Subforums

[kagami]

In my humble opinion, there are already too many threads on the forum. Maybe it is time to implement more complicated structure - create subforums. E.g. separate threads about GUI, databases, network, etc. in Desktop forum. What do you think?

[blex]

Good idea. But often it is difficult to correctly define subforum for the issue.

I think that improvement of the tag system is better.

[kagami]

We can use both approaches together

[blex]

[quote author="Alexander Antsev" date="1291406185"]We can use both approaches together[/quote]

Yes, sure. Implementation of your proposal will not take much support team time. Thanks.

[Franzk]

I don't think more sub-forums will really add value. It'll just require more clicks to see the topics. Tagging is much more useful for fine grained categorization.

[DenisKormalev]

Maybe not subforums, but remove Desktop and create more specialized categories (database, graphics, network, etc.) and one for common questions (named something like "Common questions", eh? :) ).
But with such thing we will have more mis-categories (we have not a lot for now, but there were some number of them a bit ago).

[giesbert]

More categories would make life a bit easier. If you just want to look a bit in the forum, you do not search by tags, you just open a forum and start reding headers....

[DenisKormalev]

Gerolf, one problem that I see in such specialization is posting in wrong categories. But I think we can solve it (at least for some percent) with proper descriptions for categories.

[goetz]

I don't know if a finer-grained structure will make lives easier. Users must decide where to go - and that is very often not clear, especially for new users.

[giesbert]

It will always happen, that people post to a wrong forum. That's one thing, where admins etc. perhaps can move the posts. BUt the less categories you have, the bigger they get. And If you are just looking around, that makes it really hard (with only few forums).

[DenisKormalev]

I'm agreed with Gerolf. I hope I and other moderators will be able to sort all posts in needed categories.

[goetz]

I know. You do a good job with this. Maybe I can help you in the future, now that I'm breeding dinosaurs :-)

What's desperately missing in the forum, IMHO, is a simple search box in the entry page. When I'm searching for something on other forums, I just try simple search with some keywords.

[DenisKormalev]

Volker, search box is on all pages at the header. Or I didn't understand you clearly :)

[goetz]

Yes, but that search the whole DevNet, not only the forum. If I want to do a search only in the forum, I must go to the advanced search. That wording, BTW, only does make sense if you have a simple search :-)

I often remember that there was a forum discussion and I know what I would type in that search box to find it...

But there are some improvements in the pipeline, maybe this one too. Let's wait for Santa :)

[DenisKormalev]

You can choose wiki or forum tab at search results if you want results only from forum or only from wiki.

[goetz]

Too much I have to choose and click on - we are lazy, aren't we? :-)

We have a simple search in the wiki to seach the wiki only.

To be orthogonal it would be good to have a simple search in the forum to search the forum only. At best in the sidebar on the right. Make similar functions look and feel similar.

[blex]

Sometimes it is not impotent where is the information located: in the Wiki or in the Forum. The current implementation of search looks fine for me.

[blex]

Lets give time to the forum support team. They works hard and improvements on forum are significant. Lets wait...

[blex]

[quote author="tamhanna" date="1291445071"]Hi blex,
for me, it is a "generation" issue. I never liked the tags, having grown up on Windows 3.1 using folders...[/quote]

Sorry for off-topic, we are nearly from the same generation and I also prefer folders. But the world is changed and the information flow is so huge now that it is almost impossible to work only in hierarchical environment (folders and sub-folders). We should adopt to it. Google is not hierarchical :)

[goetz]

[quote author="blex" date="1291437528"]Sometimes it is not impotent where is the information located: in the Wiki or in the Forum. The current implementation of search looks fine for me.[/quote]

Then we could also remove the wiki only search, that can be superseeded by the global search too.