Changes to the Forums

Like Critterologist, I too think consolidating and streamlining is an improvement. Many fora have been undergoing a near death experience for years. Admin. had been conscientious about being all things to all people for all the years I've been a member while adding fora that sooner or later struggled to maintain a steady stream of participants. When a forum has played itself out the forum should either be reevaluated and removed or blended. Active threads to an otherwise dead fora will have to go with the flow.

I will add my two cents regarding current improvements. I think all beginner fora should have been melded into their main genre. Beginner threads should be under the purview and in the mix with more experienced gardeners, be more easily noticed and benefit from their expertise. There should not be an entry level forum with every kind of plant cultivation. But that's me. Granted when a site requires both topic and technology editing there will be problems.

While addressing technology issues, I am a case study. SO is tech savvy but I am not. When the occasion arise that I need help, it amazes me how often he can't because his instruction is a longer, more convoluted way, than what I've discovered on my own. What I'm saying here is that we tend to navigate DG in ways learned early on, based on our individual expertise at the time and become accustomed to what works for us. Apparently the way I navigate, though not at all with any expertise, is not causing the same problems others are having. I see one change to my watched threads and it was easy to locate the lost topic. There must be a reason they offer the option of watching selected threads. Perhaps it's for people like me who could not remember twenty or more in my head. I don't post to most of the threads I watch.

In all fairness to Terry and Melody, they are part of a team where decisions for change must certainly be based on an economy and efficiency that benefits a business model. They are liaisons between those who own the business and the customers who use the product. They want to help with customer satisfaction and are concerned about your thoughts and feelings. With that in mind, they certainly don't deserve the drubbing posted by some any more than they deserve the credit for the changes. Posters here might be a statistically negative majority but to state percentages that attempt to describe what the majority of members or subscribers at large feel doesn't describe an empirical sample. In short, it doesn't represent the thinking of the majority who are not posting. So, though there are problems with changes that I hope will be worked out (though maybe not as speedily as some would prefer) I still think an online community is about the positive input of the many people who participate and not about the negative input of a select few.

I just love how things are changed without giving consideration to anyone except the "they" who does all the changing. Why not give consideration to the people who might be affected by posting in the appropriate forums about upcoming changes and stuff and *GASP* even ask for their input? Don't just trample on your subscribers.

I don't believe pointing out the issues is being negative. I think the consolidation might be good but I'm not going to say I like something when I don't, and I'm not the only one. If I'd known I would have marked stuff so I could find it later. That way Gymgirl and others wouldn't have to go around and bump threads that have been put in other forums so the individuals (who pay their subscription) could find them. I also think the "files" issues should have been straighten out before this was done.

Still trying to figure out why annual poppies are put in perennials?

For what it's worth, I was a newbie in a lot of areas when I signed up (DG is where I learned 90% of what I know about gardening). And I learned much more before the forums started proliferating so widely. Lately, I've just been frequenting a few forums and exploring the rest of DG far less.

I checked out the new list of forums, and I like it... actually, I think there's room for more consolidation, but one step at a time is probably a good thing. It pretty much looks to me like the forums that got pulled back into other forums were ones with very little traffic, or only a couple of active threads.

If I'd come to DG as a newbie after such an extreme number of forums had emerged, I'd have been entirely overwhelmed.

Maybe the transition is bumpier than it might have been, but I'm not sure posting "this forum will soon close and contents will migrate to X Forum" would have done much other than cause big headaches for admin at a time when their energy was needed to make this happen and not to placate folks.

Some of the concerns raised on this thread are quite valid, as people try to find their way around after the changes. But posting "it's awful, I hate it, I'm leaving" doesn't give admin any handle on how to help.

Sorry - I was away late this afternoon and until just a few minutes ago.

If you can point me to annual poppy threads in the perennials forum, I will be happy to move them to annuals. Poppies are both annual and perennial; we couldn't split the forum so we looked through the most recent threads, and made our best guess as to where it should go.

I apologize for the lack of notification and hopefully we can make amends by answering questions here and helping you in any way we can to use the tools (like watched threads and favorite forums) that will make it easier to find your way during this transition.

I found some threads but that was my point. Many of the Threads have annual and perennial poppies in them. I think all the poppies should be kept together and if there is no place that they fit they should have been kept in their own forum. Deadheading annual poppies doesnt belong in the perineal forum IMHO. Also, it's not accurate.

