I am trying to figure out if we want to have many "geeky" posts or not. That is, do we want to have articles reviewing people's modules, posting about different programs people are writing, etc.? Or do we want the articles to be more about news and issues? I am not sure. What do you think?
Bouncing the question back...
Abigail on 2000-04-05T17:51:35
Let me ask you the question.
Why did you create this site? There are already several usenet groups discussing Perl in general, and certain topics in detail. There is p5p. There is the perl friends mailing list. There are several other mailings lists about Perl. There is The Perl Journal. There is PerlMonth. There are the Perl Mongers with their mailing lists. There is #perl. There are the conferences. There's an entire library of books.
What aspect of Perl do you think hasn't been already covered by other means that will make this site interesting?
-- Abigail
Content
KM on 2000-04-05T17:56:27
I think that if someone is planning to release a module to CPAN and would like to make sure a good cross-section of folks have looked at it, it could be a Good Thing to allow them to say that they want people to test. However, I can see that this could snowball and everyone with a package Foo; will start asking to have things looked at.
I also think discussing cool and crappy things we see others do, or do ourselves, would be good. It would be interesting to read things like 'Hey, I always did X, but when I tried Y I got the same results in half the time. Here are my bechmarks...'.
So, I like geeky posts. As long as it has to do with Perl, and using Perl. If it is _only_ news and issues, we could read Perl News and the p5p summaries.
Re:Content
pudge on 2000-04-05T18:04:24
That stuff sounds cool, but I am not sure this is the site for it (though I am not sure it isn't, either). And sure, Perl News allows you to read about news and issues, but does not let you discuss them with others. That's kinda the point.
:-)
Re:Bouncing the question back...
pudge on 2000-04-05T18:12:31
I created this site primarily to let people discuss the news and issues I was already mentioning in Perl News.
I could note each one of the venues and references you've mentioned and say how this site is different, but I think much of it is self-evident. What I wanted was a web-based, somewhat controlled environment (unlike Usenet) to discuss Perl issues and news. I do not, however, want to impose my will on everyone else. I don't want this to be Pudge's Perl Site. I want others to tell me what they want, and as a group we can decide what direction to take it. Yeah, I will make the ultimate decision (or it will be voted on by the authors who control the site, of which I will not be the only one), but I want some consensus on what everyone else wants, because this site will be about community if it is to be useful.
Does that answer your question?
Re:Bouncing the question back...
KM on 2000-04-05T18:14:53
There are all of those other resources, but none are brought together in a central place. This is something that I could see this site doing. Not everyone in the community subscribes to p5p, perl-friends, comes to #perl, etc... and by using this site maybe they could get a good taste of All Things Perl.
Also, by bringing a topic here there can be a broader audience to share ideas. When arguments are on p5p and making discussion difficult, that discussion could be taken here (as well). PerlMonth and TPJ have no discussion forum to talk about articles. These things can be talked about here. Not everyone comes to #perl, has the time to read CLPM, or is subscribbed to 50 different mailing lists.
I think that this site can be very useful to the masses of the community by giving this cross-section of other resources.
Cheers,
KM
Re:Content
KM on 2000-04-05T18:22:15
The vast majority of the new in Perl News is new modules. So, that is discussing modules. I just think it could be useful at times to discuss them before they are released.
I don't know if there is really enough Perl 'news' that comes out regularly to keep people interested in seeing what is new on use Perl; on a daily basis.
Re:Bouncing the question back...
amw1 on 2000-04-05T19:05:04
I agree totally, I haven't really been able to
actively participate in mailling lists in quite
some time due to the ammount of mail I'm already
getting. Having this type of forum that is
(hopefully) read by a decent sized group of clued
people would be "very good" (tm) imho.
This also provides a place to discuss general
computing concerns that do relate to perl that
may or may not be 100% perl specific. For
example, how do people deal with maintaining a
"standard" perl install across several machines/platforms? I really don't see a list that is appropriate to discuss things like that on and is well out of the scope of what can be accomplished in #perl.
yeah, and geeky is fine.
:)
- [andrew]
Re:Bouncing the question back...
Abigail on 2000-04-05T19:42:53
There are all of those other resources, but none are brought together in a central place. This is something that I
could see this site doing.
Not everyone in the community subscribes to p5p, perl-friends, comes to #perl, etc...
and by using this site maybe they could get a good taste of All Things Perl.
But not everyone will use this site either. It will be just yet another form of media, increasing the defraction, and further decentralize information about Perl; if it was ever centralized to start with.
Not everyone comes to #perl, has the time to read CLPM, or is subscribbed to 50 different mailing lists.
