-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Rajko M. wrote:

The IRC as realtime has it's limitations for worldwide usage. It has to be split in regional branches in order to be useful for people that are at work, sleep etc. Second, the people that don't type fast can be only observers.

I don't see why email is not good for topics that are discussed on meetings. There is seldom something urgent that has to be solved in real time like it is with installation and configuration issues, where IRC is in obvious advantage.

The only problem is that people should be aware that some thread is dedicated to discuss issues that deserve broad presence, and it is not meant for chatter, but serious dicussion.

Is there anything else that makes IRC better medium for such topics.

It's usually a lot more productive from my experience because you interact directly, not with a delay. The problem I see with discussing things using email is that we don't have a mailing-list that is appropriate for that purpose. Definitely not this one. 50% are off-topic, 40% are support questions, and maybe 10% at best are really about initiatives around the community. Though I don't even think it's 10% Any topic that proposes interesting thoughts and sharing opinions about the project, its initiatives and its future just drown in here, getting 2-3 replies at best. Most technical support questions like "why doesn't ... work properly on 10.2" gets 20 replies with 10 of them being off-topic. Personally, I'm really disappointed about the current situation, there's no place to discuss bigger topics. And to get back to your proposal: IRC meetings and mailing-list discussions are very different in nature, one being more effective for certain aspects and topics, the other one being more effective for others. They're complementary though. We need both of them. cheers - -- -o) Pascal Bleser http://linux01.gwdg.de/~pbleser/ /\\ _\_v The more things change, the more they stay insane. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFFjalqr3NMWliFcXcRAhEHAKC3SNgkJ6lagI57ar31DKQu2MmPtgCgr4tw LV0xdhCjMRuxXQoCzEnTtPI= =n/Pm -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Rajko M. a écrit :

So if we can declare the rules that make IRC good as wanted, we would be able to discuss serious things, without time zone constrains.

IRC have many drawbacks: if more than two people speak, it becomes very fast impossible to follow the management involve knowledge not immediately accessible for people not using it all the time. I gave up following the weekly meetings largely because of this... a support forum should allow a p2p connection, MSN (Gaim?) is much easier for that (even if i don't like it either). if you need immediate response, a mailing list is _faster_ than IRC as you get your own answer isolated from the other, even after 10 minutes or so off line for tests and you can send as many info as you want IRC is good, for people that like it and use it frequently, so, of course, the channels must be kept :-) jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/mediawiki/index.php/GPS_Lowrance_GO --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Randall R Schulz a écrit :

I suppose the lack of Linux client software might be a problem, but perhaps one of the other MMORPGs could serve as a platform for community meetings?

why not :-) I'm not found of WoW, but never tried Second Life, could be fun jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/mediawiki/index.php/GPS_Lowrance_GO --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 23 December 2006 16:10, Pascal Bleser wrote:

Any topic that proposes interesting thoughts and sharing opinions about the project, its initiatives and its future just drown in here, getting 2-3 replies at best.

It is interesting your note is absolutely right. It seems that only few people have interest to overcome time zone and typing skills constraints. -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/MiniSUSE http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Wednesday 27 December 2006 19:18, Rajko M. wrote:

On Sunday 24 December 2006 13:24, jdd sur free wrote: ...

...

why not :-)

I'm not found of WoW, but never tried Second Life, could be fun

Good as a fun, but we would be better off to stay with something that works, doesn't need extra knowedge and financing.

Does Second Life not work? Is the amount of user learning required to use Second Life excessive? Is the magnitude of that learning unreasonable to ask of people wising to participate in openSuSE planning meetings? Is there any such virtual world technology that would not require some user learning? As far as "financing" goes, I don't know how much it costs, if anything to create a limited-access island in Second Life, but I'm betting that itj would be affordable to Novell. But anyway, I'm not really advocating Second Life, since I know nothing about it, but I do think the concept of holding openSuSE meetings in a virtual nexus is worth considering and pursuing. Randall Schulz --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On 12/28/06, Thomas Hertweck wrote:

Just look at opensuse - 75% is OT or useless, there are the guys who think they own the truth and don't allow any other opinion (which usually leads to heated discussions, e.g. whether programming is just writing text or a bit more than that), there are the guys who think they have to reply to each email (whether they have a useful contribution or not; usually, it's a waste of time), then there are the old guys who have to mention their experiences with PC systems from 1956 or so in almost every thread (otherwise their ego would be hurt), there are guys who instead of just reading what is written tend to read everything in between the lines and come up with obscure interpretations of an email and what it might mean, and so on... Frankly, I think serious discussion by email without any restrictions are not possible.

