phabricator or on IRC. Almost nobody with a question subscribes to the mailing list. The only thing that gets less used than the mailing list is the FAQ. We also do get user support questions on IRC, through the web interface, but it's clear that it confuses people horribly. They come, ask and leave, or don't know what to do once they're in the channel. Much as it pains me, for user support, IRC is the wrong tool. It's still find for project collaboration, though. As for the forum, it would be good to replace that with something more modern. We get a lot of traffic on the forums, People don't understand the layout of the forums, but because there's only an RSS feed, no email integration, I miss a lot of questions, and it's often very unclear what the current questions are. And the process of registering and logging in to the forum confuses people a lot, too. -- https://www.krita.org signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
Hello, Although my experience maintaining a full-fledged Discourse deployment is nil (so I can't speak to that side of the discussion with any authority), I did install and research Discourse for an experiment with Hispalinux a couple of years ago. From a users' point of view, the Discourse interface is usable (as in it complies with most rules of usability), looks good and makes following and mining threads easy. Furthermore, as Rubén points out, Discourse provides a way for users who prefer mailing lists to participate without having to change their habits. Discourse also helps to certain degree with self-regulation: all parties, admins and end-users, can collaborate in curbing spam and trolls. I understand and appreciate the technical issues, but, fwiw, a change that would help attract more people without having to use yet another proprietary medium gets a +1 from me. Now, if we could just move on from Telegram without taking a step back... Cheers Paul -- Promotion & Communication www: http://kde.org Mastodon: https://mastodon.technology/@kde Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kde/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/kdecommunity signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Discourse
On Tue, Oct 30, 2018 at 11:28 AM Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 20:56, Luca Beltrame wrote: > > - As far as I remember, they *only* supported deployment with Docker. > > This is is IMO a terrible and black-magic approach > > Seems like a perfectly sensible and modern way to deploy. You can log > into the running container fine and twiddle as needed. Sorry, Docker might be a wonderful way to test applications, but it's totally unsuitable for production workloads. First, the contents of that Docker image can be confirmed how exactly? While the Dockerfile might be available for us to inspect somewhere, is it possible for us to verify that what is supposed to be in the *binary* image (which isn't signed) is what the build log for that Dockerfile actually produced? Second, it's impossible for Sysadmin to delegate management of a Docker container to anyone. Having access to Docker's management socket grants effective root rights over the host to the people with access to that, thanks to Docker's lack of user namespaces, ability to launch privileged containers (which have no limits on their access to the physical host) and have arbitrary folders on the system (including the whole root filesystem should one want to) mounted as volumes into a container. Escalation to root on the system would be as simple as 1-2-3. This means if anything goes wrong with it a Sysadmin would have to be the one to take a look, investigate and resolve the issue. For non-containers we can fully delegate this (even in the case of Ruby apps - Passenger is awesome for auto-scaling and letting people control this sort of stuff) so this would be a substantial step backwards and would increase the barrier to entry and pressure on the Sysadmin team. Virtually all of our servers run multiple workloads, which means the second point is a *hard* deal breaker for us. Case in point, the current server for the Forum (known as Silk) also hosts amongst other things: the Dot, Akademy site, Krita.org, Techbase, Userbase, our CiviCRM instance and our website statistics collection system (Matomo). Additionally, we use LXC ( https://linuxcontainers.org/ ) for running all of the workloads on our primary servers. Running Docker within LXC requires relaxing the security constraints that LXC containers have imposed on them under normal conditions, making them inherently less secure, which sounds like a bad idea to me. > > > - It uses (used to use?) PostgreSQL as database, for which Sysadmin > > isn't really keen on using unless absolutely necessary > > Shrug, personal taste. Sorry, but that's not a case of personal taste. Virtually all of our servers, with few exceptions, run MySQL / MariaDB and I don't think it's a good idea to run two database servers on the same system (more maintenance, two things to keep backed up, plus we don't have as much experience for problems with Postgres when compared with MySQL) > > > - The UX is not as best as it looks, hijacks stuff like the back button > > on the browser and what not > > Shrug, personal taste. > > > - The "app" on mobile is a joke, basically a web view of the mobile page > > I'm told the app works fine web view or no, doesn't seem a reason to > dislike an app. > > > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto > > > > Does Discourse have a