If people already don't have the time to follow the existing channels, adding yet another medium only makes it worse, not better. And Usenet and mailing lists are better suited for people not having much time anyway, and Usenet and mail clients keep track of what you have read and what you haven't unlike this forum.
-- Abigail
Re:Bouncing the question back...
pudge on 2000-04-05T19:56:11
1. I do not know if fracturing is necessarily bad.
2. Many people just like the web better than Usenet (which I have come to dislike) and mailing lists (which come to me and force me to deal with them). And for some people, web sites take less time to use than the other mediums out there, so it can make it better in terms of time. Anyway, I don't care to discuss the merits of the form: some people like the web better. This is for them. Those who prefer mailing lists or Usenet are free to use them.
Re:Bouncing the question back...
ziggy on 2000-04-05T23:40:52
Abigail brings up a good point though.
Adding yet another nexus of discussion increases
the size of the network. That is, the n+1st
forum (use Perl;) brings about n
new connections for crossover discussions.
This is less of an issue with Usenet, because
that's the [intended] point of crossposting. It becomes more of an issue when the crossovers are between mailing lists, usenet, websites and so on.
I've stopped reading clpm in any meaningful fashion, and occasionally I see a forwarded
post or to on p5p or whatever. One thing I'd especially like to see on use Perl; is some sort of cross pollenation from the rest of the Perl community. Important announcements from p5p, fwp, perl-friends, usenet, etc. should be mentioned here for the benefit of those who don't want to monitor the other n forums.
Re:Bouncing the question back...
Abigail on 2000-04-06T00:38:46
One thing I'd especially like to see on use Perl; is some sort of cross pollenation from the rest of the Perl community. Important announcements from p5p, fwp, perl-friends, usenet, etc. should be mentioned here for the benefit of those who don't want to monitor the other n forums.
Which would not be useful for the people who do follow the other media, but can't be written by the people who don't.
I would not find such a "service" useful. It would either have issues from media I already follow, or issues from media I don't care about. So things are either redundant or noise.
-- Abigail
Re:Bouncing the question back...
ziggy on 2000-04-06T02:15:30
Which would not be useful for the people who do follow the other media, but can't be written by the people who don't.
Yes, if every post to use Perl; were intended to foster discussion. I don't think that needs to be the case.
Take a look at http://www.xmlhack.com for an example. Significant discussions on a dozen mailing lists are brought up, with links to those posts on a web mirror (egroups.com, etc.). Anyone who wants to participate knows
what to do; anyone who is interested in just hearing the latest developments doesn't need to go any further.
(It also helps that xmlhack.com doesn't support comments, so the point about redundant discussions is moot.)
I would not find such a "service" useful. It would either have issues from media I already follow, or issues from media I don't care about. So things are either redundant or noise.
Ideally, it would be a forum for you to see posts you've seen elsewhere. It could be a valueable resource to those who don't [regularly] follow all of the major fora. Noisy for you, useful to others.
Worst case, it does invite redundant discussions. That wasn't the intent I had in mind and I don't think redundancy will be a serious issue here; it would simply be "more noise" to most.
Perl programmers, not Perl
Hi,
I wrote a kind of longish message last night where I ended by saying that use.perl worked fine with the Netscape 6 pre-release. Since my message doesn't show up this morning, I guess I was wrong about that anyway.
In short, I think the site needs to focus on Perl programmers and not Perl. It needs to disseminate that information that is of reasonably general interested to Perl programmers, and that they will not get elsewhere. Notice I say 'will not get elsewhere' rather than 'cannot get elsewhere'. Obviously if every Perl programmer is already an avid reader of P5P, clpm, Perl News,
/., CPAN Latest, Perl Month, TPJ etc they probably won't need use.perl.
But in my experience few Perl programmers have time for any of that beyond checking CPAN every now and then.
I think Abigail pointed out that the only people able to select information from other sources and send it to use.perl were those that wouldn't need use.perl. That's only semi true. I think alot of people have in interest in one of the pre-existing forums and not any of the others. I never read p5p or clpm, but I always read the advocacy list. So I could catch a more widely relevant thread on there (such as the Solaris 8 announcement a while back) and pass it on.
Likewise, Perl programmers with an interest in security might catch CERT advisories related to Perl and pass them on. P5P readers might catch an important bug report on P5P and pass it on.
Ultimately, the idea is that everyone is an expert in at least one area, and where they find something that is important generally to the common Perl Programmer, use.perl provides a way for them to reach a large audience.
Re:Bouncing the question back...
It will be just yet another form of media, increasing the defraction, and further decentralize information about Perl
You make it sound like this is a bad thing...
Generally speaking the more general the interest in something is, and the more important it is, the more decentralised information on it is.
