Is TiddlyTalk inviting for new (new-ish) users? I don't find

Well, truth be told, I don’t have any special knowledge of discourse to know for sure.

But I’m of the opinion, in general technical terms: why wouldn’t it be possible?

What we are looking at now re TiddlyTalk, it is just a rendered page. Why couldn’t there be two versions of such a page, one version showing the full monty that is this, and one showing the friendlier warm-welcoming page to newbies (and folk such as me with cognitive disabilities) who need something much less busy that this beast.

ADD-ON: I loath automatic “opt-in” with option to “opt-out”. As a newbie, I’d much prefer automatic “opt-out” of the broad/busy view, with easy way to “opt-in”. That applies to me in all things. Make it an easy not-overwhelming start, with opportunity to transition to “more” later.

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I would welcome a newbie friendly area/topic, because the developer-level discussion is pretty intimidating. I think part of what makes TiddlyWiki very difficult to start using is that new users are trying to solve two complicated problems simultaneously:

  1. Figuring out how to use an unusual and excitingly powerful piece of software. (A web page as a wiki? Through the browser? So, how do I save? Is it a trustworthy place to store information? and so on…)

  2. Figuring out how to build a framework in the system and integrate it into a workflow. (Can TW do what I need it to? What kind of fields should I use? How to I organize my tiddlers? What kind of templates do I need? I am a professional [whatever], how do I make TW work for me? and so on…)

Figuring out both the software and the framework is a lot, especially for people who only think they need to figure out the software, aren’t aware an implicit framework even exists, and don’t think that it’s equally important to even develop the framework/workflow. I think newbies will have a lot more framework-/workflow-related questions than the more seasoned users, so pulling that breed of question out from the “how-to-code-this” type of questions would be helpful.

As to the mechanics, perhaps it could be like the onboarding process for the discussion board, where higher-level items get unlocked, and for those who are starting at a higher level of questioning, the moderators could unlock access for them? It’s a delicate balance. I would hate to suggest hiding the higher-level discussion, because I’m sure there are people looking to advance straight to that level of conversation. Tough call.

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Dammit, I wish I could have written that. Very good stuff.

For sure. I am all for the easy to find (noticeable) “turn on / opt-in” button, then easy to find “turn off / opt-out” (or the “oops, I am not ready for this”) button.

Not so easy to notice these things when there are too many shiny objects grabbing one’s attention.

SQUIRREL!

Aside: maybe I’m just imagining things, but there seemed to be way more “newbie” “how do I do this / that” posts in Google Groups. Either seasoned folk have gotten so excited about the move to TiddlyTalk that it has drowned out “TiddlyWiki basics” posts, maybe potential newbies turned off by the volume of technical/project/documentation/seasoned-user-polls/etc., maybe how Discourse works, maybe all of it, maybe none of it and it is just a low-adoption cycle, … meh.

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Hey Charlie — I think Introduce Yourself, Start Here, or some other inviting beginner category is a great idea.

We started with the default / Uncategorized forum of “Discussions” to mirror the “single thread” of Google Groups. If a new user just posts — they don’t have to pick a category.

I know you’re not a fan of the forum. I’m not aware of any open source communities that hive off their new users into a separate area.

Definitely always room to improve new user experiences and community feelings.

Would be great if someone found some new users and interviewed them about what did / didn’t work for them. We can’t really know without identifying and asking new users.

“Introduce Yourself” might be just the prompt to learn more about new users, including some suggestions about their background, what they’re trying to accomplish, and perhaps what their biggest question / struggle is.

Who wants to work on this with me? We can use the #meta category to work on this.

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I would be happy to be interview as a new user but currently I am only willing to do this through text, not video or audio. I was going to eventually post my ideas as I promised here but I think a conversation would be more productive.

Please let me know if the above conditions are acceptable.

Ciao @boris, I think that is fine so long as at up-front is also …

1 - “Introducing TiddlyWiki for you …”
2 - “Introducing things this forum does …”

Something like that. Overviews. You can’t just lumber newbies with telling us, we also need tell them what “we” have.

