Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

Andrew Johnson <[email protected]> · Fri, 18 Feb 2000 12:52:32 -0600

Maren Purves wrote:
> 
> >   Maybe this is a little extreme, but would it be more
> > productive to use some sort of collaborative tool (like
> > bugzilla) for "tech-support" type problems?  When someone
> > has a problem, he/she can categorize it, then submit it
> > to a database, where it gets routed to the "expert" who
> > may then inform others about it.
> 
> and who's got the time to implement that?

I have been thinking about something like this recently and went as far as
downloading the GPLed web application software that runs the SourceForge
web-site (http://www.sourceforge.com/ IIRC, might be .org).  Although this
probably provides all the functionality we want and more, my guess is that
it would take a fair bit of effort to set up, customize for EPICS and
manage (an ongoing responsibility).  I'm not volunteering, although I am
looking at automating the maintenance of Steve Lewis' Supported Hardware &
Software lists.

However I wonder if a monthly digest mailing list might be attractive to
those who don't want to follow the day-to-day discussions on tech-talk. 
The APS archive system already creates a monthly web-page containing the
subjects discussed, with URLs to each message in the archive.  It might be
possible to have this page sent out to another list monthly iff there's
sufficient call for it (which would obviously still take some work by our
sysadmins to implement).  I imagine "sufficient" to need at least 15
individuals (I will manage a count, email me privately if you'd prefer
this), but the final decision would be up to Bill McDowell.

- Andrew
-- 
Complexity comes for free, Simplicity you have to work for.

Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System