Re: [Caml-list] how to encourage adoption of OCaml?

[Yotam Barnoy <yotambarnoy@gmail.com>]

gitter.im is easy to mute for a particular room, if it gets too high
volume. There's a mobile app and an OSX app, so it's easy to monitor
discussions from anywhere. You can also download the entire history
via user-made open source tools, so being closed-source isn't much of
a problem.

It's also worth thinking about some of the use-cases for communication channels:

1. New users who want to just learn about the language's ideas
2. New users actively learning OCaml and needing assistance
3. Experienced users who want to discuss OCaml knowledge, techniques, theory etc
4. Users wanting to discuss improving the OCaml platform as a whole
(website, build tools, stdlib etc)
5. Questions about the OCaml compiler/language design
6. OCaml compiler devs discussing new language proposals and compiler features.

All of these use-cases (and especially 1 and 2) could benefit from a
high-frequency channel. This is what IRC is for, but it's simply
inadequate IMO compared to something like gitter: old tech, no easy
access, limited accessibility from workplaces.

Considering forums, I do think that mailing lists tend to have too
high a barrier of entry for use (sending questions into the void, fear
of harsh feedback etc), and they exclude visible, easily available
examples (unlike forums). At the same time, forums tend not to
advertise and forward every single thread that was created -- the user
must express interest in a specific thread before receiving
notifications about that thread, and even then, the notification
usually just reminds the user to check back on the thread itself at
the forum. This is both an advantage and a disadvantage, making forums
a good fit for anything but 6. A forum would contain deeper, more
long-lasting discussions than gitter/IRC about anything that shouldn't
be worth bothering every single member of the community about unless
they're specifically interested in it. This would have the added
advantage of reducing the volume of mailing list messages, allowing
more people to focus on what's truly important.

What would be really nice would be to have forums that automatically
collate the output of the mailing list under a specific section (the
mailing list being considered the essential topics of discussion). I
don't know if this is possible, but it would be the ideal forum IMO.
It would mean that to view any long-term discussion, one need only
check the forums, viewing both the less essential (general) topics and
the more essential (mailing-list) topics.

BTW reddit is a pretty vacuous place in my experience, brandishing the
blunt weapon of community upvotes or downvotes, and unable to focus on
anything other than the latest news item. Other than advertising and
presence, it presents almost no benefit whatsoever IMO.