Even reading through all the criticisms is mindboggling- I think I will just give up like so many others and just start Googling what I want to know. This stuff just doesn't make any sense at all.

Please know I'm not trying to be argumentative, and just hear me out:

When I searched for "poppy" in the annuals forum, I found about 20 threads.

When I searched that forum for "poppies", 36 threads showed up (some were the same, because both words were used in the same threads.)

Several of them are from 2015 - a couple were started this month. I haven't moved any threads from the perennials - these were already here, probably because the OP or someone replying to them were referring to annual poppies.

Likewise, in the Beginner Gardening threads, there are 30+ threads on poppy/poppies.

In the California Regional Gardening forum (not surprisingly because it's the poppy state) there are another 30-ish threads discussing poppies.

My only point in this exercise is to underscore that we've never (and will never) have all threads pertaining to one subject in one forum, no matter how specialized we get with them. We gave up that hope when we began sub-dividing forums almost 15 years ago. And the consolidation of some of the lesser-used forums will (hopefully) reduce the hunt-and-peck through quite so many forums to find what we're looking for.

As has always been the case, if you come across a thread that absolutely does not belong in the forum where you find it, please let us know and we will move it so it can be more easily browsed in its appropriate forum.

The comments aren't restricted to this thread either I have found some on varies forums. I have yet to find any that are "positive".

Edited to add Thanks Terry....I understand what you're saying but I still wish poppies had been left alone. It has been separate since I joined so its not a recent forum.

This message was edited Sep 3, 2015 6:56 AM

hey, my comments are positive! please note, I'm a subscriber, not one of the admins... I'm not supporting the recent consolidation in order to curry their favor so they'll like my articles better or something.... I'm supporting it because I LIKE IT.

I actually returned to this thread just now to post a suggestion. If you're having trouble searching for threads from a previous forum, "Winter Sowing" for example, try using the advanced search. It lets you search threads within a particular forum, not from all of DG.

Click on the search button at the top left of the page, without typing anything in the "search forums" field. The page that pops up will have a green link to "advanced search." Clicking that link will take you to the advanced search, which also lets you search for posts by a particular user, filter results by date, etc. For my "winter sowing" example, you just need to do 2 things. Type "winter sowing" into the search box AND go to the scroll-down menu of forums on the right and choose "Propagation" from the list. Then click the search button.

Note that you don't actually have to scroll down to "Propagation," you can click your cursor to the top of that box and start typing... typing "pro.." gets me down "propagation." I like that feature!

It would sure be easier to have a "search in this forum" feature on the page for the forum rather than having to click around for the advanced search each time... I'm pretty sure we've had that before, and I hope we can rebuild it -- better, faster, stronger than it was before! Terry?

This message was edited Sep 3, 2015 8:07 AM

Lol I meant that there are comments in other forums regarding this consolidation and THEY aren't positive.

Thank you for the information on searching.

If you can point me to the threads, I will try to get those questions and comments steered to this forum. We don't try to chase people around the forums to read what they're saying :-). This is - and always has been - the place to come for questions, suggestions, kudos and complaints about the site, and we do try to pay fairly close attention to the threads we start here, and respond as promptly as possible.

Thank God I used the bookmarks prolifically...anything I want to backtrack on is in there...cross-referenced, even. (recipes:snack mustard, snack mustard, mustard)

Please, don't do anything to the bookmarks without a warning.

No changes are planned for the bookmarks :-).

But this does raise an interesting question: how do most of our most active members navigate the site:

1. Do you use your "home" page to find posts to your watched threads?

2. Do you go to the Communities tab and click on a favorite forum from there?

3. Or do you use the bookmarks or some other route to get to the forums and threads you frequent?

Lol Terry, that post wasn't directed at you. It was in response to earlier posts. I did steer them to this forum and thread. I really think they were just surprised.

Rather then make things MORE confusing I'll stop posting here, unless I have a question, I've had my say. : )

My "home" page.

The page I "watch" my forums on has "Welcome Home, Gymgirl" at the top.

I don't have a clue what page that is. Although, since it doesn't have all the "Welcome to Dave's Garden" stuff on it, I guess it's my personal home page?

yep, that's your logged-in "home" page.

