Board Needs Reorganizing!

[macromark]

OK, time for a breather! Please have a look over the board and let me know if any forums are misplaced or are missing! Also, let me know if any older "legacy" forums (HS1 or HS2 related) are still on the main page. Thanks!

*Edit - forgot to mention some of the changes..

1. Board Sections have been added to mimic the sections of the HS3 updater. This will help create a universal search experience for users.
2. The 3rd party author section has been "submerged" a level to reduce clutter from the home page. Authors just need to click once to get to their listings
3. Specific links to plug-ins in the author's section have been added to the appropriate topic section on the home page. This should make it far easier to find plug-ins of a specific type
4. Each section now have only ONE general discussion forum. Again, this will reduce some clutter

[sparkman]

Looks great Mark!

Cheers
Al

[Pete]

Looks good from here Mark..

[jlrichar]

Looks good. Though I don't think the kinect and wiimote plugins have anything to do with game systems (even though the hw is sourced from such). They probably should be in a less confusing categories in the updater and on the board. I would think that the kinect should be in a voice recognition category, along with the alexa plugin. The wiimote plugin should be in whatever category the harmony hub is in since it is essentially a remote.

If there is a wiki forthcoming (which I think is a good idea), then it would be nice to have crosslinking for each plugin between the store page (where the plugin is purchased), the wiki, and the discussion forum page.

[sparkman]

Looks good. Though I don't think the kinect and wiimote plugins have anything to do with game systems (even though the hw is sourced from such). They probably should be in a less confusing categories in the updater and on the board. I would think that the kinect should be in a voice recognition category, along with the alexa plugin. The wiimote plugin should be in whatever category the harmony hub is in since it is essentially a remote.

I generally agree with this. They can probably go into the User Interface section except for BLXbox which can go into the Utilities section and then the Gaming section can get dropped.

Cheers
Al

[spud]

I generally agree with this. They can probably go into the User Interface section except for BLXbox which can go into the Utilities section and then the Gaming section can get dropped.

Cheers
Al

I agree, the gaming section could probably go away in both updater and forum.

[mikaluch]

I'm late to this thread but I think it is an important one. New/old user here. I worked with Homeseer and a lot of other automation products going back a long time. Then I didn't use it for about 8 years. I started again basically the beginning of the year. The documentation is not so much lacking as disorganized. One of the problems being the ubiquitos nature of the software. Trying to support all versions of Windows, all versions of Linux, plus embedded devices for software that is heavily dependent on dozens of third party apps interacting with hundreds of different hardware components makes for a lot of instructions and bugs that may or not be applicable for the bewildered.

I am sure what has been accomplished is an improvement but the result is still confusing for a newbie. There is a lot of information to cover and a newbie wastes most of their time and effort reading or implementing things that are not applicable or obsolete. Squeezing it down to fewer forums won't help with that. I think what would help is something like this: two checklists. This is probably only implementable going forward. One checklist goes with each new thread. The other goes with each new software release. The entries would be in categories and describe what things and versions the thread is applicable to. A set of simple checkboxes plus a box to enter the version something like this:

Hardware: Troller, PC, R-Pi, etc.
OS: Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 10, RPM Linux, Deb Linux, etc. + Version
Homeseer: HS2, HS3, R-Pi, Linux, etc + Version 3.xx.xx
Plugins: Goodplugin, Badplugin, Thatotherone, etc.

As you check each set of boxes the ones below it adjust to make available only what is applicable (no HS2 plugins with HS3). Maybe a check and an X to designate known compatible or author expects compatibility. There is a similar set of boxes to use when you search. That would help a newbie narrow down to only what he is working with. This would also help the developers generate documentation as they could more heavily rely on the forum posts and collect metrics on error sources. It would help moderators keep the threads on topic since the topic is now well defined.

Two other problems that are hard for a noob. Some plugin authors support nearly instantaneously, others not so much. A noob that posts a question and gets no answers doesn't know if it was posted in the wrong place, the post somehow offended someone, or the plugin author is busy elsewhere. This is a commercial endeavor being operated like open source. If you are going to sell software there should be a maximum time period allowed to respond to issues. We all like to work on the new stuff and not clean up our messes afterward. It's human nature. That nature has to be actively managed.

The second one is the nature of the releases themselves and the location of the downloads. This could use a little more organization also. I don't know whether to use the full release or the beta or the one linked in the dev's answer to a question.

[BeePee]

For sure there needs to be some maintenance, when I was making the change from HS2-HS3, the board although immensely helpful was also frustrating at times.

HS2 and all that goes with it, Plugins, how to's etc. needs to be separated from HS3 related stuff.

Stickies, should only appear on the first page, some are so long there is only enough room for several posts on subsequent pages.

There are also many posts relating to "new release" stuff which is out of date.

There is a bit of house keeping to do here but as many users bookmark topics for a future to do list, makes this task harder.