My main point is orientation on landing here. Even I, after some months, find it confusing to know what is going on.

Best TT

I think it is true that the Discourse forum has maybe gone a bit more tech talk than the GG. Per se that is not bad. But I would say the richness / complexity of Discourse as a system makes it far less simple to get to grips with. If you just stumbled upon it looking for TW help it could seem very over-complex I think.

Thoughts, TT

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As a new, lurking user i suggest the following:

  1. For those who are not comfortable or are conservative -privacy-wise- in introducing themselves, an ‘introduce yourself’ section may be way too much / too invasive
  2. A dedicated Get Started section to help transition new users would be much more effective. Need to organize newbie info better like GrokWiki. Make video series more fun and interactive. - forum posts that are uncategorized can intimidate and confuse new users
  3. Staying/ bring more active and helpful guides/users on popular platforms would bring much more convenience. Lots of users dont like the hassle of making new accounts unless it’s hyped.
  4. Forums designed like this website (i’ve got to say it’s tedious for those not familiar with the UI or not too tech savy and not always userfriendly on mobile platform especially for more slower devices) are normally seen as troubleshooting discussion for technical users so it’s quite intimidating to join any discussion. We want something more social especially for future generations like Tapatalk or Reddit

Note: I wouldn’t mind an interview but prefer just voice. TBD

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Awesome — thanks for the feedback!

By introduce yourself — I don’t mean being non anonymous, I mean “I’m a student who is looking for better class note taking” or whatever background about your needs / interest in TW.

I have found this to be a particular feature of the TW community. I can’t believe how much GG and then inherited here people do troubleshooting and support.

In other open source communities I’ve been a part of, a lot more energy is funnelled into documentation.

On the one hand it’s great — people enjoy figuring out problems and tips and tricks and seem to get energy from contributing that way — but it sort of crowds out lots of other things, and as you say can immediately dump people into the deep end.

Can you say more? I read part of what you said as meaning “cross post stuff to Reddit and Twitter”, but what do you mean by wanting something more social.

I’ll split this into a new user feedback thread when I’m on desktop, sorry for clutter

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It is all about perspective. To me, it is brutally bad. Too broad-in-scope of a forum (i.e. everything and the kitchen sink), in and of itself a form of too much richness/complexity, compounds the too much richness/complexity of Discourse. A double-whammy.

I’m sure many agree with you about “that is not bad.”

But if even just one person says something is bad (my view: brutally bad), then dollars to doughnuts that one person is not alone. I’m not so convinced that many folk would want to say anything for fear of sounding like a naysayer/complainer, and/or fear of raining on a parade in which folk have been quite reliable to counter a message of dislike with a message of delight for the very thing not liked. Understandable because I think most folk would want to quash any possibility of losing any volunteer because anybody is criticising his/her work. But I do believe in something my pop once said:

My Dad to his aunt: This pie you made, it tastes awful.
My Mom, embarrassed/shocked, to my Dad: Hey, how could you say that?
My Dad, to my Mom: Well, if I don’t tell her, she’ll make it again

My great-aunt’s pies put everybody else’s pies to shame. Until she decided to do something different. After which she immediately returned to putting everybody else’s pies to shame.

Oops. I majorly digress …

I’m going to channel my frustrations with into an analysis and design (re-imagination) project. Although not my cup of tea, I am going to start this project. At some point, I’ll make an announcement of said project here. Wait for it …

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Social as in the following:

1.) Not just cross post major/most active/popular content
2.) Anything that encourages open ended discussions and ideas or questions or even relatable, emotionally creative social expressions (i.e frustrations or accomplishments or workflows) like… (think of campfire stories in a sense but virtual)

a.) i.e. posting relatable memes in any style (videos, images, funny skits - Cater more to what’s trending for this generation to the next)

