I'm outraged! You left out the forum for left-handed lesbian laparascope DIY-ers!!
Seriously, there are far too many sub-forums. Why is it that forum owners get carried away with heirarchies, while users don't bother? A search function is a far better substitute for a taxonomy ... just look at the way Google triumphed over the original Yahoo ... and we don't get hung up in choosing the "right" forum for a post.
You left out the forum for left-handed lesbian laparascope DIY-ers!!
Check back later in the day. It'll probably be there. You want to be moderator in that forum?
Hahaha
no worries, we will reorder the categories once we see how they get populated.
You will notice that our new search function is about a zillion times better than the previous one ... and so much faster!
/d
I disagree - I think all the subforums are good.
Thanks mowcius, it was Mellis idea, he will be happy to know
well, we already had people asking Software questions in Hardware group , Hardware questions in Software group and anything goes in Frequently asked questions (which should have been Read Only... IMHO)
So I guess there are bound to be some misplaced things no matter what... I guess it's just human nature to not really follow forum group titles... it's not unique to here.
As for improvements? YAY!
I agree, FAR too many categories with sub-forums.
Topics looks like the reincarnation of exhibition? That forum only received a topic a day or so at best... splitting it into multiple makes little sense.
Nevermind the several fora like LED's, displays, motors etc. which should belong in their respective approach forum in my opinion (hardware / software).
PS: like this is a bar-sport clone.
pwillard:
well, we already had people asking Software questions in Hardware group , Hardware questions in Software group and anything goes in Frequently asked questions (which should have been Read Only... IMHO)So I guess there are bound to be some misplaced things no matter what... I guess it's just human nature to not really follow forum group titles... it's not unique to here.
As for improvements? YAY!
I think the trick to this is more moderators. A forum I've been on has about the same number of categories and probably one and a half dozen moderators. Almost every thread is in it's correct forum and there is virtually no spam.
You will notice that our new search function is about a zillion times better than the previous one ... and so much faster!
No, I must've missed that one.
I don't use search that often so I'm not that worried about its performance, but I just timed the lag from hitting "reply" to getting up the post editor and it was just short of 15 seconds.
I'm now going to time how long it takes from hitting "Post".
From hitting "Post" to seeing the post took 35 seconds, and nearly another 20 to open the post again to edit it.
Why is this so slow? The forum is nearly empty!
mowcius:
I disagree - I think all the subforums are good.
This ^
I really like the range.
I'm still waiting for the "It doesn't work" subforum. 
Or how about a "Why must I use resistors with leds" subforum.
Of course Grumpy_Mike has probably earned the right for his own subforum Called "Arduino the S&M way"
A total upside to this granularity is that people can ask their question in the exact right place. A downside is that many new "users" will ask in a couple of places because they lack the language to determine which is the right one in the first place. (e.g. "My random thingy doesn't work with an Arduino. Oh and I don't know how to program stuffs either!!1!")
Here's the rub. Whether they have one place to ask or 'n,' they are going to ask in 'n' places. So it is up to proper moderation to make sure such as question isn't abusing the forum.
Personally I believe the "Using Arduino" forum is a great example granularity. Again assuming moderation is done properly. The other breakdowns I'm not so sure about, but that might just be me.
I like the diversification, that way if I don't care about fabric stuff or art stuff (sorry artists, there is very little art that I care for, most of it results in me going "They spent x hours on THAT?!") I don't need to sift through it
(to be fair, there isn't a lot of posts about fabric stuff or art stuff in the first place, but if say I didn't care about something a bit more common, then I could ignore it as well)
I like having all the different forum topics, but I also liked having right at the beginning: exhibition, news, etc.
Exhibition at least should be near the top.
I think the development team has done a good job of choosing sub-forums but I still don't like to have them; or to clarify I think there should be fewer of them. I don't know if software exists for this, but I support the idea of moderator-controlled tagging as an alternative to sub-forums.
with this type of design, the OP would choose from a list of predefined TAGS all that apply to the topic. Searches would be filtered using the same tags. One benefit is that this would make it less likely for people to cross-post.
mk3:
I think the development team has done a good job of choosing sub-forums but I still don't like to have them; or to clarify I think there should be fewer of them. I don't know if software exists for this, but I support the idea of moderator-controlled tagging as an alternative to sub-forums.with this type of design, the OP would choose from a list of predefined TAGS all that apply to the topic. Searches would be filtered using the same tags. One benefit is that this would make it less likely for people to cross-post.
Except that most users don't take advantage of most features of a forum, I've only recently started using things like "post to Facebook" (and the older email) links, I've never used tags on a forum