Re: Mailing lists and Discourse

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On Mon, 2022-10-24 at 11:32 -0300, George N. White III wrote:
> I suspect one reason for the change was the need to combat SPAM and
> DOS attacks.

I noticed comments about spam handling on the mailing lists Patrick
linked (the notion that the web forum was better at rejecting it).  I
have to wonder why.  Surely it can't just be captchas?  I'd hate having
to do those damn things for every post that I did.

Mailing lists have been getting better at rejecting spam, over the
years.  The sign-up processes being a bit better implemented than they
used to be.  And some moderate all new user's posts, but that could be
quite a chore, and doesn't help against determined spammers who post
normal interactions for a while, then spam afterwards.  (Likewise for
malcontents who post abusive mail, rather than marketing claptrap.)

But if I had to post to this mailing list through a website, I'd leave
immediately.  I don't have the time to deal with that inconvenience,
nor the slightest interest in doing so.



> The NASA forum seems to have discouraged all but the most
> serious users

That was an old complaint about Linux mailing lists and newsgroups (put
on your asbestos fireproof pants before daring to post anything, lest
you get flamed alive for saying something dumb).

> but the ESA forum has many users whose previous experience is with
> IOS or Android and who struggle with basic linux concepts, post
> screen captures of text windows, don't provide context, hijack
> threads, etc.

One of the pains of Windows was (and probably still is), that you
couldn't copy and paste text from many of the dialogue boxes (or not
copy something from the part of one that you wanted to).


> In my view, the educational systems are introducing computing without
> any training in effective use of online communications, problem
> reporting, and troubleshooting.  This creates problems and wasted
> energy for online forums that no user interface can overcome.

It's been many years since I worked in schools, but I remember similar
comments back then.  When I got into computing, we had to write our own
programs, and we had no OS.  Many years later when working at my local
school, one of their computing lessons comprised to learning to copy
and paste pictures into a word processor file.  That was in a high
school in the late 1980s.  The kids would have been doing more complex
computing at home.

If you commented on the absurdity of that, a common reply would have
been not wanting to scare students away by doing anything more complex.

But basic copy and pasting is art class stuff, and primary school age.
Computing classes should be about computing (accepting data, doing
something with it, hopefully with some decision making rules).  If you
don't actually get kids involved in programming, to some degree, who's
going to be the next generation to create software?  Only the self-
taught ones at home, who have some appalling programming practices.

A few years later I gave a short talk to some teachers on creating
webpages.  My approach was to teach something about the construct, the
purpose, the how and why.  Some feedback was that it was too technical.
Obviously they just wanted to type something and see it on the screen.
No understanding of what they were doing, at all.  These days, the same
people use wordpress, and the like, filling in templates.  I feel
that's like getting someone else to do your homework.

In the last few years I've got re-involved with some media education
teachers, and when wikispaces closed down I suggested they set up a
real website.  Which they kinda supported, but really didn't have much
of an idea (and still don't) about what they wanted to get out of a
website and have it do.  One meeting was like a staff conference in the
Absolutely Fabulous tv show.  "It should have pop up menus, and
animated video clips...  All flashy, and trendy looking."  And a bunch
of other handwaving.  But not a single idea about what information it
should contain.  You'd end up with some corporate website looking
thing, which ticks a box as "having a website," using some stock photos
of people apparently doing some work.  But, ultimately, is a completely
useless website.

Ignoring the silliness of creating a pointless website, these were
media education teachers, who ought to understand the concept of having
a message, and using a medium to disseminate it.  An actual purpose.

I made them a mock-up of a website which did impart some of the purpose
of their organisation.  A sample of what you could do, what you ought
to do, etc.  I got a whinge about it being "retro," but still got zero
input from them about *what* they'd actually want on a website, never
mind what it looked like.  And that's when I sunk the boot in, telling
them, "This is like being back at school when I was a student, and some
teachers would demand you did some project, complain that you didn't do
what they wanted you to do, but had never really told you what they
wanted from you in the first place."

I enjoyed that.  I wished I'd had the nerve to say that when I was in
school.  Several years of my life were wasted by having to do stupid
pointless things at school.  I'd love to have said, "I'm not a bloody
mind-reader," to some of my teachers.

Specialist subjects (e.g. computing) need specialist teachers, and the
course needs to have real purpose.  Not faking that you've done
something.
 
-- 
 
NB:  All unexpected mail to my mailbox is automatically deleted.
I will only get to see the messages that are posted to the list.
 
The following system info data is generated fresh for each post:
 
uname -rsvp
Linux 5.19.15-201.fc36.x86_64 #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Thu Oct 13
18:58:38 UTC 2022 x86_64
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