mail interface to avoid breaking user workflows? > > How should a migration be handled? Don't forget we'll lose distributed > > archiving of the mailing lists as well (very useful). > > It certainly notifies by e-mail, I've not yet worked out how it treats > incoming e-mail. > > It has import filters for mailman and maybe phpBB but also if we ever > got to a point where we dropped the current systems entirely they can > just be turned read only and continue to be used as archives. > > > Also, don't forget that "should", to quote a seminar I was at recently, > > should become "I/we/they will". If no one is willing to put support > > with the (aged! I'm not saying it's perfect) forum infrastructure why > > do you think one would put up with the new? > > Of course it would need someone to do the work, but it would mean > replacing two systems with one. > > Jonathan Cheers, Ben
Re: Discourse
Il giorno Mon, 29 Oct 2018 22:27:37 + Jonathan Riddell ha scritto: > Seems like a perfectly sensible and modern way to deploy. You can log > into the running container fine and twiddle as needed. Only if you know what's inside. I would not trust a "docker pull" without knowing how the image is made. > Shrug, personal taste. But Sysadmin needs to maintain it given their resources, so it's not just "personal taste". > I'm told the app works fine web view or no, doesn't seem a reason to > dislike an app. You don't need the app, period. A web browser on a mobile suffices. > It certainly notifies by e-mail, I've not yet worked out how it treats > incoming e-mail. I meant a reply-by-mail interface, I know about the notifications. > Of course it would need someone to do the work, but it would mean > replacing two systems with one. Color me pessimistic. This hasn't happened with the forums, which still run an old and dated phpBBB, and historically the community hasn't been great at even attracting people doing web. -- Luca Beltrame - KDE Forums team GPG key ID: A29D259B pgpPRI9gsYK8l.pgp Description: Firma digitale OpenPGP
Re: Discourse
Thank you for that link, that was an interesting read. I am heartily in favor of migrating discussion to Discourse. The features page has a good breakdown of why one would use it over phpBB, so there is no need to reiterate that here. But I would like to offer my observations as a relatively new contributor. As much as it pains me to say so, IRC is dying. Even Freenode, which used to buck that trend. New, younger contributors don't want to load IRC clients (or go through the hassle of installing Telegram and trolling our wiki to find an invite link). They want to use discussion sites like reddit, and stackoverflow, where they can make a post, maybe with Markdown formatting, and get notifications when someone responds. Not monitor a real-time chat, waiting for the discussion to proceed. Even with clients that offer username notification, you then have to be connected to the IRC server constantly. Even using Riot, with a-sync connections and chat history, is a slow, nuisance to use. You also can't easily have separate discussions at one time, and end up with a big list of @user: in your message to keep notifying people you are responding to them. It's messy. Great for real-time issues (help, I'm in a boot loop!), but I don't think it fits well in modern communication needs for other purposes. As for mailing lists, I'm not a fan. It also appears from the statistics out there, not many others are fans either. Personally, I use email like sending a letter. I only write one when it is important, as I know that my email will appear directly in your inbox, without consenting to it. Even though I know this is a purpose-built mailing list, for discussion. There's something more invasive to it in my opinion. I might have ideas and smaller thoughts that might be worth discussing in a forum, where people can go look and discuss if they deem it worthy, but not necessary to blast to hundreds of people on a mailing list. Just look at reddit's /r/kde. It receives lots of discussion on all sorts of small topics, yet this mailing list, which is supposed to be the entire KDE community, is very quiet. I certainly believe the data from Foreman regarding an increase in discussion threads. I know I would. Additionally, lots of emails are annoying. As a new contributor, I dreaded having to subscribe to mailing lists to be involved. I might only want to be involved in certain topics. Ones I could set up a filter and notification for. Not everything. Using a mailing list forces me to receive lots of discussions that are of no interest to me. Rather than skipping over a topic name in a forum, I now have to receive every post in that thread, whether I want to or not. Switching to a forum system puts the power in the users hands, to decide what to receive. This would be a good opportunity to update our infrastructure we use for community discussion, and standardize on a smaller, more modern set of systems. Andrew Crouthamel ‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐ On Monday, October 29, 2018 6:28 PM, Jonathan Riddell wrote: > More information on Fedora use experience, the graphs are impressive > for those who think it's important to keep people in KDE > > https://theforeman.org/2018/07/discourse-6-months-on-impact-assesment.html > > Jonathan > > On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 18:32, Jonathan Riddell j...@jriddell.org wrote: > > > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a > > marked increase in engagement. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > > with queries before the report a bug. > > More coverage on last week's LWN > > https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ > > Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use > > Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap > > there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than > > mailing lists overlapping. > > Jonathan