I use the home page with the forum watcher and mark "watch thread" if there is a thread that interests me. This way I can opt to post or not while seeing activity. There are a few ongoing threads, especially on Sewing and Quilting, that are so active they are difficult to keep up with. A very lively group there! I post there now and again and skim posts when time allows.

There seems to be several problems that are being worked out as fast as Terry and Melody can peddle. As for the overall subject of change, I see it as a huge improvement. I'm still in agreement with Jill and I don't write articles. That said, I'm hoping she'll post her recipe for curried favor.

Terry, sorry to say, but the example for bundling 5 Beginners forums together is so silly it is beyond belief, beginners, Flowers, Veg, Fruit, Landscape, House plant's and Gardening Questions have you said all been blocked together because "Some new members didn't ALWAYS choose the right place to post their questions" I think you have missed, the main clue here Terry, the clue is BEGINNERS, like not knowing there is different forums, OR even don't at the time know VEG, FLOWERS, FRUIT etc are really all different classes of plant. However when they arrived on the wrong forum, others including myself gave the info they required and most directed them to the VEG forum, Landscape or whatever other forum would help more.
After being a member since 2007, I have only JUST this year came across another member who Phew'ed, tutted, moaned, and almost called the for the police who deal with ruled and regulations being broken, all because someone who had never been on the sites, asked for a plant ID in the beginners flower forum, I thought her reply to the new-bi was rude, she thought the others on the forum why replied to the new NON member were terrible people and a long discussion took place mainly telling the person doing the complaining with continual writing of the rule re PLANT FIDERS , Beginners forum kept telling this rule freak they enjoyed the challenge of trying to help ID a plant, it was not a problem, it was a friendly site etc where new folks should be encouraged to get the proper help even IF it means pointing to the correct place for the particular question,
All that is what makes DG a great, friendly, informative site to be on.


PALEEEEES Terry, don't bore me with any more silly reasons for HAVING to make the changes without ever thinking you would have people exasperated due to NON information / warning to these changes. You have totally ignored answering WHY you felt NO warnings were necessary.
You are supposed to be running a gardening community, well sorry but, another clue you have missed is the very word "COMMUNITY" as in people, ALL together giving views, being kept informed and LISTENING before such large changes are made, not just altering things and taking the attitude of " suck it and see"

I called a few friends up and asked them what Flora and Fauna means, they had no clue BUT, I can tell you they have wonderful gardens, they also did know the term Flowers / plants and Fauna being small living creatures, I then asked NON gardener Friends the difference between perennial plants, Annual plants and Bi Annuals, NOT a clue, one thought Perennials was those dried everlasting flowers, you buy for indoor decorations.
I'm trying to give examples to show that the old layout you have decided needed to be more difficult and way too technical for beginner gardeners, is NOT what was needed, and you dont change things for the sake of it, rather than checking IF change was wanted,

To say you could NOT ask everyone for their opinion on a new system to replace the old one is,
IF I may suggest not true, you have already tried to inform us how to find stuff, how to go to whatever they cant find so with your computer brain, the first thing you should have done was send out a MEMO like you do when membership is to be renewed asked,
Do you agree to change the system
OR
Leave everything alone. or Don't want change.
Just a Yes or No answer would have been a starting point for you to gauge the members views, no big initial discussions required.
Like I said, I've been a member since 2007, made many friends and tried to encourage newbie's to join the DG and get all the help required whenever they feel they needed to,

In 2010 there was a huge uprising from the members, not like here, so far we are few,
Last lot of changes that were taking place caused thousands of members who said they would leave, and the reasons were, change, they didn't agree with lots of stuff going on and they voted with their feet, Now I know a whole lot of the dedicated old members have never returned to the site, so the site lost a multitude of knowledgeable gardening friends who to this day are missed by many.
My fear on this massive unhelpful and totally unnecessary change to suit who ?????, to impress how cleaver you guys are at computing, for some un-recorded reasons being people were NOT going to the correct forum. JEEEEEES Terry, there are people who don't go through the correct door to visit their doctor, but the doctor don't go change they layout of the whole practice, they just make a bigger sign or someone, like another patient shows the right door. That's what we member do on a forum where someone has got the wrong place for the subject matter.

