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> The only big thing that Slack has over IRC is being able to catch up on what was said earlier. What happens when a topic of discussion is debated intensely o

> The only big thing that Slack has over IRC is being able to catch up on what was said earlier. What happens when a topic of discussion is debated intensely on a different timezone and you wake up to more than 500 messages to read? Do you read them all? I think this is a reason for people who really don't engage on IRC for anything other than "Hi, I have a problem, can anyone help me?". If you do anything meaningful and engage on different channels you know there is no keep up with everything being said or discussed. Sorry if I sound harsh but I keep hearing the same tiring argument and keep pointing people to the same thing over and over and over. If you want IRC and history, please use an IRC bouncer. With Docker and cheap hosting solutions it's almost a no brainer. Do one better, add SSL to your bouncer and connect to, at least on Freenode, using SSL as well. Win-win.

kylec 11y ago
> What happens when a topic of discussion is debated intensely on a different timezone and you wake up to more than 500 messages to read? Do you read them all? It's your choice if you want to read them or not. This is better than IRC, because IRC doesn't give you that choice.
Bjartr 11y ago
The reason you keep hearing the same things over and over is because people keep giving technical solutions to experience problems, and so aren't really solving the problem. IMO this is one more example of a technical community being generally dismissive of the importance of user experience. UX is THE reason Slack gained the traction it did. And I don't just mean in the client, I mean also mean the experience of going from zero to having everything working with the expected bells and whistles and the experience of adding a new feature. There is real value in being able to set it all up in three minutes and a couple of clicks without having to learn the technical underpinnings of a platform well enough to bring up a server and find and configure a bunch of individual bots.
- davidw 11y ago
  Well, we are discussing chat for open source projects, rather than, say, what to use at a company. Some technical knowledge might be expected in this crowd.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - acdha 11y ago
    That's effectively telling everyone that if they aren't comfortable a) researching the available programs, b) paying for a server to host it, and c) learning enough to support a running container, manage SSL certificates, install security updates promptly, they shouldn't be part of the community. That's bad for growing the community, particularly since there are many people who participate in OSS now who don't have all of those skills or the time to spend supporting a service even if they do.
    - davidw 11y ago
      Exactly 0 of those things are required to interact on IRC. Source: have been using IRC since late 1993.
      - acdha 11y ago
        > Exactly 0 of those things are required to interact on IRC. This entire thread has been about whether IRC can offer a competitive experience to services like Slack, Gitter, etc. I don't think anyone is arguing that you cannot use IRC at all without tools but even you were just saying (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11013780 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11013780) that you need the money and skills to run a server to have a first-class experience. > Source: have been using IRC since late 1993. Ditto but the world has moved on quite a lot since then and many of us think that IRC needs to as well or it will continue declining into obscurity.
        davidw 11y ago
        My points are not about the tech so much as: * Proprietary protocols are generally a bad deal, and especially so for open source projects. Proprietary clients (gmail, for instance) don't matter as much unless you are RMS. * Chat should not be a central component of an open source project, but an 'extra' for occasional real time communications. If important stuff happens there, it will alienate people who can't participate because of time zones or other reasons. Someone else wrote the comment you linked.
Larrikin 11y ago
Isn't one of the major points of using Slack is that you can just search later on if anything useful was said. You're not supposed to need to read everything
wcummings 11y ago
>I think this is a reason for people who really don't engage on IRC for anything other than "Hi, I have a problem, can anyone help me?". Nailed it, IRC isn't a significant barrier for a real contributor. If you don't have the time to figure out IRC, you don't have the time to significantly contribute to a project.
- st3v3r 11y ago
  That's an extremely elitist viewpoint, that will do nothing but tell people that they aren't welcome in open source. Which is a terrible thing.
st3v3r 11y ago
No. A bouncer is not a solution. Hence why you keep hearing that argument.
- kuschku 11y ago
  Ever tried IRCCloud, or Quassel with Quassel-Webserver and QuasselDroid (beta)? Especially in a corporate setting, the result is a simple username/password login to a webpage or the mobile client, it Just Works™, and has a user-friendly interface.

kylec 11y ago

> What happens when a topic of discussion is debated intensely on a different timezone and you wake up to more than 500 messages to read? Do you read them all? It's your choice if you want to read them or not. This is better than IRC, because IRC doesn't give you that choice.

Bjartr 11y ago

The reason you keep hearing the same things over and over is because people keep giving technical solutions to experience problems, and so aren't really solving the problem. IMO this is one more example of a technical community being generally dismissive of the importance of user experience. UX is THE reason Slack gained the traction it did. And I don't just mean in the client, I mean also mean the experience of going from zero to having everything working with the expected bells and whistles and the experience of adding a new feature. There is real value in being able to set it all up in three minutes and a couple of clicks without having to learn the technical underpinnings of a platform well enough to bring up a server and find and configure a bunch of individual bots.

davidw 11y ago
Well, we are discussing chat for open source projects, rather than, say, what to use at a company. Some technical knowledge might be expected in this crowd.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- acdha 11y ago
  That's effectively telling everyone that if they aren't comfortable a) researching the available programs, b) paying for a server to host it, and c) learning enough to support a running container, manage SSL certificates, install security updates promptly, they shouldn't be part of the community. That's bad for growing the community, particularly since there are many people who participate in OSS now who don't have all of those skills or the time to spend supporting a service even if they do.
  - davidw 11y ago
    Exactly 0 of those things are required to interact on IRC. Source: have been using IRC since late 1993.
    - acdha 11y ago
      > Exactly 0 of those things are required to interact on IRC. This entire thread has been about whether IRC can offer a competitive experience to services like Slack, Gitter, etc. I don't think anyone is arguing that you cannot use IRC at all without tools but even you were just saying (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11013780 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11013780) that you need the money and skills to run a server to have a first-class experience. > Source: have been using IRC since late 1993. Ditto but the world has moved on quite a lot since then and many of us think that IRC needs to as well or it will continue declining into obscurity.
      - davidw 11y ago
        My points are not about the tech so much as: * Proprietary protocols are generally a bad deal, and especially so for open source projects. Proprietary clients (gmail, for instance) don't matter as much unless you are RMS. * Chat should not be a central component of an open source project, but an 'extra' for occasional real time communications. If important stuff happens there, it will alienate people who can't participate because of time zones or other reasons. Someone else wrote the comment you linked.

Larrikin 11y ago

Isn't one of the major points of using Slack is that you can just search later on if anything useful was said. You're not supposed to need to read everything

wcummings 11y ago

>I think this is a reason for people who really don't engage on IRC for anything other than "Hi, I have a problem, can anyone help me?". Nailed it, IRC isn't a significant barrier for a real contributor. If you don't have the time to figure out IRC, you don't have the time to significantly contribute to a project.

st3v3r 11y ago
That's an extremely elitist viewpoint, that will do nothing but tell people that they aren't welcome in open source. Which is a terrible thing.

st3v3r 11y ago

No. A bouncer is not a solution. Hence why you keep hearing that argument.

kuschku 11y ago
Ever tried IRCCloud, or Quassel with Quassel-Webserver and QuasselDroid (beta)? Especially in a corporate setting, the result is a simple username/password login to a webpage or the mobile client, it Just Works™, and has a user-friendly interface.