-Yotam

On Sat, Jul 9, 2016 at 9:51 AM, Gabriel Scherer
<gabriel.scherer@gmail.com> wrote:
> Dean Thompson wrote:
>>
>> But there’s at least one con: Discourse is not nearly as well established
>> or widely known as some other alternatives, so might be less appealing to
>> casual participants.
>
>
> Yeah, mailing-lists and IRC channels are rather more established.
>
> I hear very bad things about Slack for large communities -- it seems to be
> intended for tight-knit teams inside a single organization:
>
> https://medium.freecodecamp.com/so-yeah-we-tried-slack-and-we-deeply-regretted-it-391bcc714c81#.2ow2y1lcb
>   https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9754626
>
>> It's pretty clear that Slack is not, and never will be, built for this
>> use-case. Slack is for teams: small groups where everyone knows one-another
>> by name, can be trusted with one-another's email-addresses and other contact
>> information, can be trusted to only use @everyone triggers for important
>> things, etc. A lot of Slack's features are built to assume this "small group
>> with a shared purpose where everyone can be trusted to fiddle with things"
>> paradigm.
>
> The only feedback I could get from gitter.im is "it spams my mailbox
> constantly", not exactly high praise. I'm sure it's a good tools for people,
> but the fact that it is a proprietary tool built by a for-profit company is
> giving me pause.
>
> In general I support the idea of "meeting the users where they are" even
> when that mean displeasing technological choices; this is why I have been
> active answering OCaml questions on StackOverflow in the past. I would be
> interested in making experiments with either:
>
> - Discourse: I also heard bad things about it, but it's shiny, reactive and
> open source
>
> - Mattermost, as an open-source alternative to Slack -- but we would need to
> find someone willing to host an instance.
>
>
> On Sat, Jul 9, 2016 at 9:46 AM, Ashish Agarwal <agarwal1975@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>>
>> On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 1:02 PM, Yotam Barnoy <yotambarnoy@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Also, could someone with ocaml github permissions start a gitter.im
>>> page for OCaml? It should be relatively painless.
>>
>>
>> Can you explain what needs to be done exactly. When I'm logged in, I see
>> nothing at gitter.im/ocaml and when I'm logged out I see links for
>> ocaml/oasis and ocaml/opam. So something already works.
>>
>>
>>
>>> On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 12:54 PM, Mohamed Iguernlala
>>> <iguer.auto@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> > Hi there,
>>> >
>>> > I guess you found inria.fr and not infria.fr :-). If it's the case, the
>>> > first thing you should notice when visiting it is the message:
>>> >
>>> > "This site is updated infrequently. For up-to-date information, please
>>> > visit
>>> > the new OCaml website at ocaml.org."
>>> >
>>> > and on ocaml.org, you'll find a "modern website" with a "more
>>> > conventional"
>>> > extension. One click later (on the Community
>>> > item of the upper menu), you'll get the information you need about
>>> > mailing
>>> > lists.
>>> >
>>> > Regards,
>>> >
>>> > - Mohamed.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > Le 08/07/2016 17:16, Duane Johnson a écrit :
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 8:40 AM, Gabriel Scherer
>>> > <gabriel.scherer@gmail.com>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >> Adoption is interesting but, as Tony Hoare put it, we are not fashion
>>> >> designers. The best thing I can think of is to communicate more and
>>> >> better,
>>> >> talk about the cool world that is being done in the OCaml communities,
>>> >> and
>>> >> importantly talking about it outside it. Supporting software projects
>>> >> that
>>> >> have a potential for impact outside the OCaml community is also key --
>>> >> Coq,
>>> >> MLdonkey, Coccinelle, Flow, the SLAM static verifier toolkit, just to
>>> >> name a
>>> >> few.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > As someone who just signed up to this mailing list, may I offer some
>>> > observations?
>>> >
>>> > - my first impression of OCaml community was through
>>> > reddit.com/r/ocaml. As
>>> > a reddit user, I would rank /r/ocaml as "barely alive but stable"--in
>>> > other
>>> > words, the upvotes-per-thread there are in the single digits and low
>>> > double-digits showing people exist there, but it is not a thriving
>>> > community.
>>> > - next, I tried to find a google group. It was hard to find any
>>> > substantial
>>> > and popular OCaml groups there. There was an OCaml aggregation list,
>>> > but it
>>> > wasn't clear that it was a discussion group. My first thought was, Is
>>> > there
>>> > no mailing list? I searched around and found the infria.fr domain. To
>>> > an
>>> > outsider, this lends no credibility or brand-name familiarity. Not only
>>> > is
>>> > the web domain unfamiliar, but the website does not look welcoming--it
>>> > appears to be out of the 90s.
>>> > - signing up for a mailing list is slow and unrewarding. I'd much
>>> > rather
>>> > sign up for a more modern community technology like reddit, facebook,
>>> > slack,
>>> > or google groups.
>>> > - I clicked "Info" to get more info about the mailing list on infria.fr
>>> > and
>>> > it says "Private information" inside a white bubble. Ok...
>>> > - I looked for a chat community, and IRC is the only option. This
>>> > signals
>>> > "old tech community" to me. Slack or gitter.im is a more inclusive,
>>> > modern
>>> > community. In order to participate in IRC, one must always be
>>> > connected.
>>> > This makes it more difficult for outsiders to come in and feel like
>>> > they can
>>> > 'catch up' on the conversation (Yes, I know there are chat logs, but
>>> > this
>>> > feature is not an integrated part of IRC).
>>> >
>>> > In summary, all of the signals that I usually depend on to evaluate the
>>> > community around a technology are either weak or give me the impression
>>> > of
>>> > "old and barely stable". New, exciting technologies that I've seen tend
>>> > to
>>> > embrace and tap in to existing community platforms (slack, reddit,
>>> > github,
>>> > gitbook, google groups) in order to leverage the platform and amplify
>>> > their
>>> > advertising signal.
>>> >
>>> > Duane Johnson
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 8:40 AM, Gabriel Scherer
>>> > <gabriel.scherer@gmail.com>
