Re: [libreoffice-design] Topic for design team to investigate: Content hosting consolidation on ask.libreoffice.org

Hi,

On Sun, Oct 14, 2018 at 01:24:10PM +0200, Maarten Brouwers (murb) wrote:
> I got a bit different impression, and still see the extensive requirements
> doc (also the new one) highly contrasting with what I read as the idea of
> ‘just start iterating from ask.libreoffice.org <http://ask.libreoffice.org/>’
> (I know, no-one said that as simply). Sure you can do your bookkeeping in
> Writer, no need for Calc (or Base), but I just wonder if you should even
> considering starting with Writer.

Stating that a classic CMS is by definition better suited for the task at hand
than something more interactive like discourse is a foregone conclusion. Given
that the lack of community involvement is the core reason for many limitations
of the current setup, its not a valid one.

> - Lack of integration with LibreOffice? -> Create an API on top of the
> current database and integrate it with LibreOffice (another thing that I
> guess would be hard to realize with a foundation based on Askbot)
> [...]
> - Lack of moderators? -> All of the above?

Please dont guess or speculate on this, you will likely get it wrong. This is
something that needs to be evaluated by trying. To get integration with
LibreOffice right, the API or hosting is the smallest problem.

The hard problems are:
1/ verification of content (Codereview by humans)
2/ signing of content (ensuring that what was review is what is installed)

Again: Hosting and even integrating this is easy, compared to the social task
of verification, feedback and interaction. As such, the platform underneath is
not much of a relevant destinction -- unless on the latter. Reviewing or even
casual reviewing is the hard part. It requires manpower => which requires an
active community => which requires a platform that encourages interaction.

> I really doubt that OAuth or not has anything to do with it. Localisation, probably yes.

Well, where do the 45.000 accounts on askbot come from? The site is far from
being perfect, but still doing better that all other forums we have. OAuth etc.
certainly has a role in that, as does gamification, badges and social media
integration.

Finally, it should be obvious that is better to do custom development on our
specific (extension hosting) needs on a platform that provides broad generic
features (social media integration, gamification, oauth) than using a specific
platform for "extension hosting" and trying to add a lot of missing generic
features to it. The reason is doing custom development for social media
integration, gamification, OAuth will drown us in constant maintainance of those
custom build features.

Anyways: The start of this thread was "please consider more than one platform"
and the repeatedly given rationale is that bringing together users and content
are harder than bringing together moderators and maintainers and that is harder
than customizing a base technology. This remains universally true and as such
please stop speculating about the base technologies in a way that tries to
suggest to only use one technology.

For the community the decision should go with the team that gets the most
content, interaction and users on their platform. I dont care if someone thinks
the platform was not made for the task -- it there is a team that makes the
experience awesome and grows content, users and interaction on it.

Best,

Bjoern

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