Proposal: move or abolish the active subforums

[Mr. Coffee]

So basically your bright idea is to add even more clutter to the board... Um, yeah, you might want to go think on this one a bit more there, dude.

[CmdrWilkens]

There are two categories we could fit each of these into: second class forums and data dumps.

Second class forums: Debating Help. History Forum, STGOD role-playing games, The House of Commons
Data dumps: Completed or Cleaned Up Fanfics, Library, Art Gallery, Famous Threads

I wanted to argue a bit, not in relation to what is a data dump versus 'second class" bt rather why "second class" still deserves being setup as a subforum. Since the ansawers aren't universal lets go one by one:

Debating Help: The volume rules against making this a top level forum and the clarity of the title (and value of the content) argue against merging. In other words the voume of new postings is not at the level one would ask for a top-level forum. It would add clutter to the existing layout which already stretches past a single page view on many (if not all) computers before one counts Private Forums. So unless there is a very compellign reason we should err on the side of not promoting a forum to top-level status. That being said the forum contains valuable information which, even if it were sticked, should it be merged back into SLAM would be lost in the main postings there. In other words Debating Help is an almost perfect example of why we should have a sub-forum:
- Its title provides an incredibly clear indication of what you will find in the sub-forum
- Its content quality deserves special recognition
- Its posting frequency argues against top-level status


History Forum: This is rather similair to Debating Help excepting that the information is not as valuable but it is certainly just as specialized. It again falls into the trap where it has a very specialized data set that would easily be lost in the alrger OT forum but does not have enough traffic to rate top-level status.


STGOD role-playing games: Now maybe this one deserve top-level status but that's an iffy argument at best. Sure it doesn't relate immediately to most discussion topics in G&C because it, again, has such specialized content but I have to beleive that prior to the SDN World STGODs starting up a few months ago there simply wasn't that much content. I'd hate to make this otp level and have it die so its easier to leave it as a sub-forum and merge back if traffic falls off.


House of Commons: Simply doesn't make sense as a top-level in my mind AND by forcng the Senate button to highlight for HoC threads it also generates more traffic to review what is actually under discussion in the Senate itself which can only be a good thing.

[Sarevok]

The current subforum system works. It isolates some special purpose discussions without creating a obfuscated mess like other boards and their fuckton of dead subforums that no one posts in.

Regarding the House of Commons. Considering most people come to a web board to read interesting threads and post sometimes instead of learning internet politics it does not make sense to make it a full forum. Maybe making a private usergroup for those who wish to contribute to board management would be more useful. That way you keep out the sludge and only keep people serious about this.

[Stark]

That's totally unrelated to the layout of information; the fact remains that subforums DON'T show the usual forum information and DO report new posts as posts in the parent forum. Saying 'omg it works don't change anything' doesn't change that.

[Ace Pace]

So basically your bright idea is to add even more clutter to the board... Um, yeah, you might want to go think on this one a bit more there, dude.

It's not clutter, and infact, is easier to read than the current system. I exclusively browse by "search for new posts" but I can well understand why it's a pain to read by any other method.

[Mr. Coffee]

It's nothing more than laziness, homie. An extra click costs nothing and the current system lets us all know where certain posts are most likely to be found or where they should be posted.

[Ace Pace]

It's nothing more than laziness, homie. An extra click costs nothing and the current system lets us all know where certain posts are most likely to be found or where they should be posted.

So the fact our posting now shows up under senate shows us where posts are most likely to be found? Great information system there.
Subforums hide data.

[Ender]

So basically your bright idea is to add even more clutter to the board... Um, yeah, you might want to go think on this one a bit more there, dude.

Not sure if Mike will enable it or if it part of the package he downloaded and installed, but some forums using the same software we are running (at least it looked similar) allow you to alter what forums and subforums appear on the main page. Effectively, you add entire forums to your "Ignore" list. Some places have thread tags and allow you to do it by tags there. If we got that activated here it would remedy your complaint.

House of Commons: Simply doesn't make sense as a top-level in my mind AND by forcng the Senate button to highlight for HoC threads it also generates more traffic to review what is actually under discussion in the Senate itself which can only be a good thing.

