Thinkpads.com virtual get-together?

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AHuan · #1 Post by **AHuan** » Sun Nov 18, 2007 3:15 pm

Is anyone interested in a virtual thinkpadders conference? I don't know what software would be suitable but I see so many topics in the forum that didn't get anywhere, and could have if everyone had been at the same place at the same time.

Maybe six or seven irc channels in parallel? You tile them vertically on your screen (so you can have different discussions going on at once.) Then it can be accessed by pocket pc etc.

There have quite a few times I've been reading the forums and could have contributed something to a discussion, but didn't.

I'm sure I'm not the only one to do this.... It's like there's no reason to post. There's not even confirmation that anyone cared, ya know?

Some more thoughts:

To schedule the time, members could go to a web page, and assign a probability that they can be at the meeting to each hour of the week, and give themselves an "importance to congress" coefficient. Maybe contribute to agenda suggestions too. They have an interest in the rating themselves accurately, because that should improve the how interesting the conference is, and they can read the transcript afterwards. The web page could also give feedback, like how many people have signed up, and when the conference is most likely to happen given the current data, and how the schedule is computed.

edit: moved to the off-topic forum

#2 Post by **JaneL** » Sun Nov 18, 2007 3:23 pm

That's an interesting idea. There may be something that can be arranged.

#3 Post by **BillMorrow** » Mon Nov 19, 2007 1:07 pm

that is a VERY interesting idea..

AHuan, do you have any more to add..
perhaps someone who has the applications to run such a meeting place..?

mikey pizano · #4 Post by **mikey pizano** » Mon Nov 19, 2007 1:12 pm

I have a IRC chat room I use sometimes. Its freenode server, #MikeyPizano if anyone cares.

AHuan · #5 Post by **AHuan** » Mon Nov 19, 2007 7:06 pm

BillMorrow wrote:that is a VERY interesting idea..

AHuan, do you have any more to add..
perhaps someone who has the applications to run such a meeting place..?

Like I said, I don't know exactly what software would be best, indeed I don't know much about the software normally used for virtual conferencing. Maybe someone here has used something at work?
I think IRC would be okay, though. It's not flawless (you can't see what others are typing as they type, it's not super reliable) but it's free.

I use the "X-chat" client which you can get free from www.download.com .

With multiple channels there could be several conversations going on without loosing track of things, enough for maybe 30-40 people. An agenda might be a good idea, maybe some ideas for which could be obtained from the week's posts.

The above mentioned method of scheduling I don't know any software for, but surely it'd be pretty straightforward for someone that knew what they were doing with PERL for instance. I could do it in excel (or qbasic)

if everybody simply emailed the 169 (edit: changed from 168) numbers to me as a list in a known format (a 1 or 2 digit preference coefficient for each of 24 hours a day for a week starting 12:00 am sunday, universal time, and their importance to the conference coefficient, 1 or 2 digits).

Xchat has an option to log conversations, so the transcript part is easy.

For those who are not familiar with irc:

Anyone can create a new channel on any server using the /join command. This command is used for joining an existing channel, but if it doesn't exist yet, it will be created E.g. /join #Testchannel .

So the only software any of us needs is an irc client if IRC is used.

So just schedule, put an anouncement on the front page of this forum a couple days ahead, and people can join in (put some instructions and a copy of xchat attached to the post).

AHuan · #6 Post by **AHuan** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 12:05 am

Well what's going on??

Interesting idea, but not interesting to do anything about, I supppose.

Or was it something I said??

mattbiernat · #7 Post by **mattbiernat** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 1:23 am

AHuan wrote: Interesting idea, but not interesting to do anything about, I supppose.

well the thing with IRC and other online chats is that this is just one more application for people to open and people are lazy. People IMO don't like to put effort and change things that already work, unless of course someone else does it for them. Besides some people would start logging onto the IRC channel and would stop coming to this forum altogether, this could possible hurt it in the long run.
Now what I think would work better is integration of chatting into this website. That way people come in here, they try talking to anyone who is online and having their problem solved and if nothing works they post. what do you think? Any way to have this done?

#8 Post by **BillMorrow** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 3:50 am

AHuan wrote:Well what's going on??

Interesting idea, but not interesting to do anything about, I supppose.

Or was it something I said??

not anything you said (i still need to read your reply though

)..

you should know that:
1. i am in the middle of moving from my home in florida..
this is a huge task for one guy..
so please don't think i'm ignoring JUST you..

2. modifying phpBB for me is ALSO a monumental task.
just doing the simple tests when new users log in took me many hours..
something that would take a php person a few minutes..
the thought of making a major mod is horrifying..

3. see comment about my programming ability in php, above..

i might come back and add to this reply after i read your post..

meanwhile, don't get petulant, please..

if everybody simply emailed the 168 numbers to me as a list in a known format (a 1 or 2 digit preference coefficient for each of 24 hours a day for a week starting 12:00 am sunday, universal time, and their importance to the conference coefficient, 1 or 2 digits).

ok, i read it..
and you pretty much lost me on the above quote..

what i HAVE been wanting to add is an RSS feed..
and some other enhancements not readily available in phpBB..
which means buying a forum application..
and setting it up..
all of which can't happen until next year unless someone wants to do it for me..

ok, 2nd edit..
i looked at x-chat on cnet download..
looks interesting..
how is it set up..?
where does the application reside..
on the forum server or each individuals computer..?