You forgot, people who make sweeping generalizations :-) It is ironic that the original post suggesting email by discussion has degraded into a "nah that will never work", instead of coming up with constructive steps to improve discussion on this list. Some of the characteristics that you describe are characteristics of people, so unless we get rid of them it doesn't matter what the communication medium is. If one takes the posts in December, the biggest issue is OT posts, about packages or issues, I personally see these as a small annoyance, and can be quickly dealt with by pointing the people to the correct list. Besides Mark Shuttleworth's notable post, call for help on the Education front, launch of opensuse-community.org, I will agree that we did not do much of substance in December. In regard to Rajko's initial email, I will bring up these points: 1. We could for every second meeting switch between a morning meeting and afternoon meeting (in local time to SUSE) - I actually brought this up a long time ago and it was rejected but it could be re examined again, to allow more people to attend at least every second meeting. 2. Anybody can take the transcript and continue discussion of any topic here (of course too late for any decision that has already been made in a meeting) 3. To truly have a "meeting via email" I think we would need a moderated list just like we moderate IRC during meetings, or those would turn into chaos as well. Pflodo Peter Flodin --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Wednesday 27 December 2006 22:34, Randall R Schulz wrote:

Does Second Life not work? Is the amount of user learning required to use Second Life excessive? Is the magnitude of that learning unreasonable to ask of people wising to participate in openSuSE planning meetings? Is there any such virtual world technology that would not require some user learning?

The Second Life, or any similar virtual world, can be considered as future of real time meetings, as well as teleconferencing, but right now I'm looking for ideas/proposals how to solve problems inherent to present meeting medium with minimum or no investment in software, hardware and learning. Time zones, typing skills, availability of information about topic in real time, are real problems. and so far I can see moderated mail list, as mentioned in other post, will solve all of them at once. -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/MiniSUSE http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Thursday 28 December 2006 16:48, Thomas Hertweck wrote:

The thread was not started to discuss steps to improve the current situations on the mailing lists - that's why I think it's not ironic.

Improving situation on mail list is the same as Peter mentioned as changing people. That is not going to happen.

The main problem is that we cannot have IRC meetings with world-wide participants. Nobody wants to stay up during night just to participate an IRC meeting. This means, the fundamental problem cannot be solved by real-time IRC meetings or any real-time communication. There exist certain workarounds like... ...

...

2. Anybody can take the transcript and continue discussion of any topic here (of course too late for any decision that has already been made in a meeting)

True. I would appreciate if those transcripts/logs or a summary (if available) were sent by email. My experience is that your audience is much broader if you deliver the information by email - if people need to go to a certain website to look for the meeting minutes, you've already lost half of the audience.

To post transcript is minor problem, bigger is where. 1) opensuse is already overloaded and thread about meeting will make this worse, and probably get lost in the volume. 2) Is this list appropriate? Looking at the topic it is, but I can see many posts, and OT discussions, effectively trashing this list too. 3) New one called meetings? Can be this one made moderated? -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/MiniSUSE http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Friday 29 December 2006 02:48, jdd sur free wrote:

the best system is probably not mailing-lists but news forums

I don't know how to moderate either, but I have good experience with Novell server (see Communicate page on wiki) and I know that some groups are moderated. How it works technically, I really can't say.

exactly what criterias and how/who will moderate?

As before someone that Novell trusts to give a sysop rights will lead the meeting. How to moderate is just as it is on IRC. Sysop can ban user, delete posts that are OT. We should establish rules for posting that will mimic IRC. 1) Minimal quoting just to point few words in paragraph that is answered, as it is only one server and problems with propagation of messages don't exist. 2) Short messages, with essential information, just like conversation. 3) New topic - new thread. Enforced without mercy. 4) All points in agenda open at once in separate threads. 5) Keep with agenda of the meeting. After 24 hours recapitulation, with action items and minutes for closed dicussions, and information what to do with open discussions. Is there anything to add? -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/MiniSUSE http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 30 December 2006 02:43, jdd sur free wrote:

we can expect users to be a minimum consistent... moderation ... can stop ... OT branches

Agree. Moderation is last resort, like on IRC.

there can be the same moderation than for mails...

Once mail list server sent mail out, only subscriber can delete it.

it's also much easier to subscribe/unsubscribe to a news group and download the all posts ...

The server and the client has to be set to keep all posts, but that is minor problem. Client setup can be explained in a few words. -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Saturday 30 December 2006 17:16, Carlos E. R. wrote:

Although, there was a mail administrator in suse-e some years back, Chris, who was able to block new postings to a thread he deemed OT.