Re: Discourse
Hi all, El 29/10/18 a las 23:27, Jonathan Riddell escribió: > On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 20:56, Luca Beltrame wrote: [...] >> Does Discourse have a mail interface to avoid breaking user workflows? >> How should a migration be handled? Don't forget we'll lose distributed >> archiving of the mailing lists as well (very useful). > > It certainly notifies by e-mail, I've not yet worked out how it treats > incoming e-mail. Following my experience with this part: Here at Hacklab Almería [0], we are using Discourse for the last 3 years (I think) and, personally I don't like forums, I prefer maillist, but Discourse personal profile can be adjust in order to run "like a maillist": all of the post are send by mail, I can answer by mail, mail are threadeds... practically is no difference with a mail list (I suffer some strange issues with in-line answered, but is possible there are due to Hacklab Almería mail gateway). In fact, usually I don't use forum web, I manage all of the Hacklab stuff across my mail, even started new posts. Adding to this, I encouenter practical that if I'm away from my mail, I can enter to Discourse and answer, or see my private messages or whatever. At this moment, I think this Discourse software is not bad for me. Only my opinion and experience. Cheers. Salud y Revolución. Lobo. [0] https://hacklabalmeria.net/ -- Libertad es poder elegir en cualquier momento. Ahora yo elijo GNU/Linux, para no atar mis manos con las cadenas del soft propietario. Porque la libertad no es tu derecho, es tu responsabilidad. http://www.mucharuina.com - Desde El Ejido, en Almería, usuario registrado Linux #294013 http://www.counter.li.org
Re: Discourse
On Tue, 30 Oct 2018 at 0:28 Jonathan Riddell wrote: > On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 20:56, Luca Beltrame wrote: > > - As far as I remember, they *only* supported deployment with Docker. > > This is is IMO a terrible and black-magic approach > > Seems like a perfectly sensible and modern way to deploy. You can log > into the running container fine and twiddle as needed. > +1 > > - It uses (used to use?) PostgreSQL as database, for which Sysadmin > > isn't really keen on using unless absolutely necessary > > Shrug, personal taste. +1 > > > - The UX is not as best as it looks, hijacks stuff like the back button > > on the browser and what not > > Shrug, personal taste. > > > - The "app" on mobile is a joke, basically a web view of the mobile page > > I'm told the app works fine web view or no, doesn't seem a reason to > dislike an app. +1 also common with content viewing mobile apps. > > > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto > > > > Does Discourse have a mail interface to avoid breaking user workflows? > > How should a migration be handled? Don't forget we'll lose distributed > > archiving of the mailing lists as well (very useful). > > It certainly notifies by e-mail, I've not yet worked out how it treats > incoming e-mail. I do wish to keep the mailing list interface as I find it hard (personal taste) to work out too much “GUI” and having it all in my gmail boxes is nice. Surely it supports a sorts of mailing list interface ? > > > It has import filters for mailman and maybe phpBB but also if we ever > got to a point where we dropped the current systems entirely they can > just be turned read only and continue to be used as archives. > > > Also, don't forget that "should", to quote a seminar I was at recently, > > should become "I/we/they will". If no one is willing to put support > > with the (aged! I'm not saying it's perfect) forum infrastructure why > > do you think one would put up with the new > -- -Sivan
Re: Discourse
More information on Fedora use experience, the graphs are impressive for those who think it's important to keep people in KDE https://theforeman.org/2018/07/discourse-6-months-on-impact-assesment.html Jonathan On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 18:32, Jonathan Riddell wrote: > > > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a marked > increase in engagement. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > with queries before the report a bug. > > More coverage on last week's LWN > https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ > > Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use > Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap > there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than > mailing lists overlapping. > > Jonathan
Re: Discourse
