Open Stack

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http://forums.openstack.org

Work in progress so feel free to join and post up any comments about the forum etc.

-----Original Message-----
From: "Everett Toews" <everett.toews at cybera.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, May 3, 2011 1:22pm
To: "Anne Gentle" <anne at openstack.org>
Cc: "Jordan Rinke" <jordan at openstack.org>, openstack at lists.launchpad.net
Subject: Re: [Openstack] Creating a forum

Regarding your StackExchange questions Anne.

For an Open Source StackExchange-like site OSQA (http://www.osqa.net/) could
be used.

For StackExchange itself it's free as in beer (
http://area51.stackexchange.com/faq).

"How much does Stack Exchange cost?

Creating a Stack Exchange site is free. Using a Stack Exchange site is
free. The Creative Commons licenseguarantees that questions and answers are
free to access, free to use and re-use (with attribution), and free to
share… forever."

Everett

On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 10:48 AM, Anne Gentle <anne at openstack.org> wrote:

> Hey all, thanks for asking for my input. :)
>
> A few months ago, I said it's too early. This month, I do sense a need for
> community support, based on questions I see on the docs site and the types
> of questions in Launchpad Answers.
>
> I think we're getting to a real user community and it would be good timing
> to start a forum, so I say yes, with the request that we have strong guides.
> Jordan and Ron can be our one-percenter guys, the ones who are helpful and
> responsive. We'll need other one-percenters. Vish has done a _great_ job
> responding to Launchpad Answers. It's getting to be really helpful. But it's
> not quite a forum. And it's not about the tool, it's about being responsive,
> right?
>
> I don't want to weigh in too heavily on a tools discussion, because it's
> more about the community and people than a tool. The responses here seem to
> indicate that sys admins would lean towards forums. I personally like the
> Stack Exchange style sites for building a reputation which motivates
> participation if done well. However, OpenStack is not a big enough draw for
> them to be a "Top Network Site" like Ubuntu. And the tool is certainly not
> open source. I don't honestly know pricing or licensing or availability of a
> standalone Stack Exchange site. Does anyone have details there? That info
> might help with the tools discussion.
>
> My main point is that I'd like to ensure responsiveness, so we don't have
> empty restaurant syndrome in a forum-like support site. The people who will
> be most responsive to users and adopters should probably weigh in on the
> tools discussion. Devs won't need to monitor the admin community support
> site once we get a core group of admins running OpenStack and helping
> others.
>
> So that's my current thinking.
> Anne
>
>
>
> On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 9:36 AM, Jordan Rinke <jordan at openstack.org> wrote:
>
>> Interesting because Ron very specifically mentioned being able to find
>> useful and relevant information on the Ubuntu forums without bothering
>> devs
>> at the beginning of this discussion (which Soren then noted as an
>> excellent
>> point).
>>
>> We don't have an extended answer from Anne yet, but she did vote Yes on
>> the
>> survey (unless someone else used her name since there is no real auth).
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Thierry Carrez [mailto:thierry at openstack.org]
>> Sent: Tuesday, May 03, 2011 9:27 AM
>> To: Jordan Rinke
>> Cc: openstack at lists.launchpad.net
>> Subject: Re: [Openstack] Creating a forum
>>
>> Jordan Rinke wrote:
>> > I think a purely QnA site misses the mark a little, that style is
>> > great for a very specific question (And the OSQnA stuff Everett linked
>> > looks great) but I think a lot of users are lacking the knowledge to
>> > ask a very specific question just yet. So maybe it is that we need a
>> > place for random discussion, but that can also specifically answer a
>> question as well.
>>
>> If you take Ubuntu (arguably one of the largest software-related forums in
>> the world), the forums are completely ignored by developers, so it relies
>> on
>> a completely separate user community. It is a source for wrong (or
>> outdated)
>> technical answers and user frustration.
>>
>> They recently set up a stackexchange site at ask.ubuntu.com, and it is a
>> huge success. Developers and users contribute to it, and it's a valuable
>> and
>> continuously-updated source of information.
>>
>> I don't want us to run into the same failure before realizing there is a
>> better and more targeted tool available... Personally I would ignore
>> forums
>> (since they are a waste of time), but contribute to the stackexchange site
>> (since they are an easy way to contribute reference information).
>>
>> > 77.8% voting for a forum at this point (out of 18 responses)
>>
>> I would wait on Anne's answer before taking any hasty decision based on a
>> binary poll.
>>
>> --
>> Thierry Carrez (ttx)
>> Release Manager, OpenStack
>>
>>
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>
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