It depends how much work is that, and I the local copy in news means nothing. I deleted my messages many times and I got error message that mesaage can't be found, so it may work. So, it can work. The only few things that we need is to see some Core team guy giving some comment to idea, and to vote for rules that will make meeting one point in time, not neverending discussion. -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

On Sunday 31 December 2006 03:26, jdd sur free wrote:

* on a defined subject, given by the first message.

Or advertised in advance, like it is now. All topics in agenda can be started at once as separate threads.

* discussion for a given duration (IE one week, for example)

It can be shorter (24 h) for topic that needs urgent action, or longer (until next meeting) for followups on action items, if necessary. In case of emergency can be used IRC anyway.

* with "soft" moderation, allowing a fast pace between questions and answers. news can nearly be "on sync" if necessary

The idea is to use only one server like support-forums.novell.com and than you can have the same pace as on IRC, as there will be no usenet propagation delay. It can be closed access for people with openSUSE account, so it will be possible to identify poster in case of problems, though I haven't seen much need for force and logins, looking in IRC logs.

news are better fitted for permanent net link (modem can be expensive),

With Knode is possible only online reading, but I'm sure that exist clients that can download messages and work offline.

anyway, if most of the users agreed, it's very easy to test it for a limited period of time and to make  a decision afterward.

news is not yet used by openSUSE, it's a shame, this is a very old and very nice tool :-)

It is not much advertised, but there is a few groups on support-forums.novell.com listed on http://en.opensuse.org/Communicate adding one more for meetings shouldn't be a problem. -- Regards, Rajko. http://en.opensuse.org/Portal --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 The Sunday 2006-12-31 at 10:26 +0100, jdd sur free wrote:

Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

On news servers the administrator can also delete postings. I'm unsure if that will stop clients from posting again to that same OT thread if they have a local copy, though.

on news server, there is nothing like "local copy" (unless you make a save), so it's no more possible to anwser a cancelled message.

No, the client can have a full copy of what is (or was) at the upstream news server. Mozilla can do that. More, you can have your local mirror news server, using package "leafnode". That's what I call client local copy. I'm not sure that what is deleted upstream is also deleted on client copies. That's the point I was wondering about.

do think at the differences between news and mail:

* news are online reading. one must be online to use the forum. This allow the owner or a moderator to cancel a message. Mail are off line reading, so posts sent are kept by the receiver. this is cheaper as for connection cost, the receiver can keep a copy of the message. The owner have to keep a copy of all messages if he wants to be able to answer an old message

News can be off-line reading as well. That's what I used leafnode for when I was on dial-up. I run "fetchnews" from the ip-up script and disconnected. I answered using pine or mozilla or whatever, and my answers were sent the next time I connected. This is linux, everything is possible ;-)

* with news it's the server that archives the messages, usually for a limited time (1 month, frequently), so anybody coming in the middle of a discussion can read and answer. mails can be archived by the server, but in openSUSE one mails are obfuscated and it's impossible to answer neither on the list neither to the original poster

That's the typical use, but the users can also keep their local copy with different deletion policy.

anyway, if most of the users agreed, it's very easy to test it for a limited period of time and to make a decision afterward.

As I don't participate there, it's up to you all. I only wanted to mention some points.

news is not yet used by openSUSE, it's a shame, this is a very old and very nice tool :-)

True. It is used by Novell, by the way (support-forums.novell.com). There are some opensuse groups there, with messages stored for two years that I can see. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Made with pgp4pine 1.76 iD8DBQFFl9a8tTMYHG2NR9URAg1nAJ9kP0+Q0KnIgvoEBZ0kmaBYnukDGwCfSRfD Osuy/dgxGUUjEnrdqS+ER4g= =oeI9 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 The Sunday 2006-12-31 at 13:25 -0600, Rajko M. wrote:

On Sunday 31 December 2006 09:21, Carlos E. R. wrote:

...

Thunderbird, for instance. Or leafnode + any news client.

It sounds simple with Thunderbird. I never tried the second, but I've seen such recommendations.

I think it is still simpler with thunderbird, but it is probably better on dial-up with leafnode (and network machines can pull from it as well); which is also simple, but you have to edit a text file instead of clicking away somewhere, you know :-p Happy New Year, by the way :-) - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Made with pgp4pine 1.76 iD8DBQFFmOkWtTMYHG2NR9URAm6IAJ9xXFXOZh0wntgPjV5hJHre8S3CNwCePZIb reZFDO0wmdEPPCGRacF2lAc= =+4PY -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org

Carlos E. R. wrote:

This is linux, everything is possible ;-)

sure, but it's not the main mode of use. The problem is not forbidding anybody to make a backup but to prevent the official thread from being buried by OT posts jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/mediawiki/index.php/GPS_Lowrance_GO --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-project+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-project+help@opensuse.org