lubuntu-desktop team mailing list archive

[Tim Bernhard <ohiomoto@xxxxxxxxx>]

Phill,

I agree that the wiki is a great place to put "learned" information.  But
most people will find forums easier to use  when the don't understand
something or have a problem they can get help quickly and ideas can be
exchanged more rapidly.  I actually prefer forums to mailing lists and
blogs for most things. *To me the wiki should be the first source for
general information and the forums should be the first place to hash out
problems.*  I think the focus should be on those two areas and they should
point to each other.

BUT, forums can be difficult to navigate.  I may need help with a .desktop
file and a search of the forums will bring up many threads.  Some will be
more useful than others.  It may take much more time and energy to find
that answer on a forum than is should.  So it ends up in a wiki.  Great,
but I'm still digging through the forums.  Ali's LOST points to the wiki
and it may also point to a thread that covers Lubuntu .desktop files.  No
if I have problems following the wiki (remember, I am most likely a noob
here!)  I can pop over to that thread and ask for assistance.  When someone
posts the answer I need it is now there for others to see and it's in a
logical place.  What's great about the forums is that they are
self-updating and long lasting (they don't go away.)  And being in the
Ubuntu forums is the best place for it IMO.

What Ali's LOST has a chance to do is draw Lubuntu users to one place on
the forum and then point them in the right direction.  It's a place the
devs can look to for bugs that may not be reported.  It's could be a place
to find out who needs help.  An it could be a place to find out what we
really need in the wiki.  It could be the most useful tool we have IF it's
managed correctly.  Right now, it's close, but as I pointed out, it's
currently flawed.  It does a great job of pointing people in need to
helpful information, but it does a poor job of pointing out who needs
help.  I've posted a possible solution for that.  But I can't do it for Ali.

Which brings me up to another drawback to the LOST.  Only Ali can control
how effective it will be.  If for any reason he can't do it anymore, then
it can no longer kept current.  It's still a great thread, but it will turn
into a 4K post monster like my laptop thread.  Which would be shame in my
opinion.  Think about how much great information about that laptop is in
that thread.  Now think about how difficult it would be to mine that
information.  I had good intentions when I started it, but I set it up to
fail.  It didn't achieve what I wanted it to do.  Actually I think it made
things worse because if you search those forums for information about that
laptop, it will always point to that thread.  How will anyone ever find
what they need in there?

My hope is Ali implements my suggestion so that doesn't happen with LOST.

Tim



On Thu, Nov 3, 2011 at 5:50 PM, Phill Whiteside <phillw@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi lubunteers,
>
> The most important thing is that each part is up to date. The more we
> diverge into different areas, the more impossible this becomes.
>
> I put up to people that our official wiki area should be 1st source and
> all other areas should point to it.
>
> We have already had this discussion wıth lubuntu.net pointıng to out of
> date stuff and ıt was corrected. There is not a snow flake in hells chance
> for our small team to keep every area up to date.
>
> My proposal was, is and continues to be that we PRIMARILY use our wiki
> area that includes 'How To' and 'Work Arounds' that are pointed to as. From
> all the other areas, a link that is updated is silly. People bookmark them.
> As renewed 'How Tos' / Work arounds are placed onto the forum etc. they
> must be then put onto the wiki area so that we are 'all singing off the
> same hymn sheet' Ali is excentlally placed to both look after the forum
> thread & has proven to be good at wiki - So I vote for hım.
>
> Having different sets of instructions / advice for people is simply going
> to lead to the chaos that we see generally when someone 'googles' a problem.
>
> I look forward to the replies, and, yes - we need them as to how we are
> going to have to decide on where we keep the MASTER set of instructions.
>
> Regards,
>
> Phıll.
>
>
>
> On Thu, Nov 3, 2011 at 3:24 PM, Jared Norris <jrnorris@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> > On Thu, Nov 3, 2011 at 8:16 AM, James Gifford <james@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>> > wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Not to sound like I'm pushing or anything, but in regards to that 4.2K
>> >> posts thread, most of them useless but some of them useful, this is
>> >> where the Ask Ubuntu format is good, since the accepted answer (in
>> >> otherwords, the one that is most helpful) will *always* be on top.
>> >>
>> >> Just a thought, but the mythbuntu team is migrating from the forums to
>> >> AU over the next several weeks, no reason why Lubuntu couldn't migrate
>> >> over as well.
>> >>
>> >> Cheers,
>> >> James Gifford
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>
>>
>> My personal preference is to use each segment to the best of it's
>> ability. The help.u.c/community wiki is useful for howto guides useful
>> to large audiences, the forums are good for one on one assistance, the
>> mailing list usually gets help reasonably quickly, IRC is instant and
>> AU has it's own little place.
>>
>> We have so many ways to contribute information to the general public,
>> I think as long as we choose the best option for the type of
>> information we're trying to request or present then it doesn't really
>> matter *where* it is.
>>
>> --
>> Regards,
>>
>> Jared Norris JP(Qual) BBehSc(Psych)
>> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/JaredNorris
>>
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>
>