“that moment when…” or
“… it’d be a shame if something were to happen”
“One does not simply…”
“I need/want… Say no more”

b.) Asking things like

“What frustrates you the most as a new user?” or
“How can we make this more user friendly?”
“So why haven’t you lurkers jumped on Tiddlywiki yet?”
“What do you wish to get out of from this community?”

c.) Eyecatching statements / content (can be in social platforms or blogs or forums or YouTube)

“Look what Tiddlywiki can do that ___can’t!”
“You’ve been using this wrong!”
" (a note taking app) Can’t do this!"
“I wish I can do this”
“I’ve got this idea!”
“Wow i can’t believe this works!”
“If i can do this without knowing code, so can you!”
“The best tool I have ever used”
“This is so much better than ___!”
“Things i’ve learned…”
“What i wish i knew… (knew when…)”
“I’ve found a way(s) to make this better/easier”
“A day in the life of…” (some humor)
(Like the clickbaits you see on YouTube)
(That above especially can bring lots of inspiration for new users and be more inviting for users to jump into discussions. Makes things less intimidating)

d.) Meetups / community livestreams / podcasts / talks that encourages more discussions in that medium

  • Listing timestamps anf topic summaries in community posts/blog(s) for easy tracking and synthesis of ideas/content
  • transcriptions (YouTube, Twitch?)

3.) Giveaways, rewards for active contributors, blogs (Medium), competitions

4.) Being on multiple communication platforms can bring in new potential developers or users but can be quite tedious to manage unless we have a good amount of people to handle that
a.) more community managers
b.) Discord [Not Discourse], Element [Matrix protocol], Telegram)
5.) Keeping things on more popular social platforms can potentially and exponentially draw more new users as well as contributors (all this sounds like marketing and community management skills but not intentionally selling anything) This also makes things easier for those users who are comfortable on those platforms to interact
a.) Have more organized content/posts/discussions like megathreads/specific topic threads/categorized posts (like flairs on Subreddit)
6.) Have it all set up to give the least amount of friction (make it all as convenient as possible) for new users to start talking
a.) Reach out to users on popular platforms instead of centralizing everything and limiting / adding more friction for entries into discussion
b.) be consistent in linking/mirroring to discussion posts, contact info, and related content / resources (somehow automate that too?) Like so…

“Hey i’ve improved this. Here is the original and here is my fork” or
“I share the original source on behalf of since they forgot to”

  • Automated posts/bots referencing/linking/reminding of major sources and rules/guidelines like so following the spirit of backlinking

c.)Things like this makes it a lot easier:

7.) Instructions on how to report bugs on github (or heck even how to start an account and how to post in the first place) or how to fork etc. Bare basics. Act like you’re absolutely new to everything just as a kid discovers a puzzle for the first time
a.) Or even just let people to post their bugs/problems on the platforms (i suggest having guidelines that have templates for users to copy-paste for easy understanding of problem / situation) -encouraging more easy follow-up
i.e.

Tiddlywiki Version:
Plugin list:
Intention / Expectation (What am i trying to do?):
Result: 
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I personally do like the idea of a Getting Started category for new users.

As far as I can see in the discourse settings page, there would be the possibility to “switch off” the notifications for the “Discussions” category. So it would be an “opt in” for users who want to join it.

… but I don’t know, how the landing page would exactly look like, since testing it would need to mess with the “live server” here, which I don’t want to do atm.

I do agree with @Divine_Lotus, that troubleshooting threads can be intimidating for new users. … That’s why I do like the idea of a Getting Started category, which may be similar to a “Tips & Tricks for new users”

On the other hand, as I was a TW newbie I did find it extremely welcoming, that questions of new users are always treated, as if the question was posted the first time. …

On other portals I would have got a RTFM or “this question was answered X years ago. Search for it!” . …

My personal opinion is, that questions answered years ago are completely outdated in an industry, where every 18 month a completely new generation of projects is born.

I think the TiddlyWiki community is different here in 2 directions.