I know I am beginning to sound like an old gramophone record that has got stuck with the needle. BUT as my brain obviously doesn't connect like yours re the explanations you offer as reasons for making such difficult to follow changes, OR the reasoning behind them, I'm obviously Never going to turn into a computer expert as is now required to navigate the new site.

OH and PLEASE don't try to give me tuition as to how to get around it, I'm 73 next birthday, been gardening from childhood with my late father who grew all our food due to WW 11 rationing, so gardening I know and still enjoy the older methods combined with some new ones, Unfortunately I don't see myself having enough years left in me to get to grips with this shambolic and chaotic needless layout, and wont renew my membership when it comes for renewal, probably wont be able to find that page anyway.

Just a thought, as your into change, why not put the thread for Changes to the site in RED BOLD CAPITAL'S more folks would perhaps see it and give you more favourable replies as there appears to be an un-balanced reaction to the changes made, I'm all in favour of fairness and as a community, more people should be giving their views.
Please don't think I cant understand the amount of work, time, energy put into what has been done, I just cant agree with it being necessary, cant see the thoughts behind the new program and certainly cant agree with the reasons for the changes given to date.
Still await the answer as to why there was NO forewarning this was happening.

Kindest Regards.
WeeNel.

Terry, I use all three.

I always start with my Home Page and check it frequently so I use it the most. If I don't want to lose a thread that may not be real active or older, I keep it as "unread". It may move down my list, but I can easily locate it.

I use the Forum Page to explore or to check forums for new threads that may interest me. I also use it to find threads that I've read, but may not have on watch.

My Bookmarks are invaluable to me. So many of the items I've saved I wouldn't have a clue how to find again. I use my tags as well since sometimes it's easier to search in cloud form under "Butterfly" to see a list of items that pertain to butterflies.

Jill ~ Great suggestion about the advanced search. Now, if the search function would consistently recognize multiple words it could be priceless. :>)

It is so interesting, how we all use our resources in different ways. I always start on the communities page. Always. Before things were consolidated, my eyes would wander down that detailed list of forums and I would often end up reading something that I probably would not have normally. That is how I found the winter sow forum. I had seen the propagation forum time and again, and it was not of interest. At this early stage of my gardening education, in-depth discussions of something like how to determine the sex of a plant wasn't on my radar. Being brand-new to gardening, I did not realize all that propagation could entail . Being a newbie, I wanted something that – to me – sounded more interesting. To the best of my recollection, I never deliberately went on that forum. Since the consolidation, naturally I have gone into the propagation forum. Sorry, but I'm still at the winter sowing stage. It's nice to know all is other information is there, but I'm not using it and really don't want to have to dig through it.

I do use my homepage, primarily to see if there are any new posts in the forumI just came out of. I also check for birthdays and surveys. Surveys… Hmmmm.

A sweetheart on one of the forums I do visit regularly explained to me the difference between bookmarks and tags. I thought they were the same thing. I'm still not completely clear as to the difference. However, I have used the area where it's all alphabetical ( I believe that would be tags), in an effort to find specific things, i.e., how to a make text bold or create a quote box.

LOL, if I had a consistently successful recipe for curried favor, I'd share it!

Terry, I use all 3 methods also, but mostly I click on watched threads from my home page. I go through the communities tab for forums I don't usually frequent. If I'm looking for specific information, I do find I have more success with google than the search function here... and if I include Davesgarden with the google search, it will usually pull up the page I want. Threads that I want to refer back to quickly or make sure I don't lose track of get bookmarks.

Maybe the "propagation" forum needs a longer name? "Propagation from Seeds or Cuttings" or "Propagation: Sowing, Rooting, Grafting" I know it would be hard to include all possible propagation methods within an expanded name, but maybe we could include a couple of the most-used and then add others (like cloning, root cuttings, and an "etc") to the forum description. I agree that the term "Propagation" sounds a bit scientific and intimidating, like it's a forum for experts.

The book that really expanded my gardening horizons was Tom DeBaggio's "little book," Growing Herbs from Seed, Cutting, and Root. The word "propagation" is nowhere to be seen, and the whole book has a very friendly, welcoming, can-do feel.

Exactly; a forum for experts. Believe me, I am not that! But it was the assumed technical aspect that turned me away from that forum.