But it doesn't work so well in the reverse. I have no idea if there is something up in the Senate I should weigh in on, or if it is just another post in the HoC.

[Mr. Coffee]

Remedy who's complaint, Ender? I like the layout how it is now.

[Ender]

Remedy who's complaint, Ender? I like the layout how it is now.

My point was that your objection would be nullified in the event that such a change was made.

[Mr. Coffee]

Ah... So I see.

[CmdrWilkens]

That's totally unrelated to the layout of information; the fact remains that subforums DON'T show the usual forum information and DO report new posts as posts in the parent forum. Saying 'omg it works don't change anything' doesn't change that.

They don't show the usual forum information BUT at the same time their titles (in all but the case of the HoC) are dscriptive of the content found within to the degree that I don't know what other information needs to be added on the main page.

For insatnace other than having "STGOD role-playing games" what would you have as the descriptor? I mena you could certianly lengthen it out but there is no clarity gained by giving it top-level status and a fuill description box.

Aas to reporting posts in the parent forum I get that but I'll admit that it doesn't bother me so I have no stake in terms of whether this needs to be fixed or how it could be done.

[Thanas]

I like the current layout very much, especially with regards to the History subforum. It is a highly specialized subject field and I do not want it to get lost in the OT forum. As one of the more active contributors in the History forum I have to caution against this proposal because I for one would drastically scale back the amount of information and argument in my posts. Why? Because it is OT and why spend all that effort on something that will get booted to page 20 in three weeks.

[Captain Seafort]

I like the current layout very much, especially with regards to the History subforum. It is a highly specialized subject field and I do not want it to get lost in the OT forum. As one of the more active contributors in the History forum I have to caution against this proposal because I for one would drastically scale back the amount of information and argument in my posts. Why? Because it is OT and why spend all that effort on something that will get booted to page 20 in three weeks.

D XIII isn't suggesting History be merged back into OT - he's suggesting that it be "promoted" to a full forum in its own right.

[Thanas]

Ah, okay. My bad. I can see a possible issue with that though since the board already has a lot of first-class forums.

[Ace Pace]

Ah, okay. My bad. I can see a possible issue with that though since the board already has a lot of first-class forums.

How many do you actually see? Sure, it's two mouse flicks to scroll through, but it's already in it's own higher order boxs (announcements, Science Fiction and Fantasy, Non-Fiction, System, etc.). I don't think another addition to Non Fiction would be so out of whack.

[Stark]

They don't show the usual forum information BUT at the same time their titles (in all but the case of the HoC) are dscriptive of the content found within to the degree that I don't know what other information needs to be added on the main page.

I don't think you understand - his point is that it doesn't show new posts/recent posters/etc in the way the 'parent' forums do, and that those forums are tagged with the posts from the 'child' forum. It's unclear because, as his example shows, if Senate says there's a post by Timmy in it, it might actually be a post in the HoC that he doesn't care about. He's not talking about making the name longer or whatever.

Frankly, even if people are set on the whole parent/child arrangement (which seems daft since we've got tiers with no forums, like 'system' and 'non-fiction' etc) surely the themes could be changed to display them in a definite subordinate way while still being reported as a 'proper' forum with accurate recent post/etc information. This issue doesn't bother me either, since I browse the forum exclusively with 'new posts', but his statements are factually accurate.

[CmdrWilkens]

They don't show the usual forum information BUT at the same time their titles (in all but the case of the HoC) are dscriptive of the content found within to the degree that I don't know what other information needs to be added on the main page.

I don't think you understand - his point is that it doesn't show new posts/recent posters/etc in the way the 'parent' forums do, and that those forums are tagged with the posts from the 'child' forum. It's unclear because, as his example shows, if Senate says there's a post by Timmy in it, it might actually be a post in the HoC that he doesn't care about. He's not talking about making the name longer or whatever.

I also wrote:

As to reporting posts in the parent forum I get that but I'll admit that it doesn't bother me so I have no stake in terms of whether this needs to be fixed or how it could be done.

So while my first point may not have addressed the point he was making I will happily indicate that the issue doesn't bother me and I really don't see an issue to be fixed but I wouldn't mind if it is fixed to others satisfaction.

