Question From Jeff

[Jeff]

I would like as many opinions on this as possible. The forum is growing by leaps and bounds and sometimes that presents me with a dilema about how to keep things organized to best present the information we want to present.

For example: This morning I was going to post a thread with pictures and a video of an old wooden bowl milling machine operating in buckley at the old engine show. Well I headed for the general board. but I got to thinking I have several other olt time operations I would like to post too. So so I do it on the new bow thread? or should this go in the outdoor activities? or maybe sawmills and milling? DanG, where to put it.

Then I thought, maybe a new category under outdoors called "The way they used to do it" or something. But then that stretches out the categories and makes more things to look at.

What to do what to do??

I guess what I am asking is do you folks mind the extra areas we have developed for the Forestry Forum? Do they help? Or are they a distraction. Should we just lump everything into the boards we have or would you like to see additional areas developed as we need them?

[L. Wakefield]

   That is indeed a difficult dilemma. Some things just have more than one heading of interest within the same thread.

   Cookbooks etc use indeces, and I have always found that one of the key points about a cookbook (beyond the quality of the Rx themselves) is the index. Check out Joy of Cooking to see what I mean. if you want to find something in the index, you have to know just HOW it is indexed. Like, 'Soups, onion'- as opposed to 'Onion, soup'. Seems trivial but can be annoying.

   'Search' theoretically takes care of this on already-posted material- but I note we were just cussing and discussing the ins and outs of that method.

   What if you take your best shot at the relevant topic for a post- but also had a way to attach 'keywords' to a sidebar somehow. Like in your example 'bowl milling' or 'milling', but also 'older woodworking techniques'. The thing with this is that the 'keywords' as the author identifies them may not appear in the text at all so wouldn't work for conventional 'search'

   Does this help at all? It's the way I bookmark my favorites except that I can't cross-ref.     lw

[Bro. Noble]

My opinion would be to add it-----of course that is an area of interest to me.
 
I try to read every post, but it would make it easier to find stuff if we wanted to go back to it.

If you make a category for old stuff, I'll post my whatizzit_thingy there.

Noble

[Jeff]

Thats the thing. Finding stuff later. There are almost 18,000 posts on this forum as of tis date and finding any given one after a period can be a challenge even for me.

[Frank_Pender]

Jeff, is there some way you could set up a system similar to the Dewy Decimal system?  Somewhat like a library, with a card catalog, attatched to an index of some sort.  I am just brain storming with my sawdust container, you know. :-/

[Ron Wenrich]

18000 posts, but only 1500 topics.  You can keep on trying to peel the onion until you are at the core.  But, is that what you want?

What you will end up with is a bunch of categories with a few topics in each one.

When we started the "It happened to me" category, it sounded like a good idea.  In 16 months, you have had 8 topics posted.  Maybe they should be moved to the health and safety section, and maybe that should be moved to the General Forestry section.  Even combined, they have only 28 topics with 266 posts.  

And where do you stop with your categories?  We could get into wood turning, construction, and a whole host of wood related categories?

Then you have the problem of having all the categories, and most people will put it in the general category anyways.  

[Bro. Noble]

Ron has a good point,  I know there may be a downside to combining categories like the two Ron mentioned but it seems worthwhile to me to try the new one.  If it doesn't take, put it in the general forestry or wherever it fits the best.

I think the ones Ron mentioned could well be combined without any big problem on the users part.

My (inexperienced) opinion,

Noble

[Paul_H]

I like Ron Scott's logging& harvesting thread.It has a lot of pictures and information on many types of logging,thinning techniques.I have many old logging pictures that I haven't posted because I'm not sure if they belong there,or elsewhere.

But Ron's thread is renewed often,and I know where to look for a Chipper,Forwarder,etc.It never gets far down the page.Is it possible to lock a thread like the one we are discussing,that it doesn't fall into the basement?

Another question is,can you have the option to select "all pages" like before? Or did that bog down the system?

[Jeff]

These are all ideas I tussel with. Keep the comments coming. The more I think about it the more I think we are already doing things almost right. Or maybe completely right.
Rons safety comments are absolutley spot on. (can you tell I got a buddy from the U.K.?).

[Jeff]

Paul, I missed your all pages comment. Yes, I miss that too. I will see what I can do about coding it in to this version of the software. It was lost in the last upgrade because this is a total rewrite of the code. Let me check it out.

[Tom]

I see a growing interest in Shop type woodworking where turning, hammering and nailing (following a drawn plan) perhaps even carpentry would fit the interest.  Wood Working is a general enough subject matter that many old hand tools, procedures, building, cabinetry, turning, carving and many other related subjects would fit since it is generally understood that wood working is shop or building oriented.  I got my feelings "almost" hurt once because a cabinet maker ask me after a sawmill talk,  "do you do wood working too or is that all you do"?  I guess I know what he was talking about because he built stuff and I tore it apart. :D

"Sawmills and Milling" doesn't make a distinction between band, circle, stationary, portable, swing ,crosscut saws or even kilns, solar, steam, dehumidification, etc..  We don't have a problem with different posts in it and I don't think there would be a problem with different posts in Wood Working even though there will be some who will want to break it down further.

Want to talk about shop equipment, building, cabinet making, turning, carving, blue prints, finishing, fasteners, instruction books or artist in the field?  Wood Working!

Its not really Forestry but neither is Sawmill.

Make a General Wood Working topic under General Forestry.  If it needs to be broken up someday, we'll do it then.


Whew !  I didn't think I'd ever get it out.   :D :D

[Jeff]

At this point I am not talking about adding more interest areas, but just suggesting ways to make information that already applies fit it.

