Subj : the UI for echos
To   : Charles Pierson
From : August Abolins
Date : Wed Nov 18 2020 06:14 pm

Hello Charles!

** On Wednesday 18.11.20 - 14:08, Charles Pierson wrote to August Abolins:

 AA>> An upgrade on layout would be good, especially when reading
 AA>> through the various echos of a network. I think there is only one
 AA>> Sychronet bbs that organizes the echos into categories first:

 CP> That comes down to the various programs, and the Sysops.

 CP> I believe at least several programs have the option for at least short
 CP> descriptions for the message areas. Whether or not they are used is to
 CP> each Sysop.

The short descriptions can provide good info, but the lists  
are often unstructered, no sensical order.  If someone is just  
looking for all the potential programming echos - for example,  
they would work well all in one short-list group.


 CP> Web interfaces, I couldn't say. I've not really studied them much.

Even the traditional BBSes don't necessarily organize message  
areas by category.

The design of BBSes has been based on "find a bbs first, then  
figure out where everything is".

The "Select Conferences" via QWK menus is not bad for the BBS  
user. Some offline readers (SemPoint) offer a list of  
selectable echos by TAGNAME only, and the selected ones can  
come on the next QWK session.

But online, the BBS user often has to navigate across all the  
available "networks" looking for the conference that fits  
their interest.


--
  ../|ug

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