#9 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 10:19 am

Hi Bill,
you can get an RSS-feed for free here: http://rssfeedreader.com/
Sounds like the bee's knees and it seems a simple enough thing to do.

#10 Post by **JaneL** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 10:27 am

I looked at that a while back, and if I remember correctly, there was a problem with some of our private conferences.

There's a mod to phpBB that can be added which handles public and private conferences. Bill just hasn't had time to implement it.

#11 Post by **BillMorrow** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 10:51 am

RealBlackStuff wrote:Hi Bill,
you can get an RSS-feed for free here: http://rssfeedreader.com/
Sounds like the bee's knees and it seems a simple enough thing to do.

first, take a look at the difference in time stamps of the two posts, here..

like 5 hours of sleep..?!
which means even if i were the sharpest pencil in the box i would be pretty dull or broken in logical thought..

ok, i looked at the web page for free RSS feeds..
i'm not sure but i will bet there will be someone else's ad's included in those feeds unless i buy the utility or pay a monthly fee..
neither of which is out of the question but i need to research what the cost would be..

and how it is implemented..

#12 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Wed Nov 21, 2007 12:02 pm

http://rsscontentbuilder.com/order.html
That RSS-feeder in an ad-free version is currently available for a one-off price of $97.- (instead of $147.-)

PS: I know about HTML and FTP and related stuff (I've built a few commercial websites, best of which is www.houseofnames.ie ), but I don't know much about PHP.
I'd be happy to help if needed.

AHuan · #13 Post by **AHuan** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 1:12 am

To use IRC, you simply open the client,

X-chat asks what server you want to connect to and pick a nickname. Then press connect, it takes a second, then you're connected. Then, you have to join a channel - type /join #whateverchannel
and another window will open in xchat, taking you there. If the channel didn't exist, it gets created. Then you can start chatting.

Whoever creates the channel is an operator, and can ban people based on their ip address from the channel using the /ban command, among other things.

here's a page with a tutorial for just this sort of situation
http://www.irchelp.org/irchelp/misc/webchat.html

It also lists a few web-based IRC clients for those who don't want to download a client.

#14 Post by **BillMorrow** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 4:10 am

so i see..
without reading the tutorial it looks interesting..
so what needs to be installed on the forum server or thinkpads.com..?

i just created a forum.thinkpads.com channel..
on XWorld as billmorrow1..
(FWIW running this on T60p/vista ultimate)

obviously there is no one else on this channel..

kosse · #15 Post by **kosse** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 6:26 am

BillMorrow wrote:so i see..
without reading the tutorial it looks interesting..
so what needs to be installed on the forum server or thinkpads.com..?

I think you'll need something like this to make it easy to join for users that don't have their own IRC clients like mIRC or X-chat installed:

AHuan already provided a link with some instructions as how to do it.

obviously there is no one else on this channel..

I am

#16 Post by **Harryc** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 6:27 am

Bill, basically you just announce the channel is available somewhere prominent here, but it may require constant supervision or else it will get like the wild west in there. Probably a good topic for staff discussion.

#17 Post by **carbon_unit** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 8:05 am

I'm there too. We'll see if there is any interest.
If you have a chat client installed try clicking irc://XWorld/#forum.thinkpads.com

AHuan · #18 Post by **AHuan** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 5:53 pm

Good to some interest in one's idea

.

But having an always-open irc channel linked to the forum wasn't really what I meant. It won't really get people in the same place at the same time.

What I was thinking was, have a set time, maybe once a week for an hour, that is the officially sanctioned conference time, and maybe people will refrain from hanging out on the IRC channel and use their time to come then instead.

The more interesting that hour was, the more people would come, and we have a sort of nonlinear effect where much more happens, perhaps over the week as a whole.

Right now, it looks like forum.thinkpads.com is destined to become yet another empty room (try searching on www.searchirc.com for just about anything to see what I mean).

#19 Post by **JaneL** » Thu Nov 22, 2007 10:40 pm

AHuan wrote:Right now, it looks like forum.thinkpads.com is destined to become yet another empty room (try searching on www.searchirc.com for just about anything to see what I mean).

You know, this is a holiday here in the USA, and we're all busy eating turkey and watching football. Tomorrow, we'll all be shopping, so settle down. It may be next week or next month before we even decide if this is something we want to pursue any further.

mattbiernat · #20 Post by **mattbiernat** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 2:16 am

so how are things progressing... i know its getting closer to christmas but i would like to hear some news

#21 Post by **Harryc** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 6:02 am

The forum staff has decided not to open/run/sponsor/manage a forum.thinkpads.com IRC channel. You are welcome to do what you want under another name.

#22 Post by **RealBlackStuff** » Thu Nov 29, 2007 8:32 am

I think that's a wise decision.
When I was a mod (for over 2 years) on another forum, mostly some other mods were 'on' it, and the crap they let loose there was really of no interest other than boosting their own ego's. Hardly ever did 'normal' forum members visit there, because of the low-class content.

Thinkpads.com virtual get-together?

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