14 Apr
2008
14 Apr
'08
10:43 a.m.
On Fri, 11 Apr 2008 21:26:49 -0400
"Ivica Ico Bukvic" <ico(a)vt.edu> wrote:
I certainly agree some consolidation could be a good
thing. What I am
wondering about though, is the possibility of truly using the
linuxaudio.org as a portal. In order to do this I think several
things would be needed from my standpoint....
See http://portal.linuxaudio.org <http://portal.linuxaudio.org/>
1. A centralized basic information about all applications (wiki
already in existance, good start)
http://apps.linuxaudio.org <http://apps.linuxaudio.org/> has all
apps that have been a part of Dave's website. They can be also sorted
according to jack/ladspa/whatever support and entries are open to
community contributions. There were a number of people here very
vocal how they would not contribute to a wiki that was password
protected. Well, it hasn been open access since its introduction
little over a year ago, yet we had little or no contributions since.
It would be nice if we would be as determined about our contributions
as we are about our preferences, no?
2. A centralized repository of general linux audio information(ie
What is realtime, why/when should you use it, FAQs etc.)
http://lowlatency.linuxaudio.org/ (yes, it could be much better,
volunteers are always welcome)
3. A centralized place to go for announcements from all projects at
once...
http://lists.linuxaudio.org <http://lists.linuxaudio.org/>
we are hoping to also implement forum.linuxaudio.org
- This would likely entail using a RSS feeds for all members of the
linuxaudio consortium, and subscribing to those feeds to be displayed
on the news page. I am sure there is a better way, but this is what
sticks out to me at the moment, filtering of the announcements might
be necessary. I suppose another option would be to utilize the
linux-audio-announce mailing list instead so as to have a natural
filter preventing things like general informational posts.
Linuxaudio.org main page has RSS feeds.
4. I am not against a centralized forum either, however I think app
specific forums and websites are still a good thing, which leads to
the next point couple of points...
5. Tight integration between all of the above. On the wiki we have
links to the forums for those peices of software, or from the
FAQ/Info sections links to the forums, or from the Forums to the
wikis, with the news announcements a link to the wiki for the
software the announcement is about, etc.
This is in progress but again, most of the work you've seen so far
has been the fruit of maybe half-dozen people including myself.
6. A single login for linuxaudio... And I don't just mean
linuxaudio.org, but all member projects if possible. This is the one
most difficult to implement, and probably most contreversial, but
would allay some of the problems that Dave and others have, which is
having to sign up for hundreds of forums with logins to remember
etc. Having one place to go for that would be great. This could tie
into the centralized forums, by having direct links to each of the
projects individual forums, if applicable, and auto-login. OpenID is
making good strides in this area, but as I mentioned I do expect this
to be the most contreversial of my suggestions I suppose, along with
still being the most difficult to implement.
See above. Some users complain about having to log in so we left it
open for the sake of greatest possible target audience.
Best wishes,
ico
But the goal with these would be to provide a single portal, from
which you can get all levels of help by utilizing all the availiable
resources out there.
Seablade
What I think would be a good idea is not to centralise anything as such
but to have a central place to go for directions and information,
call it signpost, call it portal, call it whatever you want.
One criteria it would need to fulfil is to be up-to-date, another to
offer a real overview, a third to be well structured.
It would require quite some and constant work to reflect the real
situation, outdated and wrong information would only be misleading
(once it is established, that is).
I guess that some people would be needed to do this job, a team of
people who are willing to invest a considerable amount of time and
effort, not just for a brief period but in the long run.
Else, I don't really see hope for that.
On the matter of a forum: I used those for quite some time, but pretty
much stopped doing so when I got more and more into Linux audio.
I don't really know why, but I can't stand them any more.
It is hard for me to find valuable information an a forum and asking to
get information is more cumbersome than on IRC or a mailing-list.
A mailing list is a far more standard-way of communication and more
accessible in many ways, everybody, including people without eyesight,
like Julien, can access it. That's something that is impossible with a
forum, to my knowledge at least.
What I wish for a mailing-list like this a good way to search it,
placed so that everyone can easily find and use it, to avoid
unnecessary repetitions as far as possible.
From my experience it is a very common and big problem of fora that
people are asking the same questions over and over again, and
knowledgeable people get tired of answering and/or redirecting.
IRC and mailing-lists may have the same problem, but it appears to be
not as big a problem.
The key to solve that may be a good wiki or something like that, where
people write something down once, instead of answering a hundred times.
A good and active wiki, in combination with a good mailing-list search
placed at a prominent position may provide the informational backbone.
A forum may be an addition to it, but I personally would like to have
the vast majority of information on the wiki and the list.
The wiki has the sign-up-problem as well, for contributions at least,
and I don't know how to get rid of that barrier.
When writing the above, I had mostly the technical aspects in mind.
I can well imagine a forum as a place for more musical and community
related communications. A place for communications of a low priority
from a technical point of view, where it is possible to talk on a more
personal level because you don't disturb anybody.
I guess that's the one good thing about fora, communication that would
be considered inappropriate on a list could be fine there, under the
premise that important information is present and easily
accessible elsewhere.
It is all just from my limited experience, and it's just how I imagine
that it could work, and I think it could. What it would require is a
lot of constant work from a bunch of people with different expertise.
It may well be that I was unclear on some points, please don't hesitate
to ask. What is imagined, described, and understood may well be apart
a lot.
It would be nice if it all came true, let's see who makes it happen.
Best Regards,
Philipp