[TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

Fri Apr 23 06:23:47 PDT 2010

Hi!

I felt that I had to add my voice for a forum type support.

Making some statistics based on the archives, the amount of mails on this mailing list have increased on the average by 20% yearly since 2006. (direct correlation to energy price increase, anyone? ;))

In 2006 that amounted to some 3 mails per work day (assuming some weeks of vacation yearly...) while as this year it will be some 7 mails per work day. Assuming a similar trend until 2015 you will by then get roughly 20 mails per workday, i.e. 100 mails weekly. I will not make any further elaboration or conclusions on that.

I am active on a home music studio forum on my spare time and personally I find it a lot more motivating browsing and answering only "my" topics of the forum on a somewhat daily basis, as compared to going through all of the new TRNSYS mails accumulated in my dedicated outlook folder, without any order of topic. There are a lot of questions in topics that I don't feel even remotely connected to, but there is no real way of knowing before you have a peek.

A wiki is a good idea, but still it will probably not reduce much the amount of mail.

A real forum engine would in my opinion have other benefits not yet mentioned, in addition to getting threads under topics:
* integration with main TRNSYS website (centralized)
* password protected areas
* a file upload/download area
* integrated FAQ/Wiki
* etc.

Also, in my opinion the discussion here is somewhat automatically biased to the frequent mailing list user's opinion. I think the younger generation used to modern forums are not so active here because they feel this is a bit awkward way of doing it and thus you will not get as much response on this matter here either.

Cheers,
Janne

-------------------------------------------------------------
Janne Paavilainen
MSc, PhD student
Researcher in Energy and Environmental engineering
-------------------------------------------------------------
Solar Energy Research Center SERC
Högskolan Dalarna
SE-781 88 Borlänge
Sweden
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tel +46 (0)23 778728
fax +46 (0)23 778701
e-mail: jip at du.se<mailto:jip at du.se>
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www.du.se<http://www.du.se>
www.serc.se<http://www.serc.se>
www.eses.org<http://www.eses.org>
http://solar.uni-kassel.de/solnet/index.htm
-------------------------------------------------------------

From: Jones Marcus [mailto:Marcus.Jones at ait.ac.at]
Sent: den 23 april 2010 12:19
To: 'Redpath David'; trnsys-users at cae.wisc.edu
Subject: Re: [TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

David; here's the full link.

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/TRNSYS

For all who would like to contribute; we can discuss table of contents and other issues in the "discussion" page of the book!

Best regards,

Marcus

MARCUS JONES, MSc
Energy Department
Sustainable Building Technologies

AIT Austrian Institute of Technology
Österreichisches Forschungs- und Prüfzentrum Arsenal Ges.m.b.H.
Giefinggasse 2 | 1210 Vienna | Austria
T +43(0) 50 550-6387 | M +43(0) 664 210 24 15 | F +43(0) 50550-6598
marcus.jones at ait.ac.at<mailto:marcus.jones at ait.ac.at> | http://www.ait.ac.at<http://www.ait.ac.at/>
FN: 165088b HG Wien | UID: ATU46577208 This email and any attachments thereto, is intended only for use by the addressee(s) named herein and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender by return e-mail or by telephone and delete this message from your system and any printout thereof. Any unauthorized use, reproduction, or dissemination of this message is strictly prohibited. Please note that e-mails are susceptible to change. Österreichisches Forschungs- und Prüfzentrum Arsenal Ges.m.b.H. shall not be liable for the improper or incomplete transmission of the information contained in this communication, nor shall it be liable for any delay in its receipt.

