In general we want to minimize the number of categories on this discussion board, but it seems like we should have at least one place for users to discuss the growing list of 3rd-party integrations for Smart Weather Stations. The #developers category is a de-facto discussion of 3rd party developers, so I propose adding a new sub-category to #owners called “3rd Party Integrations” or similar. This can be a place for users to discuss the various integrations available.
Please let me know your thoughts before I create the category.
That leads to categories under categories. It would seem natural to have Weather34 as a category under this category, as I’m sure there will be many topics under the Weather34 category.
I fully understand your desire to limit the categories but many times that is not practical. Having ran several high profile forums on AoL, Genie, Delphi, CompuServe and independent bulletin board systems, it never ends up as simple as it starts.
I’ve been in this business since 1984, first as a BBS Sysop for a TBBS board in Fayetteville, Arkansas to Director of Technology at Boardwatch Magazine. It’s never easy and never simple. As a former moderator of several professional groups I can testify that it will only get worse.
I could count at least a half dozen 3rd party templates or hardware systems that that could use WF data. IMHO, the best support for such 3rd party apps or hardware would be on those systems own web sites and not here. As with the WF on-line and apps display, keep it simple. Let the 3rd developers support their own systems, fracturing their limited support time across multiple sites is counterproductive.
I think its a great idea and believe if the scope is limited it can benefit many here. To Hanksters concern about fracturing, support, etc. I do agree but the reality is, that is the beauty of the Internet if a person is looking for an answer and its not provided in X forum.
Just one click of the mouse will bring them to somewhere else for that elusive answer.
There will always be cross breeding of information that may or may not pertain to (or) cover the scope of the question(s). But, rest assured the community as a whole almost always comes together to provide insight, and feedback in hopes of finding those answers.
My take is Better to have and not need vs Need and not have
Ok, after hearing your feedback and doing some research on Discourse best practices, I’ve created a single sub-category under #owners called “Third-party Integrations” (#owners:integrations for short).
I considered creating a “sub-sub-category” for each third-party integration (owners->integrations->weather34, owners->integrations->AmazonEcho, etc.), but you can’t do that in Discourse. You can only go two levels deep in Discourse. And I think it would be a bit messy to have a sub-category for each 3rd-party integration.
Fortunately, Discourse has a tagging feature for just this purpose. I enabled this feature, then moved a few topics from #owners into the sub-category, #owners:integrations, then created the appropriate tags.
The tagging system seems to be pretty flexible. Any user with trust level 3 or higher can create a tag. So, as you browse the community, please feel free to add tags as appropriate. Here is some more documentation on tagging:
I agree there are plenty of cases where support would be better provided through the 3rd party’s own outlets, but I also think there will be plenty of cases where it makes sense to have that discussion here.
If “#developers category is a de-facto discussion of 3rd party developers”, and integrating WF into other things is developing, seems to me it should be a sub category of dev, not owners. Just my $.02.
Right, the new category is for users/owners who make use of third-party apps & integrations, not developers (though discussion from users might lead to a need for the third-party developers to weigh in).
