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MCAD Central Forum Decline?

A

audctrl

New member
Now I've been a member here for a number of years now and I check the boards daily and occasionally I'll post to someones issue/question. I used toget a dailyemail showing the new topics or additions to existing topics. What I've noticed lately is that it appearsthe list of topics has decreased significantly over the past few weeks.


Now I know thatMonday email is a little shorter (8 topics today)because most of us do have lives and enjoy our weekends. But now it seems as though there are fewer people posting and I'm not getting that daily update email, well daily. I might get an update email every other day now or a couple days in a row then a couple days of silience. Other than Mondays, the update email would have closer to 20-25 topics.


Has anyone else noticed this since the change in regime
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Regards
Edited by: audctrl
 
I think the site could do with a kick up the ar$e actually. Maybe the admin need to allocate administrative duties to some members, I`ll have a go, so that we can control the forums a little more.


1) Get rid of all the old crappy topics.


2) Get rid of members which havent posted in the last 12 months. Clearout !!


3) Competition sections.


ETC. ETC.
 
I'd disagree, skint. You don't know how much traffic the old topics are generating. Also, I'd say it's bad form to give someone the boot just because they haven't posted. Many come by to read and learn, I bet, without commenting.

That said, the place could use some reorganization and some user moderators. Maybe a software update to bring some new functionality. I'd like better control over my subscriptions. Right now it's pretty basic.

The Design World overlords seem to be pretty distant, some user contributions in running the place would be good.
 
I don't think people should be booted if they haven't posted, but maybe an email confirmation sent to all members to verify if they want to keep the account open.


Those old topics are nice to hang on to in that we would not have to retype an answer tothe samequestion that was answered last year. I like telling people to use the search. One shoulddo someresearch first before asking a question blindly. I'll admit when I see a thread that someone startsandthey have tried searching but could not find anything, I give that a little more time. The person tried to find the answer themselves then asks for help.
 
I have been active in past and I really miss that proecentral.com which no more exists. There was tip & trick section and so many good things. There used to be pure proe maniacs.


I miss Dougr, Speling, xcad, and many more. In its last days there was a registration fee for it, but now the transition wasn't bad but it has gone, to be honest out of control.


I agree with audctrl and [-Skint-]


Israr
 
A bit of life into the place wouldn`t go amiss. Most forums have " introduce yourself " sections and General topics etc, so people can have a bit of fun and chit chat about various things, therefor getting to know each other a bit more and generate a healthier forum. OK i dont have time to visit most forums to talk rubbish all day, butI do use MCAD at work so I can visit and comment most days
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At the moment though, the forum does what its supposed to. Its just lacking a few modern tweaks which could be added. Its also missing pro-active members like CP I agree.
 
Yes, a welcome area. That would be a great thing to have along with some site/forum updates.


oh yes, proecentral... (aint no school like the old school)
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Out with the old in with the new. All the OG's that don't come around anymore have prolly moved on the greener pastures. All their old posts are still there. I just wish there was a better search engine to find things in the multi-page posts.

I believe there are still moderators with some administrative privileges, but I don't think they are very active. There are tips & tricks forums, but it doesn't seem like many people use it for this purpose much anymore.

We've seen ebbs & flows in posts quality & quantity before, but I agree with Bart. Priorities have changed. Theoretical & philosophical discussions now seem less vital once you're worried about getting another paycheck. That said networking features would help this problem.
 
proecentral was a pretty tight group. Sometimes I do miss the old flame wars about overseas outsourcing or adding fillets in Sketcher.

However, the good old days rarely were actually as good as we seem to remember. Maybe it's due to better communication, better collaboration, or to more specialized users, but the expertise we see on MCAD central now is superior to proecentral.
 
As if on cue, has anyone else seen pop up ads when visiting the forum lately? These aren't the kind that pop up in a new window or tab, but the ones that grey out teh window and overlay an ad on top.

Bad, bad, bad. If anyone from Design World is paying attention, those need to stop!
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I just started getting those. My popup/flash/adblocker stops anything form actually showing up but I have to click on the close window X to make it go away.

VERY ANNOYING
 
design-engine said:
I like the forum better than the exploder.... filling up my inbox for no reason.
Click to expand...

Neither is ideal for me. Seems to be more depth at PTC|User, although this place has come a long way. I seem to get faster response from PTC|User too.

I want a forum that'll email my once when a new topic is posted (with the post content), then I can subscribe to posts that I like and get further emails for them only.
 
I do not find the reasons in the mechanisms of forum or in the nature of this forum at all(ok I miss very much simple function in "Profile" window where one could check all posts indicated member attended or created).

First, big advantage and disadvantage of Mcad is being divided into small groups regarding different CAD system. This is good regarding the scope of interest, this is bad if you encounter it first time. You have go through 3 or 4 steps to get into Pro/E forum.

In fact, all depends on activity that particular forum handle, i.e there is a lot of traffic on Product Design Forum, because it is a mixture between ID and tools. Most of memebers are users of Rhino and SW, and they keep PDF still active.

If it comes to Pro/E, well, this activity is decreasing all the time. Not only at Mcad, but on the net in general.

Could it be that this fact depend heavily on number of Pro/E users? If yes, the community is getting smaller each year more. Sad.
 
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