Python Forum

[Grant Edwards]

I fully agree with the feedback, that creating a new forum is not such
an excellent idea. currently the critical mass seems to be here and I
appreciate this a lot.

However, whether we like it or not:
Fewer and fewer newcomers are willing, knowledgable, aware of nntp

If you think, that newbies are unlikely to use nntp, then create a
forum, web front end or whatever, which looks very nice and cool, which
will automatically relay messages (forward and backward) to this group.

You mean like this?

http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.general

In my opinion new forums should integrate nntp and not try to replace
it.

An nntp gateway on just another server is also not as nice as just
communicating with the existing feeds.

I'm don't know what "communicating with the existing feeds" means.

 

[Grant Edwards]

Good for you, just a shame that quite a bit of the regulars here ignore
anything that comes from google groups,

It's sad that Google won't clean up its act with respect to
facilitating spamming, but ignore posts from Google Groups has cut the
spam down to almost 0.

 

[Grant Edwards]

Sure. But Thunderbird, Horde, Squirrel, Google/GMail, Evolution, and
Outlook/OWA are *not* NNTP agents.

Thunderbird, Evolution and Outlook are all NNTP clients. Not sure if
that's different than being an "agent".

 

[Lie Ryan]

Sure. But Thunderbird, Horde, Squirrel, Google/GMail, Evolution, and
Outlook/OWA are *not* NNTP agents.

Then how come my Thunderbird could talk with an NNTP server? Directly
without going through the bowels of a newsgroup-to-mailing list server.

 

[Colin J. Williams]

You mean like this?

http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.general

I use gmane via nntp (news.gmane.org port 119) but, as the link above
shows, there are threading problems.

Colin W.

 

[Colin J. Williams]

You mean like this?

http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.general

I use gmane via nntp (news.gmane.org port 119) but, as the link above
shows, there are threading problems.

Colin W.

 

[Colin J. Williams]

You mean like this?

http://news.gmane.org/gmane.comp.python.general

I use gmane via nntp (news.gmane.org port 119) but, as the link above
shows, there are threading problems.

Colin W.

 

[Monte Milanuk]

So? NNTP is the living dead. Time to let it go.

True. Decent NNTP access is harder to find. Not impossible, but no longer
a 'free' part of most standard ISP access any more. Gmane provides a mail-to-
nntp gateway which is great for those who like to read it via nntp.

Most people use this list via e-mail, which everyone has access to and
knows how to use.

The best solution I've seen is what is used by the Mono project; which
provides both a "web forum" and a mail list interface.

<http://lists.ximian.com/mailman/listinfo/mono-list>
<http://go-mono.com/forums/>

It works very well; and everyone [except the 3 or 4 NNTP hold outs] are
happy.

Now that looks pretty slick - both sides get to have what they want, and
the 'pool' of knowledgeable persons stays condensed rather than dispersed.

Very cool.

Monte

 

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

I'm not sure that means what you imply it does. I'm involved in several
projects and technical groups. List traffic is down across-the-board.
I remember [physical] UG [of various flavors] meetings of 30+ people,
now you average ~10. I see two factors: [a] much better documentation,
more traditional training, and simply that many of the hard nuts have
been cracked. It is much easier to develop [regardless of language] or

I'm tempted to offer up that a lot of things that may once have been
covered in this general group have been migrated to specific mailing
lists (which are too many for me to consider subscribing just to do one
or two posts)...

 

[Phlip]

+1

Yuck; no better way to make new users hate your product than have a web
forum - where they post questions....

Free of all the spam that leaks into here from the remnants of
USENET!!

and never get answers...

You mean like how I never get answers, to my super-easy GED-level
questions, here??!

 

[geremy condra]

Free of all the spam that leaks into here from the remnants of
USENET!!


You mean like how I never get answers, to my super-easy GED-level
questions, here??!

I agree. This proves conclusively that a web forum is the right
place for you.

Geremy Condra

 

[Phlip]

I agree. This proves conclusively that a web forum is the right
place for you.

Ah, so you feel up to my "xsl for xmlrunner.py" question?

