[Tb] Tantalizing

On Tuesday, December 23, 2003, at 06:10 PM, Andy Dent wrote:

> Garth Corral writes
>> ...traffic is light and the membership small,
>> due in no small part to the fact that Eastgate does not seem
>> to endorse the notion of a public forum for it's product.
>
> I think they regard the Wiki as the public forum :-)
>
Yes, I got that impression.

> There good news is that I think the underlying engine is sufficiently
> strong to make most things a matter of fixing the UI. Adopting XML as
> the file format was a very smart move.
>
This is exactly the sense that I got. That the underlying architecture
would support some very powerful interaction with your data. It is the
GUI on top of that architecture that causes most of my annoyances. I
thought that UI refinements might come slowly over time but I'm worried
that they will not get the attention that they need, especially in
light of the fact that a windows version is on the way.

> I did put some ideas together earlier on
> http://www.oofile.com.au/adsother/tinderbox.html
>
Thanks, I'll check it out.

> I suspect the range of paying customers for this kind of product varies
> widely. I sympathise with you AND Eastgate.
>
Point taken, but not seeing a forum for feedback or a public face on
issue tracking makes me think that they aren't trying very hard to get
their finger on the pulse of their user base. Perhaps I'm too old
fashioned.

> I've had a lot of positive experiences but that comes from using a Wiki
> engine which includes versioning (twiki). Editing is then a matter of
> keeping a discussion focussed, NOT obliterating comment.
>
I don't have an issue with wikis per se, they are a great thing for
some purposes. Some of the wiki cookbooks I have used are an
invaluable resource and I'm sure there are other things for which they
are well suited. A discussion forum isn't among those things, however.
  From some of the stuff written on the Tinderbox wiki, it would seem
that the user base is convinced that a wiki is the solution to all
problems.
When all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail.

> Regards
>
Thanks for your input.

Garth
Received on Tue Dec 23 19:37:32 2003