From: Redpath David [mailto:D.Redpath at ulster.ac.uk]
Sent: April 23, 2010 11:33 AM
To: Jones Marcus
Subject: RE: [TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

Hi Marcus,
          I can't seem to find the wikibook I clicked the link you sent but nothing happened. Could you send the full URL? Thanks

Regards,
        David

David Redpath
Research Associate thermal energy storage
Centre for Sustainable Technologies
Room 26B16
School of the Built Environment
University of Ulster
Jordanstown Campus
Shore Road
Newtownabbey
N.Ireland
UK
BT37 0QB
d.redpath at ulster.ac.uk
028 90368235 (office)
028 90366169  (lab)
http://www.cst.ulster.ac.uk/

-----Original Message-----
From: Jones Marcus [mailto:Marcus.Jones at ait.ac.at]
Sent: Fri 23/04/2010 9:51 AM
To: 'keilholz, werner'; duffy at tess-inc.com; bdo at stb.rwth-aachen.de; trnsys-users at cae.wisc.edu
Subject: Re: [TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

I echo Werner - I like the mailing list over a forum, I don't have time to check a forum, but I can see the mailing list posts immediately in an Outlook folder. However, I think it would be great to have a place where substantial and often posted questions can be developed and solved. I often see the same absorption chiller questions, how to get a compiler to work, etc. on the list. It would be useful to have clear and concise information and links for these issues. We are also currently teaching a course on TRNSYS 17 so hopefully this could serve as curriculum development. Therefore I (presumptuously) created a Wikibook for TRNSYS! Its very straightforward to edit;

http://en.wikibooks.org/

Cheers,

Marcus

MARCUS JONES, MSc
Energy Department
Sustainable Building Technologies

AIT Austrian Institute of Technology
Österreichisches Forschungs- und Prüfzentrum Arsenal Ges.m.b.H.
Giefinggasse 2 | 1210 Vienna | Austria

-----Original Message-----
From: keilholz, werner [mailto:werner.keilholz at cstb.fr]
Sent: April 22, 2010 10:57 AM
To: duffy at tess-inc.com; bdo at stb.rwth-aachen.de; trnsys-users at cae.wisc.edu
Subject: Re: [TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

Hi all,

Setting up a forum is not very complicated. I made this one (about free maps for GPS systems, nothing to do with TRNSYS) for a personal project in less than 5 minutes and it is free (except for the commercials):

http://maplorer.forumotion.com/english-discussions-about-maplorer-f3/

I sure could do one for TRNSYS.

However, I'm not sure this is really a good idea:
Getting mail tends to make people react more than if you have to pull info from a forum. I like the 'real-time' aspect of the current list.
(It is possible to subscribe to threads on forums, but some people don't understand how it works and find it complicated).

Personally I like the good, old mailing list. And as Matt says, there's always the archive and nothing beats Google for search it. You can use filters in your mail program to automatically tag/archive the messages.

How about a vote:
http://software.cstb.fr/trnsys_vote.html

Werner

-----Message d'origine-----
De : Matt Duffy [mailto:duffy at tess-inc.com]
Envoyé : jeudi 22 avril 2010 00:21
À : bdo at stb.rwth-aachen.de; trnsys-users at cae.wisc.edu
Objet : Re: [TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

Dear Bernd Döring,

Thank you for expressing your concern for the TRNSYS Users Email list. I
am not sure if you are aware, but you can indeed search (from your
internet browser) and follow old threads in the archives section.

https://www-old.cae.wisc.edu/pipermail/trnsys-users/

Some ideas have been suggested, and I invite your suggestions as well. I
will make sure to share them with the TRNSYS users group. Unfortunately, I
can only assume that the group does not have the resources to maintain a
thorough forum, but any ideas are welcome.

Best regards,

Matt Duffy

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bernd Döring" <bdo at stb.rwth-aachen.de>
Sent: Tue, April 20, 2010 3:31
Subject:[TRNSYS-users] Kind request for a more "up-to-date" user forum

Dear TRNSYS expert,

we had the discussions some month ago, but I will come back to this
point again:

A more powerful and user-friendly way of organising the exchange between
the users is highly requested. The e-mail traffic is not clearly
arranged, it is difficult to follow specific threads and so on. Numerous
(also very small) clubs or associations offer such services in the internet.

Who is able and who is responsible to improve this important objective?
What kind of support is needed?

Best regards,

Bernd Döring.

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----- End of original message -----

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