[KLUG Members] have we ever considered running a forum?

[Adam Williams]

> Personally, I feel a webforum would be underused. Our answers to
> questions aren't in the kind of format that would be congenial to such
> browse/replies.
> (And the thought of meta-moderating KLUGdot is making my palms sweat,
> FYI.)

Post to any forum would have to be authenticated somehow,  I really
don't want to operate a "public" forum.  You end up with a crap pile
like slashdot as become.  Having to take the two/three steps required to
join the list is a nice filter for superfluous traffic.

> Consider the following example. Adam posts some answer I find
> interesting. I leave it in my KLUG mail folder. Some months later, I am
> using his mail, as I thought I would, but am having problems. I simply
> "list reply" to his old email, and am provided with a nice context for
> my questions. Meanwhile, everyone else would have deleted his email,
> saving their own HD space.

I find the mail archives with next in thread/previous in thread very
usable.  Having initial thread listing broken by month can make it take
a few trial shots to locate the "source" message.  But I don't know how
else they would be organized.

> On a web forum, Adam's post to the original story/topic would be long
> expired/buried/hard to find. I don't think that's a Good Thing.
> Improving our mailing list archives might be better.
> As one feature, is it possible to subscribe to the list as a
> non-receiving member? That way, such a member could web browse the

Yes, this is currently possible.  Simply subscribe and issue a "set
nomail on"/"ser nomail off" command.  This is a standard mailman
feature.  I currently do this on several public lists.  With nomail set
one can still post, and either enable mail again with a second message
ot watch for replies in the archive.