There are a lot of items to discuss when it comes to interconnect a 68kM to other stuff (peripherals from a serial mouse to any other PC, an instrument in the lab or even the whole Internet). Or how about emulations, to get Sys. 7 running on a recent machine, any command executed within fractions of a second? Think of data interchange, also. Some of the forums should be left open as a kind of 'compatibility area' to permit useful threads that would be marked 'off topic', otherwise. Some structure is helpful, so I would not put this stuff into the lounge, but have some dedicated areas. Why not have some extra forums for recent computers, as long as the posts are 68k-related? And yes, we have the 'Peripherals' area, but I think it could use some re-organisation to allow easy access to specific information.
But this leads to a more database related question: Might it be possible to 'flag' a post in 'peripherals' as 'related to SCSI' or 'related to RS 422' AND 'related to HyperCard' (for example), and to switch on/off visibility of posts in a forum depending to their flag? Any new post should meet one or more categories to choose from. This way one could decide easily if the post belongs to the forum. Or think different, and have a set of categories to choose from to post something (with nothing chosen, it is clearly off topic, to be thrown into the lounge). Let the server decide into which forum the post will go, without additional interaction (-> less 'moved' posts). To view something, check the categories you are interested in, and have a forum customised to your needs. From a database organisation point of view there should be no need to organise the forums in fixed categories. Fixed forums still could be supported, like the forums we already have. They are one possible set of categories to organise discissions. No one needs to change habits.
P.S.: A lot of people organise their photo collections in categories like 'general stuff', 'miscellaneous', 'other stuff' and so on, what is the mind-blowing result of a present inability to predict future needs
A software based forum may take advantage of automagic re-organisation on individual demand.
But this leads to a more database related question: Might it be possible to 'flag' a post in 'peripherals' as 'related to SCSI' or 'related to RS 422' AND 'related to HyperCard' (for example), and to switch on/off visibility of posts in a forum depending to their flag? Any new post should meet one or more categories to choose from. This way one could decide easily if the post belongs to the forum. Or think different, and have a set of categories to choose from to post something (with nothing chosen, it is clearly off topic, to be thrown into the lounge). Let the server decide into which forum the post will go, without additional interaction (-> less 'moved' posts). To view something, check the categories you are interested in, and have a forum customised to your needs. From a database organisation point of view there should be no need to organise the forums in fixed categories. Fixed forums still could be supported, like the forums we already have. They are one possible set of categories to organise discissions. No one needs to change habits.
P.S.: A lot of people organise their photo collections in categories like 'general stuff', 'miscellaneous', 'other stuff' and so on, what is the mind-blowing result of a present inability to predict future needs
A software based forum may take advantage of automagic re-organisation on individual demand.