In life, the important issues of the day show up in a hundred different newspapers with different treatments and biases. Then they show up as themes in novels. Some are expressed in art and architecture, some in glossy magazines. Some are discussed in doctoral theses, some in the tabloid's letters pages.
Then after a while, someone spends some effort collating this information into a single source - a large book, perhaps. Often several people spend effort collating into several different single sources. This is considered a good thing. The professors have time to read every old newspaper, parish record and dusty journal to determine the effects of the industrial revolution on rural England. Anyone else with an interest in the matter buys a single book from one of those professors.
To be sure, the Internet makes doing our own research rather easier - but not that much easier. If we are creating the big bestseller book of the Perl world, that seems like a worthy objective, and if we get lambasted for presenting a biased/populist/over-academic/under-academic view, then that seems like a good reason for someone to create another site with the same aim.
If people already don't have the time to follow the existing channels, adding yet another medium only makes it worse, not better
So, as you can tell, I disagree with that...
Re:Bouncing the question back...
KM on 2000-04-06T12:16:41
I would not find such a "service" useful. It would either have issues from media I already follow, or issues from media I don't care about. So things are either redundant or noise.
Noise is subjective, if you don't find a service useful, then don't use it.
Re:Content
pudge on 2000-04-06T16:30:24
Actually, well under half of Perl News online is new modules.
Re: Diversity isn't bad
jjohn on 2000-04-06T19:59:44
While I agree that when I want information, I want it in discreet and easy to handle packets.
However, there's little harm in adding another venue to the world of Perl. The worst that could happen is that Pudge and Co, waste their time and bandwidth. The best the could happen is a first class Perl information portal. Being a fan of Pascal (the man, not the language so much), there is nothing to lose. Like some evil corruption of Darwin after some time, only the fittest website will survive. This is how perl.org died.
Anyway, it's nice to see you're alive and kicking, Abi.
;-)
Geeky Yes!
Theory on 2000-04-06T20:37:54
As someone who has not read clpm in about 4 years, and someone who has not often been on mail lists becuase of the way they clog up my mailbox, I think that use Perl; is a great idea whose time has come It can serve as a great clearinghouse for information about what's happening in the Perl community. I can check in only when I feel like it, and participate in the conversation as I see fit
I'd like to address some of the issues brought up by others. First, Abigail, I agree with some of the comments of Pudge, et al., on the position of use Perl; relative to other Perl resources. It can serve as a great discussion forum for articles published in other media and sites that don't feature discussion (e.g., TPJ, PerlMonth, and books). Plus it can bring some of the pertinent discussions of the (archived) mail lists to a more general forum. For me personally, the discussions on p5p are over my head, but Mark-Jason Dominus' This Week on p5p is a great resource that can perhaps trigger more generalized discussions here. Unlike a mail list, use Perl; won't clog my mailbox, and unlike clpm, it's moderation and filtering can keep the signal-noise ratio down. In short, I think that by referencing the other sources you mention, use Perl; can bring discussion to a more general level without a lot of the baggage.
As for modules, I think a module announcement and testing section would be useful, but not perhaps on the main site. Maybe there can be a permanent topic for that (Like Apache on Slashdot)?
So while I think that discussions about "How do I do X?" might be better left to clpm and the mail lists, new ideas, Perl features (i.e., in v. 5.6), new approaches to problems, and of course relevant news items in all media are great topics of conversation for use Perl;.
I look forward to having many fulfilling discussions here.
Best,
David
Cover everything!
dlc on 2000-04-07T15:14:26
Perl as a topic is probably narrow enough that all aspects of the language, from highly technical to social to news, could live comfortably on the same site -- maybe separated into distinct sections to make it easy for folks to pick and choose what they want to read.
darren
Re:Cover everything!
pudge on 2000-04-07T15:55:37
I think this may be true. So, what topics / sections do we need?
Discussion: Fun. Announcements: Boring.
chip on 2000-04-09T09:03:06
The whole point of the Slash format is to open up what would otherwise be one-way announcements for general discussion.
Geeky/non-geeky isn't a good division, I think. The question is: Will this be something that usePerlPeople really want to talk to each other about? If not, then leave it in a slashbox.
Re:Discussion: Fun. Announcements: Boring.
pudge on 2000-04-09T18:20:13
Good insight. Hmmmmm. Ponder ponder ponder.
Re:Cover everything!
dlc on 2000-04-11T18:16:14
We need sections on:
- Apache/mod_perl (of course)
- Regular expressions
- OOP, in the style of Damian Conway's book
- XML
In addition, I'd like to see sections for something like the following:
- Perl for standalone network daemons
- LDAP
- Daily recipes, like the ones on perl.com from the Perl Cookbook.
- Perl on non-*nix platforms?
You get the idea. Basically, this is (could be) the resource I've been looking for for a long long time.
darren
