On Jan 31, 2010, at 21:35:01, Karl O. Pinc wrote: > On 01/31/2010 11:13:06 AM, Eric F Crist wrote: >> I do not feel the forums and mailing list need to be synchronized. >> They are two different mediums, and should be treated as such. > > I disagree. (Although this has no impact on any operational decision > because so far as I know there's no good choice of software. > Maybe mailman 3.0 will someday deliver.) > > Forms and archived mailing lists are the exact same medium. They may > happen to have different interfaces for input and output, but the > interfaces are in no way mutually exclusive. The end result is a > threaded archive viewable on the web in either case. > > If you've software that allows input via web page and/or email > and output via web interface and/or email is it a forum or a mailing > list? It's both. My point being it's then really silly to have > 2 different archives depending on whether the data went in or out via > an email or a web page. > > There should be only one place to look for archived answers no > matter how the questions are asked and answers supplied. To > do otherwise leads to duplication of effort and difficulty in > searching.
I need to correct myself. The interface is where the userbase is split, not the backend. I've found a supported plugin for vBulletin which allows the mailing list and forum to act as a single repository of knowledge. It uses mailman on the backend, and allows for posts to the forum to be sent and properly threaded on the mailing list, and vice-versa. vBulletin also has good RSS support, so we can pipe that into RSS with the channel bot. This plugin, I think, would suit the needs here perfectly. This week I'm going to look into it further and do some testing. If you (or anyone else) has additional input, please let me know. The only question in my mind is how things such as polls and the like would be relayed on the mailing lists, if at all. There are some things that would likely not make it to the list, but we can work with those as we go. --- Eric Crist
