Cumulus Support

Good luck ...

... give you something to do in self isolation

Good luck.
I am curious for the result

water01 wrote: ↑Fri 20 Mar 2020 11:37 am Over the next few days you are going to see some changes in the organisation of the whole Forum. The General plan is to make is slightly more logical and to split various things up so they are in more relevant places.

Liking it so far
Nice to see the description on the Cumulus 1 forum has been changed, always thought that the "discontinued" was misleading

Cumulus MX browser Front End Customisation

That's a bit of a mouthful !

Website / pages in the same locations ?

water01 wrote: ↑Sat 21 Mar 2020 1:26 amThere are now 3 areas under Cumulus MX, Cumulus MX since build 3043 (Mark Crossley's development), Cumulus MX up to build 3043 (Steve Loft's development) and the Cumulus MX browser Front End Customisation Forum.

I don't see that last name anywhere. I do see "Customisation", which was the name assigned by Steve Loft.

beteljuice wrote: ↑Sat 21 Mar 2020 1:52 am

Cumulus MX browser Front End Customisation

That's a bit of a mouthful !

Would

MX Interface Customisation

be acceptable ?

Anyone customising the Cumulus MX browser Front End will know that MX stores the browser front end in a folder called "interface"

Weather Stations and associated hardware

Cumulus Software and Cumulus Wiki Development

Cumulus Archive

That aside, Congratulations, on all these part 2 stage innovations, to me it now makes much more sense
Presumably "Ecowitt" and "Instromet" sections will appear within "Weather Stations and associated hardware" in a later part of your reorganisation (I understand the former is related to Fine Offset, but Mark has treated them separately in his edit of "Supported Devices" in Wiki).

jimi wrote: ↑Fri 20 Mar 2020 11:55 pmNice to see the description on the Cumulus 1 forum has been changed, always thought that the "discontinued" was misleading

Yep, that was my original wording. "development discontinued" would have been better. In my defence, I am a software developer so actually read it that way. I appreciate now that other forum users didn't

I like the progress, thanks!

1) Could you also think about some subforum place for the specific MX platforms: windows, RPi and Mac from the OS point of view (maybe in relation to installation) and start/stop?
2) Could you look into inactive website templates (Weather by You e.g.) and inactive tools see how to separate those from the active ones?
3) Could you make subforums in Weather? Extremes, tornados, fire weather etc...?
4) Could you look in 'General' for possibilities to create subforums anywhere (if a subject gets a lot of threads)? As a result, General might truly become General.
5) Could you look into aged sticky threads which are no longer needed to be sticky?

Cheers, Hans

Patience, It's a WIP
IMO to many sub forums just make the forum look messy and harder to navigate, for example look at https://www.wxforum.net/index.php
that has far to many sub forums you end up scrolling forever to find the one you want. In my experience (much gained from using Google Analytics) when you have that many sub forums the top ones on the page tend to get the majority of the hits and the lower ones much less. Human nature at play, people get bored scrolling or navigating a complex forum tree, the KISS principal seems to work best. Obviously this is just my opinion, no criticism of "The Management" implied or intended, I think it's coming along nicely

I disagree that wxforum.net has too many boards. I think it is well organized with lots of options to find the right board. Besides it covers many more topics than one software application. I recently did some housekeeping at wxforum.net and changed the order to make those most used boards moved toward the top of each section. Similar boards are now grouped as it isn't purely a most popular contest for listing order. Some sections are purely alphabetical like the weather services. Many sections have an "Other" category as a catchall when nothing matches. These "Other" categories before my reshuffle were not at the end of the list and that was confusing and not optimal. I'm only a new mod and I have other ideas (like moving some old and not used boards to become child boards) but I don't want to turn the house upside down overnight. I only just made all these changes on February 24. I haven't seen anyone comment on it. But I think it was a big improvement. On wxforum.net we seldom need to move threads, which is an indication that people find the right boards to post in.

jimi wrote: ↑Sun 22 Mar 2020 1:41 pm Patience, It's a WIP

I noticed.

And for the rest I disagree with what you say. Yes human nature at play but that's not an argument for not adding structure.
Your WXforum argument is irrelevant. I suggest here something for this situation under these conditions, that's where you have to look. Not in the WXforum.

jimi wrote: ↑Sun 22 Mar 2020 1:41 pm In my experience (much gained from using Google Analytics) when you have that many sub forums the top ones on the page tend to get the majority of the hits and the lower ones much less. Human nature at play, people get bored scrolling or navigating a complex forum tree...

This softly reminds me of me pointing to the number of posts and the reaction on it.

I recommend making some clarifications now that you separately have Fine Offset and Ecowitt sub boards. Because Ecowitt is Fine Offset.

- move Ecowitt board to be right on top of old Fine Offset board. To lessen chances of wrong board to post in. I think it should be on top because it is the current solution.
- clarify that Fine Offset sub board is the old USB connectivity method for now discontinued stations. So rename it to have the USB indicator.
- clarify that Ecowitt (GW1000) board is a solution for not just Ecowitt stations but serves as an expansion to other current model Fine Offset clones (Ambient, Froggit, Maplin... etc.)
- rename Ecowitt to "Ecowitt GW1000 for all current Fine Offset clones" or something similar.
- include in the board description Froggit DP1500 as that is also a GW1000 clone.

galfert wrote: ↑Sun 22 Mar 2020 2:03 pm I disagree that wxforum.net has too many boards. I think it is well organized with lots of options to find the right board. etc

I wasn't implying it's not well organised, it is, I just think there's to many forums/ sub forums. However we can agree to disagree
As I said only my opinion, wasn't saying anyone is right or wrong, it would be a boring old world if we all thought the same.

HansR wrote: ↑Sun 22 Mar 2020 2:18 pm ........ stuff

I chose WXforum as an visual example of what I meant, so not irrelevant at all. I could have chosen many other forums as an example.
I also posted that it was MY opinion nothing else, wasn't making any suggestions or criticism.
Don't confuse structure with complexity.
I'm somewhat reminded of a quote from someone who worked for while in the same organisation as I did many years ago
" Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction."
E.F Schumacher

I note the new Instromet sub-forum is empty, yet there are a number of posts relating to that make of station elsewhere. Anyone using that make of station would be helped if the old posts are relocated sometime in future


Thank you very much David and Niall for the reorganisation that has been done :clap:

I will try and seek them out and move them.