I ask Charlie way back if he thought a woodworking board was warranted., He said he came here for forestry and tree and milling related stuff. I forget what his exact comments were, but it could have been something like; "if he wanted wood working info he would go to his garage and get it". Basically, lets do what we do well and don't convolute it.

I am always trying to make everyone happy but I think that eventually that could lead to doing just the opposite. Need to find that line...

[Bibbyman]

I suggest we have an Announcement Board heading where the posts self-destruct after some time period say 10 days or 30 days.  This would be a good place to put notices of timely value like "Who's all going to the Paul Bunyon Show?"  It's a good question up until the show but after the show date, it's yesterday's news.  

Another tool could be an addition of a "retention time value" on a post or thread.  I have no idea how it would be implemented on a forum wide bases but if you had a box when you made a post where you would select how many days a post would stay up – say again, 10days, 30days, 1year, forever – that kind of idea.  Then after it's time is up,  ZAP, it's gone.

I'd think Sawmill and Milling could be broken down into Band, Circle, Chain, etc.  Could have a Drying,  Milling and Marketing heading.

We've all made posts where we've chimed in with some wit or banter that when you go back through the tread to find the "meat" of the post,  it's littered with this chatter.  I'll be the first to voluntarily review my posts and try to remove any that do not add to the topic (provided I find any that is). ;D

Probably we should go back through some of the posts and compile the topic into a subject for the Knowledge Base.  I've thought of a couple that should be worked up but have been too lazy to tackle them.

[CHARLIE]

I think there are enough categories. If I can't determine which category a thread would best fit....I put it in General.  General is just what it says and if I want to put in something on woodworking.....or woodturning....it goes in General. General is a catchall and works well for that. I say leave things as  they are, maybe as  suggested, get rid of subjects that don't have much activity.  The General Board is a neat place to visit.

[woodman]

I like Bib's idear of 30 days and it gos by by the good stuff gos to the knoledge the rest gos by by. The chit chat is fun but not after a time of say 30 days, lets just keep the meat .

[Tom]

Whoa-a-a-a--a

We're pretty lucky to have a forum where we banter back and forth.   That's one thing that makes this site so unique and good.  As long as Jeff thinks the server can handle the load I would be against arbitrarily erasing posts. What is trash to one member may be gold to a guest.   I like to go back and read the old posts.  It's the people who have gotten themselves in a position of Hurry Hurry Hurry, many times for no reason, that need to have everything concise with no waste. (The definition of which is in their mind and may not match anothers)  Do you know any other Forum in our field where the entire conversation is not only retained but can be updated and brought to the fore-front?

I go back all the time and laugh my can off.  We had a member that was interested in turning who hasn't been around in a long time.  I keep wishing he would show up, I miss him.  But, what would he think if he came back and his posts were gone, his pictures were gone.  I think they are important even when they are over a year old.

I feel sorry for those individuals who only read one topic and/or only read the 10 latest posts or only read the last post in a thread.  They're missing  the tenderloin and chewing on the bone.

I have described this Forum as "sitting around a pot-bellied stove in a hardware store" to potential members.  I'd not be happy if it were turned into a line of people waiting to ask the guru a question, especially if the question and answer self destructed if it weren't "important".  Look at the history here. This is the type of stuff from which history books are made. :-/

[Jeff]

Yes, thats one thing that Tom knows that I am adamant about and that is retaining posts and information. I certainly dont want people erasing posts. I give that right so you can edit your posts and have a second chance if you write something you thought better of. If people start erasing thier posts because they think it is no longer relevant that goes against everything this forum has tried to do. I would hate to revoke that function.

Let me try to get this straight. I was asking what we should do to be able to find or place information. Not how to get rid of or change it. On many threads the real golden information comes from the banter which leads to another conversation. Like Tom says "What is trash to one member may be gold to a guest" What we think is mundane everyday information might be exactly why and what someone came here to find.

I too go back and read old stuff. I also use it for reference material for those that need information. Every word on here is gold.

[Tom]

                          Whe-e-e-w ! -!
                                                            

[Paul_H]

The wit,and banter is what made me want to join this forum in the first place.It is the same good natured BS that I grew up around,and have worked around,in the past 25 years of logging.

As a guest,I read and laughed out loud at many posts.As someone totally green in regards to milling/marketing etc,I have learned much from the members on this forum, on all subjects.

  This place has Character (s)





         Thank you.

[Saki]

I am relatively new to this type of Environment, but have found the people and the site to be everything that you would find if you indeed did have a bunch of good folks gathered around a potbellied stove.

Let me say that generally speaking I am often thought of as a " casualty of the technological revolution " I am not a computer pro and will not claim to be. This is one of the sites that I found and enjoy immensely. Another one is the old tractor folks over at ytmag.com ( yesterdays tractors magazine.com ) they will keep their most recent posts, and have the others ( back forever as far as I can tell ) archived to where you can do a search by subject ( allis, ford, farmall ) or by author ( if you can remember who was talking about it, you can find it that way ). Again, I don't know how workable that would be in this situation, with this forum, but it seems to work well there.I think congrats are in order for all the people that make this site what it is. THANK YOU. I am new but do really enjoy it. Saki

[L. Wakefield]

   Jeff, Tom and others; I am SO GLAD to hear people speak up in support of the warmth and friendliness aspect of this  group. It keeps me coming back with a feeling of 'coming home' to be among friends. I suspect those who don't like this aspect or find it irrelevant will be well served by the knowledge base- but I find the grits and the gravy go right along with the DBH and the Huskys. Man cannot live by sawdust alone...lw