PanoTools:
RE: PanoTools Yahoo Groups Membership Migration
JD Smith 2004-Nov-23 16:43:11
On Mon, 22 Nov 2004 22:01:40 -0800, John Spikowski wrote:
>
> <
> You mean that the Yahoo group is going to be extincted, and we'll have to
> use the bulletin board style forum in its place? Was this ever discussed? Is
> there some good reason for this? Personally, I've always found that style
> forum to be a really awful format, and I've used quite a few of them. The
> big negative is that you can't keep pieces of information easily. With a
> mailing list, I just skip the pressing of the Delete key, if I want to
> archive someone's post for future reference on my own machine.
>>
>
> Ciao,
>
> If you would have gone past the first sentence, you would have read that the
> forum will include a mailing list option. If you would have visited the
> forum link provided and checked out the Forum & Mailing list section, you
> would have found some facts that support that your in the minority. Two
> thirds of the list prefers on-line viewing or a single daily digest as a
> delivery mode.
>
> Remember, Yahoo Groups will not take responsibility if the PanoTools group
> data is corrupted or they remove the group. (I have seen this done by
> mistake.) All they care about is that you read their advertising.
>
> There are over 1600 members now with an active development effort. It's time
> to move on.
I'm not big fan of Yahoo groups. In fact, I think it's quite an
abomination. However, one thing the GMANE interface I recently setup
buys us is a good common point of archive that isn't going away. It
also makes searching the entire 4+ year archive quite reasonable, at
least in comparison with Yahoo's crippleware. I have a smart toolbar
pointing to GMANE which allows me to enter a phrase and search the
full archive in a snap:
http://search.gmane.org/search.php?query=%s&email=&group=gmane.c...
That said, there's nothing wrong with supplanting what GMANE does
using a flexible forum system which allows the full superset of what
we've got now:
- Full archive starting 04/2000.
- Posting via email.
- Posting via web (at Yahoo or GMANE)
- Posting via NNTP (at GMANE)
The last (NNTP) could be optional, given how few people use the group
this way.
However, one big concern of such a system will be its use of
resources. How much will it bog down the server(s) to execute a full
message body search over 26000+ messages? You can try incorporating
Bruno's archives to test that:
http://bugbear.blackfish.org.uk/~bruno/mail/proj-imim.2000-04-11_2003-04...
http://bugbear.blackfish.org.uk/~bruno/mail/panotools.2003-02-09_2004-11...
One other possibility I'll throw out is migrating from Yahoo Groups to
Google Groups (not newsgroups, but the new Beta Groups2 interface:
http://groups-beta.google.com/). Given Google's track record, this
will probably offer the most lightening fast searchable archive
available. The only drawback would be the text ads Google puts up,
but I find those much less offensive than the Yahoo ad-splat. Here's
the blurb from their FAQ:
5. Why would I want to move the mailing list I manage to Google
Groups?
Google Groups is a simple and reliable service for managing and
archiving mailing lists. In addition to basic mailing list
functionality, all your mailing list content will be stored and
searchable on the Web. Unlike other free mailing list services, Google
Groups offers generous storage limits and only displays relevant text
ads (never banners or pop-ups).
To move your mailing list to Google Groups, create a new group by
clicking "Create a new group" in the menu on the left side of the
screen. First, name your group and fill out the other required
info. Next, add the email addresses of the people in your group. If
you're adding more than 10 members, click "Invite people in bulk"
(copying an existing list of email addresses into this form is one
easy way of creating a large group). Once you're ready, click "Invite
these people" and invitations to join your group will be sent out
momentarily.
I've asked, and they don't import archives at this time, but GMANE
could still fill that roll.
Anyway, just another option to muddy the waters. I think a web-forum
with "sticky FAQs" etc. could be very useful, but I know I'd pay it
much less attention than I do the regular mailing list.
JD
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~-->
$9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything.
http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/.Cr1lB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PanoTools/
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
#removed#
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/