Structuration of the EA forum

[Kamal Hammoutene]

I know it won't help you directly, but you might still be interested to know that there are several initiatives at the moment to start EA user groups.
Hopefully, once these user groups have some body they can start weighing in on Sparx strategy as a sort of lobby groups.

Improving the forum, and allowing some kind of public access to reported issues and roadmaps would be high on my wish list.

Geert

What are these initiatives?

If we really want, we can setup a new forum in almost one hour using free tools such as phpbb.

[Geert Bellekens]

One of them is the European Enterprise Architect User Group.
It's still in an early stage, but the one of the goals is to organize an EA conference in May 2013 in London.

Keep an eye on the usual channels (this forum, the Sparx Community Site, LinkedIn,...) for updates from the marketing division of the group.

And I heard that in Canada there's a comparable initiative.

I don't think it would be a good idea to start a new forum.

Geert

[Patrick Julian]

Hey Geert,

this is really nice to hear. That'll be interesting. Thanks for you motivation and commitment.

Concerning the forum I still don't see why it should not be possible to move on to something that is not so last-century.

I know that just referring all Q & A to the tag "enterprise-architect" at Stackoverflow or pointing at some other established and well-running platform for user support on peer level is not gonna solve the current problems as it would have drawbacks as well. But at least a solution like that would improve usability, searchability and so on by many dimensions.

Does it have to be a closed forum? Really?

(from skiwi) We seem to be stuck with the current forum.

Please do not take it personal but for me that just does not sound like a good attitude towards things: Especially software developers and business analysts should always be open to improvement and change for the better. Otherwise I guess something might be wrong with their choice of the job. To be clear, this shall be understood as referring to anyone specific here but everybody.

No, we're not in 1999. We always have the opportunity to switch to the better, and sooner or later users might start to vote with their feet and go elsewhere.

Just my thoughts when going through this topic.

[qwerty]

Well, young Jedi. The power be with you.

All my best wishes. To repeat myself: I abandoned all hope.

q.

[skiwi]

(from skiwi) We seem to be stuck with the current forum.

Please do not take it personal but for me that just does not sound like a good attitude towards things: Especially software developers and business analysts should always be open to improvement and change for the better. Otherwise I guess something might be wrong with their choice of the job. To be clear, this shall be understood as referring to anyone specific here but everybody.

Actually I don't want to have to browse the forums on Linked-in, Stack-Overflow, etc,  to elsewhere to collate all the information about EA.
Its bad enough the forum being separate from the community (not even a link to it from the forum as far as I can see).
So this is a reality check, the best place for the forum is sponsored by the vendor.

The attitude towards "things" - which I interpret as 'customer service' in is driven by Sparx, I'd address your comment to them, perhaps even the CEO, when it comes to advancing these bulletin boards.

[Ian Mitchell]

I'm with the 'we can do better' camp here: there are more and better ways to organise this forum, and we should all encourage Sparx to move forward. I also agree with the 'lets keep it in one place' idea: I also don't want to crawl through lots of forums (fora?) to find an answer: this one has the most important asset already in place; people who actually know the answers!
And following on from Geert's point about EA User groups, these are happening. European one on 15th May 2013 in London (see eausergroup.com) and Ottawa on 1st May 2013 (just Google it). Both have lots of great speakers, and should be a good place to move this, and other Sparx-related debates, forward. I'm going to both. See you there.

[Patrick Julian]

Actually I don't want to have to browse the forums on Linked-in, Stack-Overflow, etc,  to elsewhere to collate all the information about EA.

I see and understand your point. It was meant just as an example for a well-run site for discussion in contrast to the options here (see discussion especially about the shortcomings of the forum search here, etcetera).

Yet it is likely that many people might just go there if they find this forum here just too hard or uncomfortable to use.

Its bad enough the forum being separate from the community (not even a link to it from the forum as far as I can see).

Also true.

So this is a reality check, the best place for the forum is sponsored by the vendor.

Should be, but the prerequisites seem to be bad as you pointed out earlier.

The attitude towards "things" - which I interpret as 'customer service' in is driven by Sparx, I'd address your comment to them, perhaps even the CEO, when it comes to advancing these bulletin boards.

Certainly it applies to Sparx, but I definitely see a good share of responsibility with the users to convey the perceived problems.

Have a nice weekend everyone!

[skiwi]

It was meant just as an example for a well-run site for discussion in contrast to the options here (see discussion especially about the shortcomings of the forum search here, etcetera).

I do like the idea of using something like StackExchange.
The answers to questions would get rated and ranked, they would not get lost in the mists of time (ie time out when running a search, or max of 100 search results), there should be much less repetition, so we should all be more effective and efficient (a local catch cry)!

[g.makulik]

I do like the idea of using something like StackExchange

At least there's already a wiki tagged site on StackOverflow: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/enterprise-architect, but you'll probably know this.

[Patrick Julian]

Hi Günther,

that is true. skiwi is right that vendor support is really a key "feature".
Unfortunately, this kind of active vendor engagement seems to be found in neither solution. (Which of course is not very surprising from a business point of view.)

[GClaes]

Hi Geert, its Geert here

I reckon Sparx needs to go social and implement a crowdsourced support type solution, allowing everyone to not anly ask questions and answer to help fellow EA'ers but also double as an "ideation" solution where everyone can submit ideas and vote for other' ideas.  Another use would be of course a way to submit and follow up bugs.  I am thinking products like useresponse.com or if Sparx is willing to go full-scale social, platforms like Jive Software etc would be something to consider