[Python-ideas] A bit meta

[Nicholas Chammas]

If both Discourse and Mailman can live side-by-side, with
Discourse being the “web interface” to the Mailman list,I think we’d get
the best of both worlds.

Funny you ask that, since I wondered about exactly the same thing when I
looked into using Discourse for an Apache project. The Apache Software
Foundation has a strict policy about ASF-owned mailing lists being the
place of discussion, so the only way Discourse would have been able to play
a role was as an interface to an existing, ASF-owned mailing list.

Here is the discussion I started about this
<https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-as-a-front-end-for-existing-asf-mailing-lists/23167/2>
on Discourse Meta around a year ago.

In short, I think the answer that came out from that discussion is (quoting
<https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-as-a-front-end-for-existing-asf-mailing-lists/23167/2?u=nicholaschammas>
Jeff Atwood; emphasis his):

This really depends on the culture of the mailing list. Discourse has
fairly robust email support (for notifications, and if configured, for
replies and email-in to start new topics), but it is still fundamentally
web-centric in the way that it views the world. There will be clashes for
people who are 100% email-centric.

Do you have support from the “powers that be” at said mailing lists to make
such a change? Are they asking for such a change? We are very open to
working with a partner on migrating mailing lists and further enhancing the
mailing list support in Discourse, but it very much requires solid support
from the *leadership* and a significant part of the *community*.

There’s a lot of friction involved in changes for groups!

Nick
​

On Sun, Jan 31, 2016 at 2:21 PM Ben Finney <ben+python at benfinney.id.au>
wrote:

> Brett Cannon <brett at python.org> writes:
>
> > For instance, people have said they don't want to set up another
> > account.
>
> The complaint expressed (by me, at least; perhaps others agree) was not
> against setting up an account. As you point out, PSF mailing lists
> already require creating accounts. It's against being required to
> maintain a trusted relationship with some non-PSF-accountable entity, in
> order to participate in some aspect of Python community.
>
> I agree with others that a Discourse instance entirely controlled by PSF
> would avoid that problem.
>
> --
>  \        “Consider the daffodil. And while you're doing that, I'll be |
>   `\              over here, looking through your stuff.” —Jack Handey |
> _o__)                                                                  |
> Ben Finney
>
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