Re: [Caml-list] Change policy on beginners list?

[Oliver Bandel <oliver@first.in-berlin.de>]

BTW: On freenode (IRC) there is #ocaml

Ciao,
    Oliver



Zitat von Marshall <marshall@logical.net> (Thu, 11 May 2017 11:09:41 -0500)

> I’m an OCaml beginner, so you would think that I would find the  
> OCaml beginners’ list helpful.  However, every interaction I have  
> with Yahoo groups just pushes me away.  There are obnoxious ads in  
> the web interface, which is not very intuitive anyway.  I could use  
> the beginners list/group via email, but that would require using my  
> Yahoo email address, which I don’t have set up on any of my mail  
> clients.  When I go into the Yahoo web mail interface, I mainly see  
> a list of junk mail that I don’t care about, so I don’t want to use  
> the Yahoo address.  More than once, I have thought, “I should use  
> the OCaml beginners’ list.”  When I start to go down that path, I  
> stop.  Yahoo groups are too distasteful.  I’m not sure how many  
> other people feel this way, but surely I’m not alone.  That means  
> that for some new OCaml users, the public face of OCaml support  
> pushes us away.  So sending new users to the Yahoo group seems  
> unhelpful to the growth of OCaml.
>
> I personally find Google groups easier to use.  They’re not perfect,  
> but the web interface doesn’t include ads.  Might it be a good thing  
> to move the beginners’ list to Google groups or some other system?   
> Obviously, this change should not be done suddenly.  There would  
> have to be period—possibly indefinite—during which both lists were  
> available.
>
> (At present, when I want help on OCaml questions, I go to  
> StackOverflow, where people have been very helpful.  This is a good  
> solution for me, and it’s easy to browse the latest OCaml questions.  
>  However, the way that the ocaml.org community page is set up  
> encourages beginners to use the Yahoo group.  There is a  
> StackOverflow icon down at the bottom of the page, but you have to  
> investigate that on your own.  In any event, I do like the idea of  
> using an online group or mailing list focused on beginners  
> questions, so I personally would welcome a beginners Google group.   
> I don’t expect to use the Yahoo group.)
>
>
> Marshall Abrams
>
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