pcplantdb

[Stephanie Gerson <sgerson@stanfordalumni.org>]

howdy folks,

So I hope yalls enjoyed a Lovely .e.q.u.i.n.o.x. (thanks for reminding us John
Howe), the full moon tomorrow…

Synthetically synthesized synthesis:

‡ PIW and PCPLANTDB Lists
About the PIW list, Lawrence asked, “Do you want the archives public or
private; subscriptions open without approval or anyone can subscribe (without
me being given notification and the opportunity to review their application
and give my approval for access to the list - I can remove spammers and
malicious users this way -  rather than after the fact)?”
Let’s make the PIW pretty much open to anyone without spammic (my new word)
nor malicious intentions.  That would be wonderful if you helped weed them out
by reviewing their applications.

About the pcplantdb list (or the piw list?), Lawrence wrote, “I thought it
was already decided not to limit subscriptions.  I have it set up for anyone
interested to apply and send me email which I will post here for group
approval of their access to the forum. Otherwise anyone can send me
email with email ID's anyone they want in this list and I will subscribe them.
Much better to know before subscribing them - letting them on for a
"probationary" period then possibly unsubbing them is not good for PR.”
This is absolutely fine with me.


‡ SHARED WEB WORKSPACE 
Lawrence wrote, “It looks like pcplantdb and piw lists, permaculture.info's
Plone CMS and the pcplantdb wiki in the pcwiki. Group access to a (public)
website where we all edit the html and upload documents could be had also (on
ibiblio, where everyone has ibiblio accounts and write access to the
filespace) - this might be even easier for Stephanie than using wiki or a
cms.”
The easier the better.  What do others say?


‡ PIW site
-When I asked about how many hits the piw website got, Chad responded that a
“web log analyzer could give a lot more meaningful info here.”  Do we know
any web log analyzers?  I’m thinking that we should spiff up the site with
whatever we can and then announce hg to the pc lists.  Then, we can write
about the traffic we get in grant proposals (if October 15th is too soon for
this, that’s fine – I’m just thinking site traffic will add validity to
our project).

-Chad wrote that everyone can edit their bios on the PIW site themselves.  If
you do make edits, though, let me know so that I can incorporate them in the
grant proposals!  (Thanks for your edits, Scott).


‡ INFORMATIONAL ARCHITECTURE
Although Chad assured us that code will be pretty modular, I’d still like to
initiate this discussion (don’t worry Scott, this isn’t about overloading
Chad – more about fleshing out the delicious ingredients of hg).  I’ll
write up something preliminary, including ideas and questions, and send it out
at some point soon (like Chad, I’d rather be ambiguous than set rigorous
deadlines).  

Somewhat related to the informational architecture, Lawrence wrote, “I
thought input from anonymous users would not be allowed or were they to be
allowed within a peer-review system wherein spam would be rejected?”
This is something we’ve briefly alluded to, but haven’t thoroughly
discussed.  People have suggested peer-review systems similar to e-Bay
(someone recently told me that at this point, your e-Bay rating is more
important than your credit rating) and Amazon – how exactly do they work and
would we want to mimic them?  What do people think?  


‡ MISCELLANEOUS
-Ecological Engineering – Apologies that I still haven’t initiated this
thread…but I will!  I know Lawrence was excited about it, and thanks for the
extra poking around you did.  I actually subscribe to JIE (Journal of
Industrial Ecology), so shhhhh - if you’re quiet, I can send you the article
I was referring to (“Industrial Ecology and Ecological Engineering,” by
David Tilley) along with any other relevant ones.

-Chad wrote, “There is 'having something to show' and there is 'having
something kick-butt to show'.”  Completely understand the difference.  Todo
bien.  Just want a proof-of-concept (a.k.a. something to show that doesn’t
necessarily kick butt) to show by October 15th – will this be possible.  If
not, no need to stress about it.

-Latest tasks updated below.  Check 'em if you please.

Alrighty, that’s all for now.

hg LOve
*Stephanie

p.s. holy guacamole Scott, you don’t know what an hg is?
p.p.s.  $B"x (B
p.p.p.s.  just kidding…ok ok I will make the transition from MS Word soon
(will someone hold my hand)

=====

LATEST TASKS
∑ Everyone – now
1. Make an account on bugzilla, create bugs, check Johns’s docs (has 
anyone done this, Johns?)
2. Add/change stuff to/on permaculture.info website – check your bio 
(attached), make UI design suggestions, etc. 
3. Check Phase 1 goals below, respond with feedback and timeline ideas 
(no one responded last week, so I’m trying again)
4. Check project budget, make recommendations
5. Respond to the questions below 

∑ John S.
1. look into customization options with John H.
2. once we are ready, set up more permanent issue tracking system and 
whatever data/parameters/customizations are necessary to start using it 
on our project
3. post this info on the shared web workspace (whether wiki or otherwise) 
for feedback (is this what Chad just did?)
4. organize for user test of first “build” (to start happening weekly in 
1-3 weeks?)

∑ Chad and Rich 
1. create a working database (with no real data) with php connection and 
simple front end (basically just checking that the different bits can 
work together)  - no worries, Chad!
2. Rich – start doing whatever needs to be done in order to get the 
latest version of PFAF that is under the CC-BY-NC-SA (2 weeks to 
complete)

∑ John Howe

∑ Scott 
1. Let us know about PCU loan for server.

∑ Lawrence
1. Create new and improved wiki, or other form of shared work webspace

∑ Stephanie 
1. write up description user interface/experience, send to list
2. re-connect with Paula
3. grant-seeking…
4. send group Industrial Ecology references
5. write mission and vision statements for website



+++++++++++++++
Stephanie Gerson
sgerson@stanfordalumni.org
(c) 415.871.5683


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