From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Msuck: nntp://news.gmane.io/gmane.emacs.gnus.general/35501 Path: main.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Karl Kleinpaste Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.gnus.general Subject: Re: Oort Version Date: 27 Mar 2001 19:13:27 -0500 Message-ID: References: <763dc0s6d0.fsf@newjersey.ppllc.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: coloc-standby.netfonds.no Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Trace: main.gmane.org 1035171234 3410 80.91.224.250 (21 Oct 2002 03:33:54 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@main.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2002 03:33:54 +0000 (UTC) Keywords: gnus,mail,luser,groups,user,lots,help,emacs Return-Path: Original-Received: (qmail 6555 invoked by alias); 28 Mar 2001 00:13:32 -0000 Original-Received: (qmail 6550 invoked from network); 28 Mar 2001 00:13:29 -0000 Original-Received: from mesquite.slip.cs.cmu.edu (HELO cinnamon.vanillaknot.com) (128.2.207.11) by gnus.org with SMTP; 28 Mar 2001 00:13:29 -0000 Original-Received: (from karl@localhost) by cinnamon.vanillaknot.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) id TAA12563; Tue, 27 Mar 2001 19:13:27 -0500 Original-To: ding@gnus.org X-Face: "5(T0tZd{6}pd~YzBG8O/*EW,.]6]@`m^e;fv65W^Y&=d"M\1H}>T~4_.kcDD.O~y3k)a6 hR;Nmi>9|>Nm${2IpM0^RcUEa\jcq?KOP)C&~x51l~zCHTulL^_T|u0I^kB'z@]{`2YjQu In-Reply-To: ("Robin S. Socha"'s message of "28 Mar 2001 00:29:16 +0200") User-Agent: Gnus/5.090001 (Oort Gnus v0.01) XEmacs/21.2 (Urania) Original-Lines: 72 Xref: main.gmane.org gmane.emacs.gnus.general:35501 X-Report-Spam: http://spam.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.gnus.general:35501 "Robin S. Socha" writes: > I'd like to see some luser-proof clicky-clicky interface to fancy > split rules. Take off the qualifying end clause and I'd be really interested: Some very general, very wide-ranging luser-proofing. That is, it seems to me that there continues to be a huge gap between us, the Gnus cognoscenti, and people who've managed to install XEmacs but have just barely figured out that it's got a built-in tutorial. The latter folks, as exemplified in news.software.readers this week, have trouble even invoking Gnus for the first time. I had to write a brief walk-through for someone, just to help him set gnus-select- method and start it all up. Our "market penetration" will be forever miserable if we always represent such a steep wall to be scaled. Customize is good, but I would really like to see... - A set of functions named things like gnus-init-very-first-time, gnus-init-mail, gnus-init-topics. And then have Gnus use these functions based on obvious criteria. For example, the lack of any .gnus would be a firm indicator of a need for gnus-init-first-time, where the user would be queried for the name of his NNTP server, set up authinfo if needed, and perhaps be asked if there are any groups he'd like to see immediately subscribed. Maybe bring up an explanatory buffer to sit alongside *Group* to explain server mode, so as to find other groups to subscribe. Make some of these "init" functions into toolbar buttons, such as for setting up mail for the very first time. - Generally, lots of interactive help in setting up mail. We get lots and lots of questions in gnu.emacs.gnus about the umpteen thousand ways to suffer through mail configuration. It should never be this hard, and Outlook and Netscape Messenger users have it so easy. Conceptually, mail configuration _is_ easy: Pick sources, perhaps pick servers + names + passwords, set variables to indicate those things. Joe Luser shouldn't have to invoke setq himself. We should pick one backend as "the standard luser mail backend" and conform Joe Luser to that. - Prepackaged, selectable nnmail-split-rules entries to do "obvious" things, such as splitting yahoogroups.com mailing lists to their own groups, or selecting classes of users into usable groups (prototypes for things like "family", "coworkers", "kinky people I know from Usenet"), or punting mailer errors to their own group. Think of how Netscape Messenger walks the user through filtration rules. Also, we should pre-make (`G m') any mail groups requested, so that the user needn't (e.g.) go hunting for `F' in *Group*. - Help the user auto-graft BBDB onto his universe. "What address book does Gnus provide?" is another perennial gnu.emacs.gnus question. - Maybe some sort of WYSIWYG buffer configurator. There are lots of viewpoints on what buffers ought to be where in what context. The defaults aren't bad, but a lot of people want to do other things, and they tend to be rather confused by gnus-add-configuration. - ...other stuff of this sort... Finding a way to overcome the luser barrier interests me most. Unfortunately, it's precisely the sort of topic that might not garner the interest of the cognoscenti, generally, specifically because we're not the lusers that such effort would help. Related question: It should be possible to customize custom-file in a buffer-local way, yes? That is, assuming Joe Luser wants to use one Emacs for both ordinary editing work as well as Gnus, if he uses customize for normal stuff, he wants the customizations to end up in .emacs, but if he customizes Gnus stuff, it should land in .gnus. Regardless of any luser-proofing, we should ensure that customize does the Right Thing from within Gnus. --karl