1mailing list/forum software 2--------------------------- 3Find a replacement for Google Groups. 4 5Goal is to support both a mailing list and a web forum interface, with both 6treated as first class citizens. 7 * The email interface needs to be good: readable subject lines, 8 readable message bodies, containing the subject and text of the message 9 with minimal boilerplate. Forum threads become email threads in your 10 mail reader. Replying to a post creates a thread on the forum. 11 * The forum UI needs to be good, at least as good as as a threaded mail 12 reader. Easy to browse, find and submit posts. Rich text, embedded images. 13 * Good admin interface, good spam filtering. First new post from a unique 14 email address is quarantined until that address is approved for posting. 15 16The data model for the forum is: 17 * One or more lists/channels/rooms, initially just the one, but with room 18 for expansion later. 19 * Within a channel, there are posts, with subject lines and bodies, with 20 discussions threaded by subject line. 21 Rich text, ideally Markdown, and embedded images are supported. 22 Replying to a post creates a thread. 23 * You can subscribe to a channel via email, it behaves exactly like 24 a mailing list. 25 26I currently use Google Groups. Problem: not open source, and it's google. 27The fact that it's google limits the set of people willing to sign up. 28Otherwise it is fine. 29 30Alternative software: 31Someone's list: https://producingoss.com/en/message-forums.html 32Not suitable: 33 * sympa.org: no web forum, just readonly web archive 34 * dadamailproject.com: no web forum 35People are confused about: 36 * Discourse. Forum UI is very complex, featureful, configurable, popular. 37 https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-vs-email-mailing-lists/54298 38 "With properly configured incoming mail, Discourse can be used just like 39 a mailing list. If you’ll be interacting with Discourse exclusively by 40 email, consider enabling Mailing list mode in your personal preferences, 41 provided it’s enabled on your forum." (Not actually true.) 42 And you can import from Google Groups. 43 And there is a mobile client. 44 And check out https://blenderartists.org/ 45 -- 46 But: Tried mailing list mode once, and found it unusable. 47 Even Jeff Atwood says: mailing list mode forces an email on every single 48 post, forever. It’s “nightmare difficulty”, or “the nuclear option”. 49 https://meta.discourse.org/t/apply-mailing-list-mode-per-category/47772/16 50 This thread explains why Discourse is not suitable for migrating from a 51 mailman instance. It's not designed to support mailing lists. 52Possibly suitable: 53 * Zulip 3. The Zulip data model matches the email data model: each message 54 has a subject line, contents, belongs to a thread. The Zulip project 55 lists "mirroring mailing list traffic" as a supported use case, and the 56 docs for configuring this look plausible. Still need: testimonials about 57 how well this works, what the problems are. 58 * Is zulip a good replacement for google groups? 59 Weirdly, "zulip-announce" is on google groups. 60 * Although Zulip has "email integration", it does not appear to have 61 high quality mailing list integration. There is an open issue 62 for Mailman integration: https://github.com/zulip/zulip/issues/959 63 * Mailman 3. 64 eg, https://lists.mailman3.org/archives/list/mailman-users@mailman3.org/ 65 Installing on Ubuntu 20.04 requires following a mailing list post, 66 manually fixing bugs in Python code. 67 * groupserver.org 68 Supposedly like google groups. Is there image support? 69 * groups.io is not open source, but is free for open source projects and 70 has github integration and markdown support. It is marketed as an upgrade 71 from mailman and google groups. 72 * dfeed : https://github.com/CyberShadow/DFeed 73 Forum UI initially looks pretty good, with full mailing list support. 74 Written in D, only used by D community. 75 One man project, no real documentation (read the source). 76 Markdown, but apparently no inline image support. 77 As of 2016, can't delete or edit a forum post, because you can't unsend 78 an email message. 79 * HyperKitty (https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/) is a "modern forum" 80 web user interface for mailman. It is GPL free software from the FSF and 81 Fedora uses it. But it is plain text only: no rich text, markdown, or 82 embedded images. https://gitlab.com/mailman/hyperkitty/-/issues/225 83 * Empathy is an archiver and forum UI for mailman, but as a forum it 84 is inadequate for OpenSCAD. Currently (Jul 2021) not open source and the 85 main dev has died, so no support or new features. 86 87Nothing exists that is free software, actively maintained, forum+mailing list, 88markdown + inline images. 89* google groups is proprietary 90* there are multiple good forums without mailing list support 91* dfeed has no inline images 92