Too many subforums?

[JohnKSa]

WARNING! BEFORE reading farther, please read the disclaimer at the end of the post.

Just a suggestion, but until the member numbers grow, it might not hurt to have fewer subforums.

A lot of the less active subforums could easily be combined without affecting the logical layout of the board in a significant manner.

I know, meddlesome, aren't I--but you DID ask for suggestions. ;)

[HighVelocity]

I was thinking we needed to ADD one more. A forum to talk about competition shooting. IDPA, IDPSA, IPSC, etc.

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

[gigag04]

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

I just link directly to that filter so that IS the forum for me :)

[KBCraig]

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

I just link directly to that filter so that IS the forum for me :)

Me too. That's the only way to read any forum on a regular basis.

The forum titles are a good way for a first-time or infrequent visitor to know where to look, or to see what kind of activity the forum has. But once you join up, "unread since last visit" is the way to go.

Kevin

[jimlongley]

I was thinking we needed to ADD one more. A forum to talk about competition shooting. IDPA, IDPSA, IPSC, etc.

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

I was thinking of a couple more we could add, and I do the same.

Life Member TSRA

[JohnKSa]

WARNING! BEFORE reading farther, please read the disclaimer at the end of the post.

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

In all fairness, that means you would be served just as well if there were only a single subforum since you don't browse by selecting the particular subforum you are interested in, you just look at all new posts regardless of the subforum they are posted in.

By viewing ALL the new posts since the last visit, you are skirting one of the main purposes of having subforums--that is, providing the user with the ability to look ONLY at the topics he finds of interest.

My rationale is that if you have a forum with a total of 15,000 topics posted and a total of 34 subforums and say a third of them have about 100 posts COMBINED, then it would seem that approximately a third of the subforums combined are getting less than 1% of the traffic of the site while the other 2/3 of the subforums are getting over 99% of the traffic.

Also, I guess that in my mind topics like "reciprocity" and "other state's laws" or "holsters & accessories" and "What works and what doesn't" are basically the same thing from a practical standpoint, and creating more subforums just means more places to look for posts...

Suggestions are just suggestions, I'm not saying things are being done incorrectly, it's just an observation from my small section of the peanut gallery. ;)

[KBCraig]

WARNING! BEFORE reading farther, please read the disclaimer at the end of the post.

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

In all fairness, that means you would be served just as well if there were only a single subforum since you don't browse by selecting the particular subforum you are interested in, you just look at all new posts regardless of the subforum they are posted in.

By viewing ALL the new posts since the last visit, you are skirting one of the main purposes of having subforums--that is, providing the user with the ability to look ONLY at the topics he finds of interest.

It still works that way. In "unread" view, you get a list of topics and the forum they're in. You don't have to actually read them all. It makes it easy for someone like me, who doesn't do much reloading, to skip the reloading posts. Or someone like me, who's broke, to skip the classifieds. (Not really... I still drool!)

Like I said previously, the forum headings are mostly for infrequent or first-time visitors.

Kevin

[JohnKSa]

I visit forums with literally millions of posts, thousands of active members and some of them have a third fewer subforums in spite of the fact that they are GENERAL forums.

This is a very specific forum--why it has so many subforums simply blows my mind. It seems that it would be confusing for a new user--especially since there seems to be considerable duplication/topic overlap amongst the subforums.

Ok, some specific questions.

How is "Reciprocity" different from "Other States"?

How is "Legislative Goals for 2007" different from "Legislative Wishlist"?

How is "Holsters and Accessories" different from "What works and What doesn't", and how is the information in those two forums not the same as what goes in General Gun, Shooting & Equipment Discussion"?

Is there a good reason to have a "Governments Resources and Links" and then also a separate "Links" when they have a total of 5 posts COMBINED?

Why isn't the "CHL Checklist" subforum instead a sticky at the top of the "Common Questions" subforum?

It looks to me like everything in the "Carry Issues" subforum is pretty much the same kind of stuff that gets posted in "General TX CHL Discussion". How is the "Carry Issues" supposed to differ from "General TX CHL Discussion"?

Sure, I understand that if you visit every day there are shortcuts to see what's changed, but if you don't and don't know the shortcuts, you have to poke around through a needlessly large number of subforums.

I promise I won't bring this up again, but I think we have actually gained another 5 subforums since the last time I counted. The other day I was trying to find an old post here and couldn't. It looks like it must have gotten moved somewhere or it was posted in a subforum other than the one I thought it was--I finally got tired of trying to figure out where it was and gave up.