  • TiddlyWiki itself is “highly backwards compatible” and
  • every question is a “new question”, which deserves to be answered as best as we can.

just my thoughts as an
ex newbie :wink:

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Issue and New Feature request templates are here on GitHub. …

If “reports” are posted here in the forum, which “look like core bug” and a dev or someone who has a GH account reads it, they will create an issue or even a PR at GitHub.

There could be a pinned thread in a Getting Started section, which contains this info again.

The landing page for new and not logged in users looks like this:

It contains links to

5 posts were split to a new topic: How we could improve posting Issue and Feature Request to GitHub

A post was merged into an existing topic: How we could improve posting Issue and Feature Request to GitHub

Thank you - for the idea and the lovely warm and welcoming blanket I’m seeing in my minds eye :wink:

On topic: I am so relieved to read that I am not alone in feeling overwhelmed when trying to use the forum. (I did in the end but felt unsure as to whether I used the right category and tag - and it took me quite a while to formulate my question due to being intimated by both the level of detail and clawless very knowledgeable persons there, as well as the lack of clear ‘do this if you need help with something rather basic’).

In the bright side: I was pleasantly surprised there were so few categories. Most fora have so many it takes a study to decide on the correct one - and if you do it wrong there’s always a not so polite mod to address your faux pas. Not here though (at least, not in the last 10 hours I first took a look here :grinning:

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I did add a link to the Discussion Category to the default banner. Welcome to the TiddlyWiki 5 Discourse discussion group for end users

Now the second bullet point will directly lead to the Discussions category. … Just to be sure … Did you read the first paragraph?

What should we change there, to make it clear, that “every” question is welcome?


Welcome to the TiddlyWiki 5 Discourse discussion group for end users

Feel free to ask questions - we welcome newcomers, and are eager to help everyone get the most out of TiddlyWiki 5. Here’s a few guidelines and links to get you started:

  • Include your OS, Browser, Tiddlywiki version and other relevant details when asking a question so that the community can help you better.
  • If you are in doubt, where to post your questions, use: Discussion - Talk TW

Side note.

I’m not so sure that is doable. In the sense that we are in a text interface writing here. It is almost impossible to communicate through that how “open” here actually is! ???

It is certainly true this discussion group has many people who dedicated themselves to helping anyone and everyone at any level.

But how can you convey that at the start point for a newbie???

TT

Objectively, the text is clear, so I guess a solution along the lines of some of the suggestions* made in this thread would be more apt than actual textual changes.
(you seeing the blush of my cheeks shining through the screen for not having read the paragraph well enough… :flushed:)

But thinking of the ’ SQUIRREL!’ Charlie_Venio mentioned : perhaps leave it at the first two bullets and have the other text appear below it?
Now there is really so much out there requiring attention the word 'discussion’s the link threw me of because:

  1. I was looking for the words ’ help’, or ‘starting’ (or ’ for dummies’ - I mean, just deciding on what the right saver would be already tripped me up… (‘discussing’ is a two way street and no matter how much I regret it: I’m not bringing anything to any discussion at this point in time)
  2. Feeling a just a tad awkward about the above
  3. Generally aware that I’m missing the knowledge / vocabulary to be precise (think writing ‘multi-platform’ when it turns out I’m actually in need of ‘cross-platform syncing’…and then some)

Especially the last one is less of a personality aspect and more of a common issue I think.

*Of course it’s easy to also spout more time-consuming ideas other than a lay-out / format change but perhaps it’s useful nevertheless:
I found this line of thinking helpful. Perhaps instead of many bullets : one newbie tag pill or button leading straight to proper location / buttons that filter the available discussions along the lines of

  • I want to use TW - where / how to start (potential / absolute beginner)
  • I have TW up and running just fine - now what? (beginner to medior)
  • Tweaks, depths and other fine stuff (advance users / niche inquiries)

and / or a writing prompt for either a first time post, or a button so it can be used if you choose so, e.g.:

  • what do you want to use TW for (use case / ideal situation where everything goes as expected :slight_smile:
  • what problem do you run into?
  • what OS, browser and cloud server do you (mostly) use
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