> On Jan 25, 2017, at 12:05 PM, Ted Kremenek via swift-evolution > <[email protected]> wrote: > > I have no problem with the project moving to forums instead of the Mailman > mailing lists we have now — if it is the right set of tradeoffs. > > My preference is to approach the topic objectively, working from goals and > seeing how the mailing lists are aligning with those goals and how an > alternative, such as Discourse, might do a better job. > > The current use of mailing lists has been carry-over of how both LLVM does > public discussion (which is all mailing lists) and how the Swift team at > Apple has used mailing lists for discussion. That inertia has benefits in > that it is a familiar workflow that is “proven” to work — but the doesn’t > mean it is the best option going forward. > > Here are some of the things that matter to me: > > - Topics are easy to manage and search, with stable URLs for archives. > > - It is easy to reference other topics with a stable (canonical) URL that > allows you to jump into that other topic easily. That’s hard to do if you > haven’t already been subscribed to the list. > > - Works fine with email clients, for those who want to keep that workflow > (again this inertia is important). > > - Code formatting, and other tools that add clarity in communication, are a > huge plus. > > I’d like to understand more the subjective comments on this thread, such as > "may intimidate newcomers”. This feels very subjective, and while I am not > disagreeing with that statement I don’t fully understand its justification. > Signing up for mailing lists is fairly straightforward, and one isn’t > obligated to respond to threads. Are forums really any less “intimating”? If > so, why is that the case? Is this simply a statement about mailing lists not > being in vogue? > > I do also think the asynchronous nature of the mailing lists is important, as > opposed to discussions feeling like a live chat. Live chat, such as the use > of Slack the SwiftPM folks have been using, is very useful too, but I don’t > want participants on swift-evolution or any of our mailing lists feel > obligated to respond in real time — that’s simply not the nature of the > communication on the lists. > > So in short, using mailing lists specifically is not sacred — we can change > what we use for our community discussions. I just want an objective > evaluation of the needs the mailing lists are meant to serve, and work from > there. If moving to something like (say) Discourse would be a negative on a > critical piece that is well-served by the mailing lists, that would (in my > opinion) a bad direction to take. I’m not saying that is the case, just that > this is how I prefer we approach the discussion.
I’ve looked into Discourse a bit, and it does look very promising. One *specific* way in which a motivated individual could help would be to take a look at Discourse’s import scripts <https://github.com/discourse/discourse/tree/master/script/import_scripts> and try importing swift-evolution’s mailing archives with them. We absolutely do not want to lose history when we switch technologies. Do the messages import well? Are threading and topics maintained in a reasonable manner? Does Discourse provide effective UI for looking into past discussions on some specific topic we’re interested in? - Doug
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