COOL OUR OWN FORUM: Feedback please!

Hello Generator!

We’re still working on the ins and outs of this forum, finding, tweaking etc. This post is partially a test post to see if people get it in their e-mails, and partially a method for starting discussion here.

what’s missing? what do you want to see? what’s broken?

Pipeline to fix: (Updated 03/10/20)

SSO from Membershipworks, not from wordpress (will fix everyone’s names being numbers, among other things

  • Currently not working well. We’ll need a script, or for people to just change their username when they arrive.

Figuring out groups

  • Member rep group added
  • Editor group for people who want to actively document
  • Any others?

Badges / badge system

  • too many badges for random things- adds clutter and noise.

Let me know!

//Robin

a test reply: at least 20 characters long.

Hey Robin,

I’m on. Thank you for setting this up and very much looking forward to using this and the wiki a little bit more. You’re awesome! Also my user name did show up as a number and I had to change it

M

Hi Matt! i’m responding via e-mail using mailgun. hope it gets back to you!

ps. the numbers wull change when i get SSO from membership works. love u!

Hey Robin,

Replying from my phone. I did get the email from a discourse email address.

M

Lets see how this beast handles images.

This guy was drag & drop:

This guy is an online link:

Both came from this article: Aircraft detection before radar, 1917-1940

3 Likes

That looks awesome. Very impressed. I didn’t see your reply in the digest for some reason, Just saw it now after looking at the forum.

hmm so maybe we need to make digest settings more apparent? i haven’t got them to “work” like google groups yet, so that and the wiki are my two next priorities. i think we need to examine how the forum and a wiki will tie in together.

I am on too. This is very interesting from my phone. It is one collumn and the pictures are great!
Thank you Robin. Send me an email or any possible responses to test.

Jean

So as for replacing the Wiki: It seems like the implication is making single user threads that cover the machines individually like they do here:
It might be just a task of converting stuff from the currently existing wiki to this?

2 Likes

Hey Robin,

I was checking out that link to the SLM discourse and noticed that upon hovering over the calendar icon that it was a google calener as the backbone just like ours… Might be helpful if we are trying to replicate their calendar. Also planning to transition what we’ve got on the MDX to a specific thread like the one shown here. Thanks!

oh man if we can tie in event posts as google calendar events, we’re all tied together ! where is our current wiki by the way? i’d love to get started on just transcribing pages

@jpweisbecker and I were talking about the way our Forum is setup compared to SLM- and we had a couple of ideas that you can view here: Link

Predominantly, our goal is getting people onto the Forum as soon as possible, especially under current circumstances, But the ideal case is the forum is setup in a meaningful way, and I have some reservations about the number of different sections, especially compared to the google groups. We had a couple of ideas about that, which I’ll post here:

Proposal A:
Combining shops into per area, reducing number of categories

  • Per area
    • Events
    • Prototyping
      • 3D Printers
      • Laser Cutters
      • Vinyl Cutters
    • Heavy Shops (Or better named?)
      • Wood shop
      • Metal shop
      • Machining
      • CNC Mill
    • Technical (Or Better named)
      • Electronics
      • Jewelry
      • Sewing
    • Digital
      • Learning Lab
      • Software (CAD modeling/etc)
    • Wiki
      • Tools Documentation
      • How to use Areas
      • Other?

Proposal B:
Similar to South London Makerspace setup

  • Discussion
    • Talk about things!
  • Projects
    • What are you working on?
  • Admin
    • Formal ticket system for bureaucracy
  • Events
  • Members
    • Opportunities for members, Seeking/selling
  • Rules
  • How To
  • Tools Documentation

Thoughts? I’d love more input about the overall design- and feedback on these proposals will be immensely helpful. I’m also interested in starting a more formal committee that makes choices about how the forum is managed, so it’s not just me making decisions for the rest of us-

Thanks,
Robin

Thank you Robin! this is fantastic.

1 Like

Where are the electronics tools manuals?

Hi Pike! We’re still in the progress of moving things over from the Wiki- if that’s something you’d be interested in helping with, let me know! Those would go into the wiki category -> Tools documentation

Robin,
I signed up and would be happy to get things moving to the wiki, any recommended tutorials? Specific formats? I see the link the the South London Makerspace above is the plan to just copy that format?
Perhaps we should set up an online meeting with interested parties and discuss how to proceed so we dont go tripping over each other

Pike,
They are here >> http://generatorvt.com/wiki/doku.php
Specifically here >> http://generatorvt.com/wiki/doku.php?id=tools_inventory
-Gary

I would vote for proposal A and B but I would not group the shops like that though.
Each Lab/Shop/Studio should have its own group as they do not necessarily intermingle in those ways.
I appreciate less categories but I feel they should still reflect logical functionality.

Although I guess the us of tags might be enough to make logical connections?

Gary, thanks for all the great input!

i created a post asking about tagging formats and ideas here - i think it’ll be a little more sane to use it then a ton of sub-categories personally, but yes i agree- let’s get more people together to talk about it!