 

[geremy condra]

Ah, so you feel up to my "xsl for xmlrunner.py" question?

Sure, it's super-easy and GED-level. We can talk about the
cost privately if you're interested.

Geremy Condra

 

[Phlip]

Sure, it's super-easy and GED-level. We can talk about the
cost privately if you're interested.

Geremy Condra

That reminds me - pyDev, your forum has a "killfile" or "block"
feature, right?

 

[geremy condra]

That reminds me - pyDev, your forum has a "killfile" or "block"
feature, right?

If you want to block me (hypothetically, of course), just add me
to your spam filter's rules.

Geremy Condra

 

[John Bokma]

Ah, so you feel up to my "xsl for xmlrunner.py" question?

Just jumping in the middle, but if you're looking for a web based forum
where you can ask questions, check out Stack Overflow (and sister sites,
depending on your question). I've noticed over the last couple of months
that often things I google for, are answered on Stack Overflow. One
thing that would've been nice to have on Usenet that I like is the
ability to vote answers up or down. I think Usenet would've been a bit
better with that option.

 

[Steven D'Aprano]

Decent NNTP access is harder to find. Not impossible, but no longer a
'free' part of most standard ISP access any more.

I disagree. Since I've been on the Internet, over a decade now (what can
I say? I was a slow starter), I've had three ISPs, and all three of them
have provided NNTP access as a standard. One of them tried to cancel
access to *binary* newsgroups, but they reversed that after customer
complaints.

I don't know what rubbish ISPs you're dealing with, or what country
you're in, but not all ISPs in all countries are rubbish.

 

[Phlip]

I don't know what rubbish ISPs you're dealing with

You've heard of a little fly-by-night outfit called AT&T?

 

[Chris Rebert]

I disagree. Since I've been on the Internet, over a decade now (what can
I say? I was a slow starter), I've had three ISPs, and all three of them
have provided NNTP access as a standard. One of them tried to cancel
access to *binary* newsgroups, but they reversed that after customer
complaints.

I don't know what rubbish ISPs you're dealing with, or what country
you're in, but not all ISPs in all countries are rubbish.

The US high-speed consumer ISP market isn't very competitive and some
players in the oligopoly are indeed rubbish WRT newsgroups. Case in
point: http://www.comcast.net/newsgroups/
</americentrism>

Cheers,
Chris

 

[Steven D'Aprano]

So the OP's initiative should be an incentive to think on the format of
the interaction between all the range of Python users, from newbees to
gurus. We are in the 2.0 era, with social networks all over the place
using a pleasant interface,

Really? I can't think of any 2.0 era social networks using pleasant
interfaces. All the ones I've seen or used start with mediocre interfaces
and get worse from there.

while c.l.p has a rather austere look and feel, with text only,

Thank goodness for that!

no way to present code snippets in a different
font / background than discussions,

If somebody can't distinguish code from comments in a post by the
context, they aren't cut out to be a programmer and should probably stick
to posting "OMG LOL" on a social networking site.

and even an unintuitive way of entering links...

Pasting or typing a URL is unintuitive?

If somebody can't take the time and effort to post a URL in a form that
is not broken, well, that doesn't say much for their skills as a coder
does it? If you can't handle the fact that URLs can't be broken over
multiple lines in email and news posts, how do you expect to handle even
more vigorous requirements while programming?

I'm not saying that pythonforum.org is the best solution but it
certainly looks more attractive than c.l.p. to the new generation of
Python users

I get:

While trying to retrieve the URL: http://pythonforum.org/
The following error was encountered:
Connection to 173.83.46.254 Failed
The system returned:
(111) Connection refused


Oops. Looks like they can't handle the millions of new users joining up.

Despite my sarcasm, I actually do wish them the best. I'm not too worried
about fragmenting the community -- the community is already fragmented,
and that's a *good thing*. There are forums for newbies, for development
*of* Python (rather than development *in* Python), for numeric work in
Python, for Italian-speakers, for game development, etc. This is the way
it should be, and I don't fear a competing general Python forum or
forums. If they're better than comp.lang.python, they will attract more
users and become the place to be, and if they're not, they won't.