Re: Forum

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: "Mike" <induction@xxxxxxxxxxx>

Hi Jonathon,
                    I like it as it is. Once a message has been 
cleared, it should dump out to the whole list, one shot.
The inbound messages I assume go to a buffer disk area for Terry to 
clear, once done it is available to send next cycle.
So, the load is on the system twice, one in , one out.
Once it is our own mailboxes, the load is off the system and it is 
free to be available for the next messages.
Also, it may be serving the old message base for people that 
research, unless that is on another machine.
The existing system reduces the need for all of us to come and 
connect to the server for new messages because they are already at 
our ISP server waiting for the next email poll (I poll every 1 minute).
The system you speak of would require everybody to connect to the 
server, spend time on it looking at and reading messages, making 
reply, etc. This would add up to a lot of connect time per person and 
multiply this times 1500 people.
The system would run out of bandwidth in no time, the CPU would have 
all those extra ports open, it would be a heavy load on the system.
I think Chip has the archive doing almost instant updates, maybe you 
can come in with the search mode and browse your topics that way.
If it were done as you say, one good software would have been PCBoard 
like in the old dial up BBS days, I used to run it and have a 2 node 
copy I bought long, long ago. That had a reasonable internet module 
available, multi conferences, file base, message packet transfer in 
and out, etc. I ran RBBS in many versions, too. I am sure there is 
better software these days.
But this still puts a load on the system for each connect, read, reply session.
The current system with the search archives is best in my opinion.
Mike


--- Original Message ----- From: "Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>
To: <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Monday, July 18, 2005 7:58 PM
Subject: Forum


> Original poster: Kidd6488@xxxxxxx
> Alright, I'm sure this idea has been beaten into the ground, but has 
> anyone considered switching over to web-based forum / bulliten 
> board, as opposed to the mailing list? I love being a part of this 
> group, but of the 50+ emails that come in a day, it seems that I am 
> interested in only 1 or maybe 2 subjects... I would think that it 
> would be easier for everyone, really, considering following a 
> topic's history, the much lighter load on the servers, and the 
> lighter load on Terry, even though the moderator would still likely 
> have to read nearly every post. I'm not positive, but there's 
> probably some free / open source BB software out there.  Plus, 
> there's all the other neat things, like profiles, and tracking of 
> number of posts, etc.
>
> What does everyone else think?
>
> Jonathon Reinhart