llvm dev - Oct 2019 - An internet Forum instead of mailing lists?

Hi all,

I suppose this has been asked before, but I wasn’t able to find a discussion on
the subject.

Is there a reason for not using a web based interface instead of a mailing
list?. It seems to me that a using a private Forum would bring a lot of
advantages.

John

Joan Lluch via llvm-dev <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> writes:
> I suppose this has been asked before, but I wasn’t able to find a
> discussion on the subject.
>
> Is there a reason for not using a web based interface instead of a
> mailing list?. It seems to me that a using a private Forum would bring
> a lot of advantages.
I personally far prefer a mailing list.  It is easy to filter e-mails
and doesn't require a web browser.  Every forum setup I've used makes it
much clunkier to respond to messages than with e-mail.

                        -David

I think the simplest answer is just "tradition". Most old open source
projects use mailing lists for collaboration. Long time contributors are
used to the current system, and they make it work for them.

Another way to look at it is that the current system suits the needs of
those who communicate on the list the most, and they are the ones who have
the power to advocate for change. As someone who closely follows LLVM
communications, getting email for every new message helps me stay up to
date and makes it easy for me to respond when interested. Maybe if I mainly
studied past llvm-dev emails to find answers, I would prefer a separate web
UI that I could use to search and study LLVM correspondence, but that
probably doesn't describe most of the people that would need to be
convinced to use it.

To fill the gap, there are various services like nabble (I was going to say
gmane, but I guess it's dead). It's less than ideal, but it's what
we have.

On Mon, Oct 7, 2019 at 6:13 AM Joan Lluch via llvm-dev <
llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I suppose this has been asked before, but I wasn’t able to find a
> discussion on the subject.
>
> Is there a reason for not using a web based interface instead of a mailing
> list?. It seems to me that a using a private Forum would bring a lot of
> advantages.
>
> John
> _______________________________________________
> LLVM Developers mailing list
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> https://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
>
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There's also mailman 3 which allows you to post from the list-archive's
website. (I personally find browsing a mailman 3 list archive completely
maddening compared to mailman 2's pipermail archives -- something about the
thread layout just makes my eyes glaze over. But I guess some people like
it, and it does allow posting.)

For an example, you can see: <https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/>.
Note that by default it's only showing you 10 of the lists, because I guess
pagination is supposed to be helpful. A good example list might be <
https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-dev at python.org/>.

On Tue, Oct 8, 2019 at 1:39 PM Reid Kleckner via llvm-dev <
llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
> I think the simplest answer is just "tradition". Most old open
source
> projects use mailing lists for collaboration. Long time contributors are
> used to the current system, and they make it work for them.
>
> Another way to look at it is that the current system suits the needs of
> those who communicate on the list the most, and they are the ones who have
> the power to advocate for change. As someone who closely follows LLVM
> communications, getting email for every new message helps me stay up to
> date and makes it easy for me to respond when interested. Maybe if I mainly
> studied past llvm-dev emails to find answers, I would prefer a separate web
> UI that I could use to search and study LLVM correspondence, but that
> probably doesn't describe most of the people that would need to be
> convinced to use it.
>
> To fill the gap, there are various services like nabble (I was going to
> say gmane, but I guess it's dead). It's less than ideal, but
it's what we
> have.
>
> On Mon, Oct 7, 2019 at 6:13 AM Joan Lluch via llvm-dev <
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I suppose this has been asked before, but I wasn’t able to find a
>> discussion on the subject.
>>
>> Is there a reason for not using a web based interface instead of a
>> mailing list?. It seems to me that a using a private Forum would bring
a
>> lot of advantages.
>>
>> John
>> _______________________________________________
>> LLVM Developers mailing list
>> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
>> https://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
>>
> _______________________________________________
> LLVM Developers mailing list
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> https://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
>
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Hi David,

That’s interesting, because I have a totally different experience. On a forum,
every topic gets its own thread, and replies are always there in order for
future reference. Topic categories can be defined which encourage subject
classification. Advanced searching helps to find already answered questions,
prevent duplicates, and enable the continuation of discussions even years later.
Mails however are always a mess in my mailboxes, because even if filtered, it’s
difficult to precisely follow conversation flows or find past topics. Also, the
way to keep conversation history is by quoting others, which tends to be
inconsistent and has a limit. Maintaining subjects for long is difficult and
finding content a pain. To me a proper forum is superior and useful than mailing
lists. Or at least based on my past experience.

John
> On 8 Oct 2019, at 17:53, David Greene <greened at obbligato.org>
wrote:
> 
> Joan Lluch via llvm-dev <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org> writes:
> 
>> I suppose this has been asked before, but I wasn’t able to find a
>> discussion on the subject.
>> 
>> Is there a reason for not using a web based interface instead of a
>> mailing list?. It seems to me that a using a private Forum would bring
>> a lot of advantages.
> 
> I personally far prefer a mailing list.  It is easy to filter e-mails
> and doesn't require a web browser.  Every forum setup I've used
makes it
> much clunkier to respond to messages than with e-mail.
> 
>                        -David