WHen the Groups will Return?

chekkizhar

Hi,

I am very eagar to know when the Group option will come back?

Bcoz,

Group - is a place to share what we/I know

Forum - is a place to answer for question .

And some questions are somewhat easy. Most of them are New Thing to me, and I hope for many others too.

After the re-born of linux.com, in last 3-4 weeks I can see that forums are very very active with the answers from Mathew, Marc, GoingEasy9 and Masen M[ who is back after some long time ;-) ] .

And absolutely I dont have any idea of what they are talking in most of the places and I feel like I am losing the touch with linux.com slowly.

So, again, when the "Groups" will be back?

marc

I didn't like the group thing nor the way the site was giving "points". It was a way of getting plenty of rubbish in here.

If you wanna go for points, do it in a way that *others* give you points (and only from someone that has proben to be trustworthy in the site, not just your "friends").

Anyway, I rather see the site *polished* than adding features and features.

The forums, as an example, are in a TERRIBLE shape.

*what's taking you so long guys????*

Regards

danielchapman

Unfortunately groups likely won't be coming back.

The vast majority of the group posts were spam, and other than the spam there was only around 12 groups that had posts in the last year, and only half a dozen in the last 6 months (at the time I measured obviously, not as of today)

It just wasn't used enough. If you want a new forum for a specific topic - e.g. to replace one of those actually active groups - let us know and we will likely set one up if there is a support for it.

There will be some community functionality coming back though, with an emphasis on those aspects that were being used frequently + improved anti-spammer tools.

The points system is still being debated, but you are right marc that the old system was not as fair as it could have been. We would like to bring it back as we feel strongly that active community members should be rewarded and recognised for their participation, but we won't unless we can put together a solid system.

Now is a perfect time to make any constructive suggestions for that or other aspects of the community setup (hint- forum fixes). Peer voting that you mentioned is one I am personally in favor of, if it can be made so that people can't exploit it.

As for what is taking us so long...

I am genuinely sorry for that but unfortunately our web development team is pretty much just me and the occasional contractor we get in for tasks here and there.

Since the hack we have totally rebuilt the server architecture to be a to more solid and robust. This unfortunately broke a lot of stuff (most actually) at the same time that had been built on the old architecture, with some code going back 5 - 10 years from the entities that predate the Linux Foundation.

From September until the end of December 2011, the sysadmins and I were working 16-20 hour days 7 days a week rebuilding the infrastructure and putting the sites back up. We did almost 9 months worth of work hours each over a 3 month period. I now have a nice new set of wrinkles around my eyes from squinting at a computer screen nonstop for 3 months

From here, the next steps are the rebuilding of the sites, because they are most certainly not "optimal" as you have observed.

However I am only human, and looking after close to ten sites, so this takes time as I can only fit new development into about 30-50% of my work hours.

I am currently in the final stages of finishing off the video site, adding some video sitemaps and tweaks so we can upload videos directly from events to the site. There is also a couple of minor bugs to squash, and then after that is the Events site which will get a much needed facelift.

After Events I will move onto Linux.com. The video site is a good example of how we see our sites looking and functioning. It is all HTML5 (except for the embedded YT videos ), CSS3 and follows many other industry standards.

I know it's taking time, but things are happening, even if not everyone notices them. We aren't just sipping wine and munching crackers.

mfillpot

Daniel,
Thank you for the update, we appreciate your hard work and can't wait to see your vision. As always, I am willing to assist however and whenever possible.

Goineasy9

What Matt stated goes for me also, Dan. We know you're doing the best you can under the circumstances, and, are patiently waiting to see all the new features.
What some of the forum members don't see, is that, if one of the mods notices a serious problem, one email to Dan gets a response quickly. We all appreciate that.

Be patient all, the best is yet to come.

marc

That's a heads up. Thanks for the update

I understand all this things it takes time, I just had the feeling that all was kind of "left aside" because nobody was giving information neither here nor in the website :S

Anyway, thanks again for the update

Looking forward to see the changes

Regards

chekkizhar

@ Daniel: Thanks for the info and we all hope, things will be good, soon

@marc : I too didn't like the score system. But, Groups, I enjoyed a lot.
Any way, as Daniel told most of them were in-active and some groups were filled with spam.So, it deserve a lowest priority..

Thanks again all... :-)

danielchapman

Don't forget crond, we are happy to add new forums (within reason) if you want somewhere to discuss something not covered elsewhere.

Thanks all for the votes of confidence. I have some big plans for linux.com, as it deserves to be a Jewel of a website.

chekkizhar

sounds great.

If there is place to discuss about what people know, with others [ kind of blog posts, discussion ,tutorials or whatever], it will be helpful .

Thanks Daniel

marc

The blog system was something I didn't like at all. Not only you had to wait for moderation but you had to write it in Linux.com as well. I have my own blog, I do not want anyone controlling what I write neither hosting nor censoring.

By the way, you can come to the irc channel #linuxdotcom at irc.freenode.net (mostly me and masenm if you wanna talk and discuss anything

Regards

chekkizhar

yah sure. I saw you guys when I peek into that.
But, mostly I may not have time to enter IRC, at the same time when you people are.

vtel57

Daniel,

You're a trooper, buddy. Thanks for all you do.

I've been remiss in visiting here at Linux.com lately because... well, because I just don't have the time to visit all the forums and blogs that I like to visit on any given day. Sometimes, you just have to pass on one or two. Unfortunately, time gets by you and you realize you haven't logged in at one of your fav places in months. That's the nature of the Internet these days... information overload.

It's good to see some familiar faces still hanging around the place, though. Hope all is well with everyone. I too am looking forward to seeing how Daniel's vision for this place will look when it becomes reality.

Take care all...

~Eric

Goineasy9

Hey Eric,

Nice to see you checking in occasionally. I guess we're all getting to busy to look at everything everyday. I've added helping with the "siduction" distro to my daily tasks. So, one more forum and a few more IRC channels running 24/7 does fill the day. Although, not in a bad way.

Anyway, nice to see you. Don't be a stranger, heh, or any stranger.

Tom

vtel57

Well, you know how it is...

Between being an Admin at Scot's Newsletter Forums - Bruno's All Things Linux, running my own personal board, and trying to provide some minimally entertaining or educational content going on my three blogs; I'm just overwhelmed some days.

I'll try to peak in here more often, though.

You folks be good now. Don't burn the place down while I'm gone.

Later...

~Eric

P.S. I'm easy to find if you need me... http://vtel.jaylach.com/vtel57/vtel57.html