Forum sections refinement request

[pdavit]

Further subdivide this forum section into the four plug-in types we have available, an additional one for support
by the individual authors and one on purely development discussions.

[ghisler(Author)]

Hmm, what are other user's opinions? The forum isn't that full yet, is it? Perhaps make a poll?

[Clo]

2pdavit
Hi Panos !
- I like the principle to split that forum, because it's true that currently it's a bit a mess…
But, like ghisler(Author) says, I would prefer a poll, with a bunch of options;
for instance, where do you place the standalone tools which are not really plugins, hence which can't match with any category you propose ?…

 F R
Claude
Clo

[djk]

First of all, it will be more work for moderators to move posts to the right forums - usually the more forums the more wrong addressed posts.

Next, What about current plugins forum? Will it still exist? If not, will we put the old posts into the new forums?

I'm not sure if we need to create new forums. I'm not saying: 'not", just... I don't know.

[deus-ex]

for instance, where do you place the standalone tools which are not really plugins, hence which can't match with any category you propose ?…

Erhm..., in Tools?
Naahh, that'd be to radical.

[norfie]

IMHO there is no need of further plugin forums. More forums wouldn't have an advantage for me because I'm interested in all types (wdx, wlx, wcx, wfx) of plugins. Maybe an extra forum for plugin developers would be good.

[pdavit]

The forum isn't that full yet, is it?

Well, for me the problem is not the size of the contents but the ease of browsing.

For example if I wanted to check what new and/or updated WDX plug-ins are available I would go to the corresponding
section and not try to read between the lines in a way as in the current situation.

BTW, I thought you were not trusting polls?

[pdavit]

for instance, where do you place the standalone tools which are not really plugins, hence which can't match with any category you propose ?

I will have to pick the easy way here since many sections is equally problematic. I suggest a VARIOUS section.
Anything fits there and you still spread the load with the remaining sections.

[pdavit]

First of all, it will be more work for moderators to move posts to the right forums - usually the more forums the more wrong addressed posts.

Next, What about current plugins forum? Will it still exist? If not, will we put the old posts into the new forums?

These are truly some problems. But when the forum becomes massive a solution would be needed and things would be even harder then to organize, split and distribute.

[icfu]

The current situation is that totalcmd.net as information source is better suited for new and updated plugins as it's definetely way faster to have a quick look each day on that front page and find a direct download instead of browsing the plugin forum here.
The efficiency would be definetely even lower if the plugin forum was split into different plugin types. In the end we are interested in plugins in general, not plugin types, aren't we?

I would prefer a very simple split only:
1. Plugin forum with sticked threads for every plugin where interested authors can post their updates and users can ask their questions, all in one thread.
The thread title should be normed, something like WCX: 7zip, to make it easier to find the thread one is interested in.

2. Corresponding forum for TC related tools.

Questions for tools/plugins that already have their sticked thread should be moved (of course more work...) and questions for nonexisting plugins/tools should be made sticky at once.

To prevent the plugin/tools forum from being "polluted" the sticky attribute should be removed after noone has posted in that thread for an amount of time, let's say two weeks or so.

The problem with the split is that there aren't much plugin authors willing to provide support in half a dozen different places. There are even authors running their own forum. Imagine what would happen if every plugin author decided that this was a good idea.

Icfu

[Hacker]

Imagine what would happen if every plugin author decided that this was a good idea.

The situation would become very ComplexCD, I guess.

Roman

[djk]

As I said I'm not sure what solution is (would be) the best. Sometimes I also thought about it. About cleaning the forum. You surely noticed that sometimes it's difficult to find some things here. Some subjects were discussed in many threads. You remember that somebody wrote something, that we were talking about something but you can't eaisly find it.

I'd like to see only one thread for one plugin (tool) but it's also not so easy. What to do if somebody starts a new thread? Delete it? Give him a link to the proper one and close the thread and delete it after a week or two? I'm not sure. There is a similar solution at Polish Miranda forum but I'm not sure if it's the best one. I don't like to see so many moderator comments.

What about situations where a user searches a solution for a problem and many plugins can help him? I remember discussion on temp panels where we were talking about several plugins at once.

Still not sure what's the best...