[salm]

I agree, the subforums indicating new posts even though there aren´t any in the parent forum is fucking annoying.

[Illuminatus Primus]

It's nothing more than laziness, homie. An extra click costs nothing and the current system lets us all know where certain posts are most likely to be found or where they should be posted.

So the board should be run according to the principle that laziness is bad, and not according to whether a different way would encourage more content and convenience?

[Singular Intellect]

It's nothing more than laziness, homie. An extra click costs nothing and the current system lets us all know where certain posts are most likely to be found or where they should be posted.

So the board should be run according to the principle that laziness is bad, and not according to whether a different way would encourage more content and convenience?

Laziness is one thing, but crying about clicking your mouse button one extra time is utterly fucking ridiculas. For fuck's sake, you can access every subforum from the main index, and the only time you'd need to make an extra click is if the new post is in a the parent/subforum when you went to the other. Oh boo hoo, cry me a fucking river.

Just who are these people who are so stressed for time that a single new post in a parent or sub forum demands their attention, but checking both is too much of a hassle?

Personally, I think the subforums are a great idea, and I've never had an issue with new post notifications being annoying.

[Mr. Coffee]

It's nothing more than laziness, homie. An extra click costs nothing and the current system lets us all know where certain posts are most likely to be found or where they should be posted.

So the board should be run according to the principle that laziness is bad, and not according to whether a different way would encourage more content and convenience?

If it improves things, sure, go for it. If it's just a matter of "I don't want to click ona sub forum, wah" then no.

[RogueIce]

You see a new post indicated in the Senate. You assume it is in the HoC, so you skip to it. You scroll down and see a few new posts. You read the interesting ones, then hit mark forums read to clear out the uninteresting ones. Meanwhile, there actually was a new post in the Senate, and you missed it entirely.

I don't know what funky setup or board theme you're using, but that's not how it works. You go to the subforum, click mark forums read, it doesn't affect the parent forum at all. Those new posts will still be shown as unread. Even if you're in the parent forum it's two seperate links; clicking mark forums read for the parent forum won't affect the subforum, and vice-versa if you use the link for the subforum in the parent forum. I do it all the time without problem.

In the end, I really don't think it's worth the fuss people are making. Yes, a post in a subforum can give a "false positive" but with phpBB3 it's fairly easy to deal with. You see the unread posts indicator, you go to the parent forum (since you don't for whatever reason care about the subforum) scroll down, see no new posts, you can click on a link to mark the subforum as read right in the parent forum. If you're interested in the subforum, you just head there.

In the end, it's down to whether the minor inconvenience of the above outweighs having even more parent forums displayed on the main page than we do now. Which, as mentioned, is already a bit and there are plenty who would rather not see it grow and have to do even more scrolling than they do now (take in to consideration those of us in usergroups or who otherwise see nonpublic forums) since we don't all have high resolution, super widescreen HD monitors and whatnot.

So your solution to your particular brand of inconvenience is to introduce a whole new inconvenience to a new subset of people? Unless there is more to your arguments than "I don't like it" but I, to be honest, haven't seen that yet.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Destructionator, I have a solution. After you post in the House of Commons or Senate, instead of checking for new posts immediately and then shaking your fist when the one new post you saw turns out to be in the other subforum, why don't you wait about 10 minutes? In 10 minutes, both the Senate and the House of Commons should have new posts in them, so you can read something new no matter where you click.

Seriously, are you just hitting "refresh" every ten seconds?

[Rawtooth]

This is just something minor, but I would like to propose a renaming of the STGOD subforum. While there are STGOD's currently on-going, there are other topics I feel could be properly located in said forum with little trouble. Namely I'm think of Let's Plays, such as the Oregon Trail by Instant Sunrise as well as the numerous Dwarf Fortress threads that have sprouted in G&C. There have also been at least two Dark Heresy games that are ongoing in the STGOD forum with their only connection to the forum title being that they are role-playing.

If we were to rename the subforum, I would vote towards "Interactive games" unless a more appropriate title is discovered.

Like I said, something minor but I felt worth mentioning.