[windows2000] Hypothetical questions for list re Web Availability of list messages
- From: "Jim Kenzig http://thethin.net" <jimkenz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <thin@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, <windows2000@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 9 Sep 2003 23:08:34 -0400
Hi All,
Okay so I am honing up my DB skills here. If I were to build a page on
thethin.net that displayed a listing of say the last 25 or so messages
posted to this list..which would get updated say at an interval of every 2
or so hours so people could read the messages online on thethin.net would
that be beneficial to anyone and worth my time pursuing.
I have a rudimentary page set up that lists the last 10 messages from the
list so you could get an idea of what I am talking about. I can set it to
do more messages but when you get over 50 or so it takes the page much
longer to load.
Have a look at the sample page.... http://thethin.net/search9002.cfm
They are currently ordered newest to oldest message. What I could do then is
set up the results page with a next and previous tag that would click you
onto the next message so that you could read them in succession.
I am not aiming to replace the messages archives at freelists I'm only
trying to make it easier for people to get the last several messages posted
to review quickly if they do not have access to email. The archives will
still also be searchable at thethin.net. I guess the aim is to maybe get
back some of the Yahoogroups functionality and not try and reinvent the
wheel.
Questions
What is a reasonable update frequency for the messages to display? I have
to schedule a script to pop3 download the messages and then a send script to
index them into the database so it can't be too frequently. My guess would
be no less than 30 minutes or it will detriment server use and no more than
3 hours or the information is unusable. I currently have it set to download
every 2 hours and reindex.
How many messages do you need to be able to view. For example the last 100,
50, 25?
Would people be interested if I attempted to syndicate the list messages
into an RSS feed? I am not quite sure how difficult this would be since it
is dynamic data. If anyone out there is syndicating outputted data from a
database let me know if you have any tips.
Issues:
-The archives has 3 mailing lists combined. The Thin List, the Windows 2000
List and the CitrixSE List.
People might not be interested in one list or another. I haven't come up
with a way yet to separate the messages out.
-Make thethin.net even slower? More database requests on the server.
Possible Future development:
-Set up the results page with a next and previous tag that would click you
onto the next message to read them in succession.
-Write code to display the previous or next 10 or 25 messages from the list.
-RSS Feed? Syndication?
-Set up a new database for each list and separate them out.
-Reply mail form at end of message to send a reply to a message. I have this
functionality done but I have to consider the security risk of people
sending spam with it and abusing it. Only members can send messages to the
list, I am more concerned with people using it to send random messages
elsewhere. I might be able to force the to line though.hmmm.so maybe I'll be
OK with this.
-Provide this functionality for other pertinent lists that do not have web
access. Let me know if interested.
-Get a whole lot faster server for thethin.net to do it. (cash or a super
fast server donations accepted) : )
Please let me know your thoughts and ideas on this. You can send comments
off list if you want to jkenzig@xxxxxxxxx
Regards,
Jim Kenzig
http://thethin.net
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