On Mon, 29 Oct 2018 at 20:56, Luca Beltrame wrote: > - As far as I remember, they *only* supported deployment with Docker. > This is is IMO a terrible and black-magic approach Seems like a perfectly sensible and modern way to deploy. You can log into the running container fine and twiddle as needed. > - It uses (used to use?) PostgreSQL as database, for which Sysadmin > isn't really keen on using unless absolutely necessary Shrug, personal taste. > - The UX is not as best as it looks, hijacks stuff like the back button > on the browser and what not Shrug, personal taste. > - The "app" on mobile is a joke, basically a web view of the mobile page I'm told the app works fine web view or no, doesn't seem a reason to dislike an app. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto > > Does Discourse have a mail interface to avoid breaking user workflows? > How should a migration be handled? Don't forget we'll lose distributed > archiving of the mailing lists as well (very useful). It certainly notifies by e-mail, I've not yet worked out how it treats incoming e-mail. It has import filters for mailman and maybe phpBB but also if we ever got to a point where we dropped the current systems entirely they can just be turned read only and continue to be used as archives. > Also, don't forget that "should", to quote a seminar I was at recently, > should become "I/we/they will". If no one is willing to put support > with the (aged! I'm not saying it's perfect) forum infrastructure why > do you think one would put up with the new? Of course it would need someone to do the work, but it would mean replacing two systems with one. Jonathan
Re: Discourse
Why not use bbpress / buddypress as the main websites are now powered by WordPress I believe? You can import too: https://codex.bbpress.org/getting-started/importing-data/import-forums/ On Mon, 29 Oct 2018, 20:56 Luca Beltrame, wrote: > Il giorno Mon, 29 Oct 2018 18:31:54 + > Jonathan Riddell ha > scritto: > > contributors not wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look > > quite old school. In Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing > > lists and forums and saw a marked increase in engagement. > > "Old school" because few people are willing (if any) to put up with > maintenance. This has been going for quite a while, unfortunately. > > I have my fair share of issues with Discourse (I run into it daily when > checking the support forum of my router): > > - As far as I remember, they *only* supported deployment with Docker. > This is is IMO a terrible and black-magic approach > - It uses (used to use?) PostgreSQL as database, for which Sysadmin > isn't really keen on using unless absolutely necessary > - The UX is not as best as it looks, hijacks stuff like the back button > on the browser and what not > - The "app" on mobile is a joke, basically a web view of the mobile page > > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto > > Does Discourse have a mail interface to avoid breaking user workflows? > How should a migration be handled? Don't forget we'll lose distributed > archiving of the mailing lists as well (very useful). > > > Discourse and at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more > > What about the old posts? Did anyone consider a migration? We don't want > to lose old content, after all. > > Also, don't forget that "should", to quote a seminar I was at recently, > should become "I/we/they will". If no one is willing to put support > with the (aged! I'm not saying it's perfect) forum infrastructure why > do you think one would put up with the new? > > > >
Re: Discourse
This would be really cool. I do use the forums a lot but navigating them (if you re not familiar with phpbb) can be tricky. Discourse is a bit more intuitive. On Monday, October 29, 2018 11:31:54 AM PDT Jonathan Riddell wrote: > Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at > https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ > > I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use > Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last > year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not > wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In > Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a > marked increase in engagement. > > I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and > at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It > might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people > with queries before the report a bug. > > More coverage on last week's LWN > https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ > > Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use > Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap > there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than > mailing lists overlapping. > > Jonathan -- Jacky Alcine Work: https://black.af Blog: https://jacky.wtf/weblog/ signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Discourse
Discourse is modern forum and mailing list software. Examples at https://discussion.fedoraproject.org/ or https://discourse.ubuntu.com/ I went to a talk at the Embedded Linux Summit about how Fedora moved to use Discourse. Similar to the discussion of moving away from IRC we had last year I see people moving away from mailing lists and new contributors not wanting to get into them. Our KDE Forums also look quite old school. In Fedora they moved to Discourse and mailing lists and forums and saw a marked increase in engagement. I think KDE should consider moving away from mailman and onto Discourse and at the same time forum.kde.org could move to this more modern software. It might also help cover Boud's use case of a user support method for people with queries before the report a bug. More coverage on last week's LWN https://lwn.net/Articles/768483/ Discussing it in person it was pointed out that we do already use Phabricator Workboards for much discussion and it might well overlap there, although I don't think that would be any more of an issue than mailing lists overlapping. Jonathan