I think I'll see if I can't find the "little book" that you referenced critterologist. ( autoCorrect kept making this read greater allergist. LOL ). Using that set of criteria, it sounds like it could be interesting.
Patti

WeeNel, here's my answer:

We could have put up notifications that the changes were coming, but I suspect that you and I would still be having this conversation, because I think your real question isn't why you weren't informed, but why you weren't involved in the decision.

Question: Why did we make this change?

Answer: We had too many forums and it is difficult for users on mobile devices to scroll through them all. By combining forums we reduced the number of forums and simplified things for them, and ultimately for everyone.

Question: Why didn't we involve the membership in this decision?

Answer: Not every decision about this website can be done with a majority vote. I think I can speak for Melody as well as myself when I say that we have been part of this community since almost the very beginning, we love DG and have devoted a significant portion of our lives to administering it. And we deeply respect and value what each member brings to this online community. But not every member gets to decide how, when or if changes to the site get made.

Please allow me to try put this particular decision in a historical context. When the site began, we had one forum. Just one. That grew to two: one for site updates and one for gardening. The gardening split into flowers and vegetables. The vegetables split into heirlooms, then tomatoes, then legumes, and peppers. The flowers split into annuals and perennials. Each of those split off into a myriad of forums. We added a mail call and a welcome forum. And an ID forum. And a farm forum. Then we introduced bugs, then birds, then pets, and regional forums. Then we added dozens of home-related forums. Finally, we added beginner forums to try to make it easier for beginners to navigate the site. Over the past 15 years, we've continued to keep adding on because we wanted to give members' suggested forums a fair chance.

The end result was simply too many forums; many of them had never become very active. We could have chosen to simply "shutter" those less-active forums, but we didn't, because - again - we respect and value our members and their contributions, and we wanted to make sure those discussions didn't get shoved into the trash.

You can continue to disagree with the decision, but I have now given you what you requested: a direct answer to your question, and the rationale for it. If you have any other personal comments about me or Melody, I would prefer that you bring those to us via the Contact Us link here: http://davesgarden.com/helpdesk/forums/

Bravo!!

Terry, I've complained as much as anyone about the change, but I've actually been hoping you would finally "put your foot down".

Some of the comments/complaints have bordered on abusive and you've been almost too patient at times. If I were in your shoes, I probably would have exploded about two days ago.

Little-by-little some of us have been finding ways...watching, bookmarking and bumping...to deal with the changes. Many of us have had to deal with Windows 8 when we didn't want it, then 8.1 and now Windows 10. Change is everywhere. We don't have to like all of it, but unless we want to go back to the stone age, we have to live with it, not only on DG, but pretty much everywhere.

Good Job!

Phew!

Please tell me where you moved brugsmansia to . I posted on site help and after 3 hours found this post . I prefer Dmail - to hard to find this post

And to put things in an even more mind-boggling context, consider that this thread has 1404587 in its URL. That means we have more than 1.4 million threads to manage and maintain.

Before the forum consolidation, we had over 200 forums. We now have right around 125-130. It's still a LOT of forums to choose from, but it should make it a little easier for the uninitiated (and even the seasoned veterans) to find a forum that fits your discussion/question.

As always, our commitment to the community to listen and help you. If you find a thread that should have gone elsewhere, let us know and we'll move it. If you have questions about how the site works, let us know and we'll do our best to answer it. If you have a suggestion for how the site *should* work, tell us and we'll take it under advisement.

The Brugs posts are included in Tropicals and Tender Perennials here: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/f/tropicals/all/

One thing I've found that is helping me is to look at the forum that's listed next to any threads I'm watching (on my home page). Before I never used to looked at that, but it tells me the new location of my favorite threads.

Thank you Terry for your reply, it was full and explanatory, not understood however.

As regard your feelings I intended to cause you upset by using any personal remarks, I can assure you that was never my intention, ( I on many occasions stepped into a thread where others have been hurtful, bullying or downright rude for no good reason) however, IF I have caused you any personal upset I am truly sorry and hope you can accept my full apology.

The reason that all the complaints AND agreements re the changes are being directed to yourself and Melody are because you have made it known that you are both the people who were instrumental in bringing the changes about, OR fronting the barrage of complaints, therefore, naturally you are in the firing line for grievances rightly or wrongly.