>>> > wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >> > Do others on this list feel the ramp to OCaml adoption is smoother
>>> >> > than
>>> >> > my impression suggests?
>>> >>
>>> >> I can't speak for "adoption", but I think that you have been very kind
>>> >> as
>>> >> far as user experience is concerned, that it is probably worse than
>>> >> you
>>> >> suggest.
>>> >>
>>> >> We discussed some of these issues a few month ago in a thread launched
>>> >> by
>>> >> Hendrik Bloom:
>>> >>
>>> >>   Is OCaml for experienced beginners?
>>> >>   Hendrik Bloom, December 2015
>>> >>   https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list/2015-12/msg00077.html
>>> >>
>>> >> I gave a few remarks on the evolution of the OCaml ecosystem on the
>>> >> period
>>> >> I know of that you may be interested in:
>>> >>   https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list/2015-12/msg00110.html
>>> >>
>>> >> I think "adoption" and "usability" are interlinked but separate
>>> >> issues.
>>> >>
>>> >> Getting adoption distributes the number of people interesting in
>>> >> helping
>>> >> on usability, so it tends to improve usability, but I tend to think
>>> >> that the
>>> >> second is actually the more interesting, important goal to aim at.
>>> >>
>>> >> Adoption is interesting but, as Tony Hoare put it, we are not fashion
>>> >> designers. The best thing I can think of is to communicate more and
>>> >> better,
>>> >> talk about the cool world that is being done in the OCaml communities,
>>> >> and
>>> >> importantly talking about it outside it. Supporting software projects
>>> >> that
>>> >> have a potential for impact outside the OCaml community is also key --
>>> >> Coq,
>>> >> MLdonkey, Coccinelle, Flow, the SLAM static verifier toolkit, just to
>>> >> name a
>>> >> few.
>>> >>
>>> >> Regarding usability, I think the tooling ecosystem is too complex
>>> >> today.
>>> >> If I wanted to bootstrap a beginner to do stuff I would have to tell
>>> >> them
>>> >> about the OCaml compiler tools (ocamlc, ocamlopt), ocamlfind, a build
>>> >> system
>>> >> (omake or ocamlbuild for example), oasis, Merlin, opam, and get them
>>> >> to
>>> >> learn either Vim or Emacs. That's a bit too much and even with the
>>> >> plethora
>>> >> of tools there are problems we haven't really solved yet -- for
>>> >> example, how
>>> >> to avoid module name conflicts.
>>> >> I think a lot more work is required, both incremental improvements and
>>> >> a
>>> >> few grand redesigns, before we reach a comfortable ecosystem where
>>> >> starting
>>> >> an OCaml project feels like a breeze. That's what I would aim at.
>>> >>
>>> >>> Who here is excited about making OCaml approachable to newcomers?
>>> >>> Where
>>> >>> is the main ongoing work on this? Who are the main leaders from this
>>> >>> perspective?
>>> >>
>>> >>
>>> >> This is an interesting question. To my knowledge, no one is
>>> >> specifically
>>> >> focused on this mightily important question. But it's fair to assume
>>> >> that we
>>> >> have no "usability team" today, it's more a distributed collection of
>>> >> efforts going in all directions from various people, for example:
>>> >>
>>> >> - Gerd Stolpmann did a lot of work on the early language tooling,
>>> >> notably
>>> >> GODI (an earlier ocaml-specific package manager) and ocamlfind, and
>>> >> also
>>> >> kept very high documentation standards that are an example to follow.
>>> >>
>>> >> - Sylvain le Gall's work on OASIS helps a lot of developers do their
>>> >> packaging by encapsulating, in particular, the knowledge of what to
>>> >> install
>>> >> where (not a simple question).
>>> >>
>>> >> - The OPAM team as a whole, as well as the maintainers of the public
>>> >> opam
>>> >> repository, have done tremendous work making OCaml software easy to
>>> >> install
>>> >> and deploy. (Windows is still of a sore point, but there is progress
>>> >> in that
>>> >> area. It's a distinct possibility that the OCaml ecosystem will become
>>> >> nice
>>> >> to use on Windows before Windows disappears or gets a real Unix
>>> >> userland.)
>>> >>
>>> >> I would personally be interested in helping someone with a holistic
>>> >> approach to usability devote as much of their time as they can. (I
>>> >> think
>>> >> there are some sources of funding that could be considered, but
>>> >> nothing very
>>> >> certain; from a crowd-funding perspective I would be glad to pay €30 a
>>> >> month
>>> >> to fund such a position.) I think this is a difficult position because
>>> >> there
>>> >> is a lot of thankless grunt work implied, and arguably it's not a very
>>> >> career-advancing move.
>>> >>
>>> >> On Fri, Jul 8, 2016 at 8:57 AM, Dean Thompson
>>> >> <deansherthompson@gmail.com>
>>> >> wrote:
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Thank you, everyone, for the responses and discussion. If there is
>>> >>> interest, I would still love to hear more thoughts about whether
>>> >>> there is a
>>> >>> roadmap (either de facto from the community, or explicit from leaders
>>> >>> of the
>>> >>> community) to foster broader adoption.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> I see that many organizations are making immense contributions to the
>>> >>> community: from language and ecosystem enhancements, to Real World
>>> >>> OCaml, to
>>> >>> the OCaml Users and Developers Workshop. Technical progress is rapid.
>>> >>> But so
>>> >>> far, to me, these wonderful contributions feel more like giving back
>>> >>> to the
>>> >>> community for us to make what we can of them, rather than anyone’s
>>> >>> systematic effort to streamline broader uptake of OCaml.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> These are the impressions of a newcomer. If there is interest, I
>>> >>> would
>>> >>> love to hear more seasoned viewpoints.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Dean
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>>
>>> >>> --
>>> >>> Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
>>> >>> https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
>>> >>> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
>>> >>> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs
>>> >>
>>> >>
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
>>> --
>>> Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
>>> https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
>>> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
>>> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs
>>
>>
>