Would anyone like a developer's IRC channel?

RichMorin · 13 Nov 2010, 12:38

I've been thinking about starting and running an IRC channel (eg, sketchup-ruby) for SketchUp Ruby developers. Before I commit to this, however, I thought I should know whether I'd be alone on it.

I would also like to know if anyone else might be willing to help run it. let me know...

Jim · 13 Nov 2010, 17:03

@richmorin said:

I thought I should know whether I'd be alone on it.

Probably, but it still might be fun. There might be more users if you make it a general-purpose SketchUp support channel; and even so I still think the signal-noise ratio would be low enough for a dev channel.

How many people do not know what IRC is?

thomthom · 13 Nov 2010, 18:43

Been a long time since I used IRC...

/me goes to look for his old copy of mIRC

Chris Fullmer · 13 Nov 2010, 20:32

I had suggested this some time ago and got little interest then. But I am still interested. I have felt much of the ruby talk around here lately has been over my head a bit , but I'd sit in an IRC channel while I'm browsing the forums, or writing code.

RichMorin · 13 Nov 2010, 22:19

I have set up an IRC channel (#sketchup-dev on irc.freenode.net ) for discussion of SketchUp development topics. I expect this to mostly be about Ruby, but other topics (eg, dynamic attributes) are also welcome. About the only thing that will cause banning is abusive behavior: MINSWAN (Matz is nice, so we are nice.)

Jim · 14 Nov 2010, 02:35

wd=UI;;WebDialog.new
wd.set_url "http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=sketchup-dev"
wd.show

Or just click here .

RichMorin · 14 Nov 2010, 04:22

Alternatively, Mac users can use Adium or Colloquy (I use the latter) to do IRC.

Krisidious · 14 Nov 2010, 05:38

I think you guys would like Vent better...http://www.ventrilo.com/

RichMorin · 14 Nov 2010, 05:51

@krisidious said:

Post by Krisidious on Sat Nov 13, 2010 9:38 pm
I think you guys would like Vent better...http://www.ventrilo.com/

Voice over IP certainly has its place, but I don't think this is one of them.

First, this is an international community, many of whose members do not have English as their first language. So, they may find it easier (and less error-prone) to communicate via text.

Second, a great deal of the material being discussed will be technical in nature and textual in format. Trying to dictate this over an audio link is not going to be fun (or productive).

Finally, by using a textual medium, we can log conversations, search them, etc. We could not do this if we were communicating via voice.

So, although I appreciate the suggestion (and welcome you to start up a voice-based forum, if you wish), I think I'll stick with IRC.

thomthom · 14 Nov 2010, 08:16

Yea, I'm with Rich here. With IRC (or any other text based medium) once choose when/if to reply. With voice you need to keep a conversation going constantly.

thomthom · 14 Nov 2010, 08:19

Rich - when the channel is registered - is it possible to set up a bot that upload chat logs to a website?

Krisidious · 14 Nov 2010, 09:48

very good points Rich... especially logging...

Mike Lucey · 14 Nov 2010, 13:05

Mmmmm, and interesting possibility. I will have a chat with Tavi (TBD) and Coen about it and see what we could do here on SCF to introduce such a facility for members.

Jim · 14 Nov 2010, 15:10

I recommend pidgin for a IM client - it supports all major services (and irc.)

Pidgin

Pidgin is a universal chat client, allowing you to consolidate all your different messaging apps into a single tool.

(www.pidgin.im)

RichMorin · 19 Nov 2010, 08:15

The IRC channel has been up for a few days now, but we've had very little traffic. Meanwhile, we've had 140+ views of this topic, so it's clear that some folks think the idea might have merit.

I think this is a "chicken and egg" situation: if everyone waits for the channel to catch on, it never will. So, if you're interested in having this resource available, please sign on for a few days, looking in from time to time.

Chris Fullmer · 19 Nov 2010, 09:14

I've already forgotten. I need to get into the habit. I'll try to make a link to login and put it on my desktop or something so I rememeber to be in there more often.

derei · 19 Nov 2010, 10:36

Well, nice idea ! And if, somehow this would be made public on other environments, other than SCF, maybe it would attract more interested people.
I logged-in today, but it was empty

RichMorin · 20 Nov 2010, 01:21

@unknownuser said:

Well, nice idea! And if, somehow this would be made public on other environments, other than SCF, maybe it would attract more interested people.
I logged-in today, but it was empty

Again, if everyone waits for the channel to fill up before they're willing to stick around, it never will. I've been on the channel for several days now; I just leave a session going. I may not be actively watching it all the time, but I'll certainly get back to anyone whose message I see.

FYI, I also posted a note to sketchupruby@googlegroups.com ; since we only want SketchUp developers, I'm not sure where else would be appropriate...

derei · 20 Nov 2010, 02:34

@richmorin said:

since we only want SketchUp developers, I'm not sure where else would be appropriate...

Well... more NEW Sketchup developers? ... the kind who didn't knew that they are Sketchup Developers until they hear about this ?