[Piney]

I was thinking we needed to ADD one more. A forum to talk about competition shooting. IDPA, IDPSA, IPSC, etc.

When I come to the site, I just click "view posts since last visit" and read them all.

I'd have to agree-- a competition forum. Charles also runs a IDPA forum ( http://www.texasidpa.com). Not much action there (yet hint hint...) but it is oriented towards that, rather than CHL issues.

[Charles L. Cotton]

How is "Reciprocity" different from "Other States"?

The "Reciprocity" section deals solely with reciprocity with other states. "Other States" is the proper place for all other discussions about CHL laws in other states. For example, discussions about eligibility requirements and off-limits areas would be found on this section.

How is "Legislative Goals for 2007" different from "Legislative Wishlist"?

When TexasCHLforum was launched in December 22, 2004, the 2005 Texas Legislative Session was to begin in less than two weeks. I can’t recall if the “Legislative Wish List� section was created before or after the 2005 Session, but the “Legislative Goals for 2007" is specific to the 2007 Session. The old “Legislative Wish List� will probably be deleted, but not until I have time to move any posts I want to keep for the 2009 Session.

How is "Holsters and Accessories" different from "What works and What doesn't", and how is the information in those two forums not the same as what goes in General Gun, Shooting & Equipment Discussion"?

“Holsters and Accessories� deal with just that - holsters and accessories and that’s what we see in posts in that section. “What Works and What Doesn’t� is much broader than merely holsters and accessories. Posts in that section include everything from personal defense ammo threads to clothing and dressing around a gun.

Is there a good reason to have a "Governments Resources and Links" and then also a separate "Links" when they have a total of 5 posts COMBINED?

The “Government Resources and Links� section is limited to information resources created and maintained by governmental agencies. By design, it should never have more than one entry that is the list of resources. The “Links� section is not so limited in scope and includes non-governmental (i.e. non-official) resources that are CHL related. For convenience, I duplicated the links to the DPS and Texas Legislative web sites. By design, this section too will have only one substantive post, one instructional post and a post for link requests. This is an area where I probably could combine the sections, but I don’t think it’s a priority.

Why isn't the "CHL Checklist" subforum instead a sticky at the top of the "Common Questions" subforum?

I want the CHL Checklist to be as obvious as possible to help people avoid the common mistakes that cause delays in obtaining their CHL. The “Common Questions� section has not really developed the way it was designed and it doesn’t get much use. That said, I’m not going to delete the posts, nor have I had time to move them to another section.

It looks to me like everything in the "Carry Issues" subforum is pretty much the same kind of stuff that gets posted in "General TX CHL Discussion". How is the "Carry Issues" supposed to differ from "General TX CHL Discussion"?

It seems that way to me as well. My original intent was that the “Carry Issues� section would be more in the vein of a FAQ section, though not quite so limited. It just didn’t work out that way. Many of these sections were part of the original design when TexasCHLforum was launched in December of 2004. Some have proven to be more active than others, but most have developed the way I anticipated, at least as to the subject matter of the posts. I probably could move all of the posts in the “Carry Issues� section to the “General CHL Discussion� section, but I don’t have time now and I don’t know when I will.

Sure, I understand that if you visit every day there are shortcuts to see what's changed, but if you don't and don't know the shortcuts, you have to poke around through a needlessly large number of subforums.

I guess we have a philosophical disagreement as to which format is easier to use. Sure, there could be so many forums as to be unworkable, but I think the forums on TexasCHLforum make it easier to locate posts on specific topics. There are two I see that could be combined, but that will have to wait until I have time to do it.

Chas.

[seamusTX]

1. It ain't broke.
2. Don't fix it.

Thanks for all your work, Charles.

- Jim

[flintknapper]

1. It ain't broke.
2. Don't fix it.

Thanks for all your work, Charles.

- Jim

YUP!

[RPBrown]

1. It ain't broke.
2. Don't fix it.

Thanks for all your work, Charles.

- Jim

[KRM45]

1. It ain't broke.
2. Don't fix it.

Thanks for all your work, Charles.

- Jim

I agree.

ps. If there is a section I don't want to read, I don't have too...

[Kalrog]

I think there are too many sub forums... not that any one of them is bad, just that it makes it MUCH more confusing trying to figure out where my new post should go. On a relatively calm forum (and this is one... the busy ones get thousands of posts per hour), I think it usually works best with just a handful of sub forums. So 5 would be a preferred max for me. But I love this place and won't be leaving even if this doesn't change. I just think it would be better if all of the forums were broader in scope.