Alternative to forums for end user questions and discussions
Background
As announced at https://www.eclipse.org/lists/eclipse.org-committers/msg01327.html:
I wanted to bring the following bug to your attention: https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=577150 .
In a nutshell the Webmaster team is proposing to shutdown our Gerrit,Bugzilla,Wiki and Forum services in the next year or two, and replace them with the integrated tools available from Gitlab and/or Github.
At this time we don't have a specific plan or timeline for these changes, but if you have comments or questions please let us know via the dependant bugs for each service.
We're also more than willing to help projects move preemptively(to avoid any rush). So if you've been on the fence, now is a great time to take the plunge.
The idea is to close these services and use GitLab and GitHub instead. This to reduce the maintenance burden. Some of these services are also very old and not really suitable anymore for these times. More information can be found at:
- The 'superbug' (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=577150)
- Sub bug for forums (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=451571)
- Sub bug for Bugzilla (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=577151)
- Sub bug for Gerrit (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=577152)
- Sub bug for Wiki (https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=577153)
Impact on Eclipse ESCET
We already use GitLab for issues rather than Bugzilla. We also use GitLab for merge requests including reviews, rather than Gerrit. We don't use the Eclipse Foundation Wiki.
We do use the forms. This is where our end users can ask questions about anything they would like, from modeling to tools. We will thus (most likely) need an alternative to our current forum, for questions from and discussion with end users.
Even if the forums stay (for a while), it would be good to look at alternatives as the current forums don't work that well and are very archaic. They don't provide a nice modern way to communicate with our users.
Our Eclipse ESCET forum is at https://www.eclipse.org/forums/index.php/f/527/. It has exactly one post, by me, to welcome everyone to the forum. If it is shut down, we thus won't lose anything unless our users that using it.
Alternatives to the current forum
There is some discussion about alternatives to the forum, at https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=451571 (an issue that exists since 2014):
- Stack Overflow: At first there was a lot of discussion about using Stack Overflow. Some considered it very useful, others are totally against it. It seems it can take some time to engage and get enough permissions to moderate, etc. The 'heavy moderation' is seen as a pro by some and a con by others. It seems to be only for concrete questions, not for broader and longer discussions. Not suitable I think.
- Other forum software: Some alternative forum software packages were proposed. The Eclipse Foundation clearly states there will no longer be forum software hosted by the Eclipse Foundation. Not provided, so not an option.
- Go where your users are: It seems a conclusion is that there is no 'one size fits all'. Different communities may have different needs. It is good to go to where the community is. I don't think we have such a place yet for Eclipse ESCET. Not an option as we don't have this yet.
- Issue regular issues: Some projects seem to use issues for bugs and feature requests as well as for end user discussions. I don't like this option as it mixes things. I would like to reserve issues for things that require development work, i.e. with commits and merge requests. Not an option as it mixes developer issues and end user questions/discussions.
- Use GitHub discussions: GitHub has 'GitHub discussions'. You can start a discussion and others can reply. It supports pasting images directly. It allows to subscribe to specific discussions or all of them. It is similar in features to issues, but separate. Eclipse Tycho uses this for a bit now, and it seems to work well. It has the advantage that it is close to the development work, as it is part of the development website. This means you can easily link to issues, create issues from discussions, etc. GitLab however doesn't seem to have a similar feature. Not an option as we use GitLab not GitHub.
- Second GitLab sub-group: The Eclipse Foundation itself uses Gitlab as a 'Helpdesk' as well. See https://gitlab.eclipse.org/eclipsefdn/helpdesk/-/issues. It is basically a GitLab project without a Git repository, with issues only. This would in essence be similar to using GitHub discussions, but as a separate GitLab project. Within the Eclipse ESCET GitLab group (https://gitlab.eclipse.org/eclipse/escet) we now have one sub-group for our Git repository, issues, merge requests, etc. We could create a second sub-group named 'ESCET Helpdesk' or 'ESCET Support' or so. This is the best option I think.
Let's discuss. What do you think?