I have at several time said that I appreciate ALL the work you do for DG and stated so on several other occasions too, in private.
I also said I agree there has been huge amount of time, mental and probably physical, energy put into such a huge task, to bring about such a large amount of change.

My gripe is NOT given as a personality attack, it is about the actual style of the change, way too complicated, unhelpful in as much as there was no previous warning we should look out for these changes and YES it's OK to offer terminology as to how to move around the site to find the threads we use most often, BUT your forgetting a lot of us who managed the site before are NOT computer Savvy, unable to think as you do / did, when moving some subjects together with others.
and I still cant find the threads I always used.

How I found my forums before was from the home page where it said FORUM on right hand side, this took me onto a list of forums, selected the ones I most often used as these came up constantly with green writing to point them out. Easy- Peasy, no brain storm required.
Now when I go to Forum page I just do't understand it, up comes a huge trail of discussions dating back several years, BUT nothing from most recent discussions, cant follow the thinking about clumping Propagation, etc. and many others.

However I think I have exhausted how I feel about the changes and fully understand how upset or hurt you and others are, who were involve with the task you took on.
It's not unheard of that you will be upsetting some, hurt by others intentionally or NOT, and at the end of the day Terry, you had a choice to make changes or not, Members did not have the luxury, NOR did you issue any warnings that changes would be taking place, thus allowing time for some to try get there heads around how to work out where there years of contacts have ended up.

Were going over old ground here Terry suffice to say I'm still non the wiser, still cant get my head around your train of thought when lumping different forums into others BUT after this time and believe me I've spent much time that I don't really have, trying to get the hang of all the mix up where thread are.

I will bow out from the discussion here as I said, I've exhausted all avenues I know as to how, why or where stuff has been place and hope it wont be long before the furore settles down.

I once again apologise that you feel my comments were directed PERSONALLY at yourself or Melony, that is NOT my style and abhor any form of bullying, so that was never my intention,
I doubt my views will change re the style/ mode of change rather than change it'self, and wish you well for any future
With Kindest Regards.
WeeNel.

Is there a place where it says what forums contain what old forums ?
Is there a way to stream line my search ? Why at home , my internet is fast , but away [ right now in Mexico ] and it is slow . Going thru 4 or 5 pages to find something that is no longer there , I ended up using google .

here are two ways to find what you're looking for:

1. In the intro of each forum, we've referred to the topics that are now in there. That doesn't necessarily help longterm members find the threads they are looking for.

2. If you started a thread, posted to a thread, or clicked on "watch this thread", your home page should be your main starting point. Anytime one of those threads has new activity, they will appear there. It doesn't matter which forum they were in previously, or where they move to - they are still on your watched list.

The spreadsheet we used to map out the changes is pretty complicated, so I haven't tried to replicate it in a thread. But if there's anything specific you can't find, Google will have a cached version for a while so you can trace it through there, or ask us and we'll gladly help you locate it.

Does not really help .
I posted and gave away seeds to 7 crowns - castillo - years ago - the seeds went fast .
Anyway , I have a few more now , but can not find the post where people asked for them after I ran out .
The plant has a square shaft , from 5 to 7 whorls of orange flowers , 6 feet tall , grows along side of road and belongs to thistle family .
I can not find my old posts - will keep looking . Not much to do right now - raining hard -

Okay, I'm drawing a blank - is castillo or 7 crowns the common name of a plant? Or a cultivar/varietal name of a Brugmansia?

I'd try to help you locate the thread, but I can't find a plant with that name. At any rate, your member "my info" page has two links: one that only you can see and one that you and others can see.

The first one lets you see all the threads you're watching (some of which may be threads that others started.) The other link is to just the threads you've started - which may help you home in on what you're looking for if you were the thread-starter: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/threads.php?user=tonyjr

Tonyjr,

I Googled and found these references to "square shaft" 5 to 7 Whorls, orange...

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/528718/#b

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/876788/#b

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/907/#b

Great minds, thinking alike, again...

I was ready to be quite upset... sustainable living and home decorating lumped together?!?! Though they can blend to a degree, I also see how near polar opposite those ideals are.

But I did see one thing I view as a big improvement... the forums for Identifications are groups together. I remember being new here and looking through all those forums trying to find the best place to ask what something is.