Re: A Forum for Guix Users

[Csepp]

Robby Zambito <contact@robbyzambito.me> writes:

> Hi Sarthak,
>
>> As of now, it's a bit difficult for beginners to find answers to their 
>> problems in the mailing list or in IRC logs as they aren't very
>> easy to navigate compared to forum threads.
>
> I personally think that it would be wiser to improve the documentation
> relating to the mailing lists and IRC logs, rather than fragmenting the
> places that someone should look for answers. Maybe a new / additional
> frontend that is more approachable for new users would also be good.

Sourcehut has full-time employees working on making these accessible, so
it really boggles my mind why we aren't using that instead of Savannah
and Debbugs.
We could also bridge IRC to Matrix (even though the company behind it
has some people who... let's say like the taste of leather too much).
Pine64 has a great chat setup actually, their channels are bridged to a
whole bunch of services.  Not saying we must also bridge with Discord,
but at least the libre options should be considered.

> I have never found myself participating in distro-specific forums; I
> have always used them as read-only sources of information. Yet here I am
> participating in the Guix mailing lists :). I bet I am not alone in this
> experience.
>
> Also FWIW, Guix was basically my introduction to participating in
> mailing lists. So I wouldn't say I am biased in my old ways of doing
> things - I just genuinely think it's a good way to handle communication.
>
> Robby

Guix is also the first project I contributed to in a major way over
mailing lists and my experience is that if you don't keep up to date
with the list, the lackluster search and linking will be a major pain in
the buttocks.  It is usable for experts, but is absolutely not
beginner-friendly.
But even experts would benefit from a better workflow.