please add tapatalk forum app support.

[MargueriteSu]

it is a mobile friendly app.
need forum owner to add some code or plugin on his forum.

very popular and can improve user experience significantly.

nowadays many technology forums especially android forums have already support it.

in our linux field. fedora and mint forum support it. and opensuse-it forum support it too .

so i think as we are a big and famous distribution. there is no reason we dont support it.

personally i strongly recommend this feature for our forum

marguerite
from my htc desire hd

[jdmcdaniel3]

it is a mobile friendly app.
need forum owner to add some code or plugin on his forum.

very popular and can improve user experience significantly.

nowadays many technology forums especially android forums have already support it.

in our linux field. fedora and mint forum support it. and opensuse-it forum support it too .

so i think as we are a big and famous distribution. there is no reason we dont support it.

personally i strongly recommend this feature for our forum

marguerite
from my htc desire hd

For anyone, like me, that has not heard of Tapatalk here is a description that I found:

Tapatalk is a forum app for iPhone, BlackBerry, Android and Nokia. The app provides super fast forum access to any vBulletin, phpBB forums that have activated Tapatalk (Simple Machine Forum and IP.Board are in development). Forum owner can download the free plug-in to activate Tapatalk in your forum.

And of course, they have a web site you can see here: Tapatalk Forum App - Empowering Forum Junkies on-the-go

The application for Android, while cheap, is not free. I am not sure if it is open source or not, the forum software here must support it and of course, its intended for smart phones. A search of the openSUSE repositories finds no match for it either. And in general, the openSUSE forums are mostly being used by desktop and Laptop computers. Anything is possible in the future, but I don't think support for Tapatalk will be something that will happen in the short run, but we do accept all suggestions.

Thank You,

[MargueriteSu]

Hi, again

0. I really understand you difficulty to add and maintain new features to our forums.
1. Tapatalk Client is not free. but vBulletin plugin is free.
actually vBulletin itself is not a free software, so I think free or open source should not be the standard of choosing supports.
2. Yes, most of the traffic must come from desktop users.
that's the common sense shared among any forum. but it does not mean we should not improve mobile user experience with a single plugin.
3. It's not mobile only, it has chrome and ipad version.
Ipad nowadays claims to "kill desktop" even if it's mobile only, think about Japanese and Chinese, they has more mobile phones than population. no offense, not everyone here are Deutsch, in some sub-forums here it's a long live habit to login and chat using mobile when taking subway or long distance bus.
4. So anyway, it's not the problem of open source or close, but of convenience and easy to maintain. I hope in the long run, I can see this feature here.

Happy New Year, SuSE!

[stakanov]

Hi, again

0. I really understand you difficulty to add and maintain new features to our forums.
1. Tapatalk Client is not free. but vBulletin plugin is free.
actually vBulletin itself is not a free software, so I think free or open source should not be the standard of choosing supports.

If opensource should not be the standard of choosing support, what should be the standard? If we choose user distribution we should stop to develop VOIP software and Asterisc and use Skype, Facebook on a Windows Client only. As there are more cell phone users then Smartphone users, we should not support access of apps at all. We should actually focus on GSM access. So distribution cannot be a support standard. Cost could be one. Underlying logic (if not ideologic) may be one. So could you be so kind to elaborate what is your view on what standards should be, as a negative definition does not seem informative enough to promote the feature.

2. Yes, most of the traffic must come from desktop users.
that's the common sense shared among any forum. but it does not mean we should not improve mobile user experience with a single plugin.

Yes this is an argument. So we should foster on what? On i-Phone non standards? Or on Android non-standards. Or Baidu, or WebOs? The problem I see is, if you choose a proprietary software supporting this feature, it will determine who is supported or not. Therefore you are giving support to a limited group but you are excluding others....not on your decision but on the basis of the vendor of the software. As this site should be as free in access as possible, I have my doubts about the implementation not about your statement. The statement actually may well oppose the use of the aforementioned software. You could talk to apple and to Google to implement an open standard, open source, royalty free to allow to do this. Open source plug-ins would appear at once, be assured.

3. It's not mobile only, it has chrome and ipad version.

But Chrome is not currently part of the regular openSUSE distribution. And i-Pad is part of an industry of which the former owner intended to spend billions to destroy open source software.
I

pad nowadays claims to "kill desktop" even if it's mobile only

They claim to kill android. A certain Steven B. claims that too. And a lot of other industries get and got (the never ending story, SCO, you recall?) from very dark channels with the aim of destroying open source software, that is also this distribution. That said, if you go into advanced tab and you choose the forth button you see: paste from word (a MS closed source application, not contained in openSUSE and not open source). So it may well be that your argument is defensible through precedents.

, think about Japanese and Chinese, they has more mobile phones than population. no offense, not everyone here are Deutsch, in some sub-forums here it's a long live habit to login and chat using mobile when taking subway or long distance bus.

No, not everybody is German. Denver AFAIK is not and is living in Denmark if he did not change residence. The fact is that in Germany there are far more cell phone than Laptops. It is estimated that every cell phone user has up to 4 unused old cell phones at home. Be aware of statistics. The problem is not the technological hardware base, but the tariff structure of the phone bills. It is also true that this forum is about open source linux software, currently running on Servers (always less), Workstation, PCs (main par of users AFAIK) and Laptops (growing). As long as no open hardware is on the market that does allow the development of a "cell phone linux" (and you have seen what resources are spent to avoid this recently), pure user experience is not a good argument maybe. Especially if you consider that a lot of users use nntp to access these pages.
You face therefore potential fragmenation of user interfaces. All this requires manpower = financial resources. And licences in your case.
A friendly suggestion: please avoid mentioning of nationalities to catalog individuals as part of a behavior or national reality. This is counterproductive and IMO not covered by the TORs of this forum. It is tricky, see dangerous, and can deviate attention from your post into unrelated flamewars. I do not feel that was in your intentions. But don't worry, I think everybody did understand this in this context. Still I do not feel comfortable reading it.

4. So anyway, it's not the problem of open source or close, but of convenience and easy to maintain. I hope in the long run, I can see this feature here.

Both convenience and ease of maintenance have been challenged by this post.

Happy New Year, SuSE!

Same for you (although the Chinese New Year should be well ahead in time, right? When is the date and what do we have this year as star sign? I love that "year of the" habit. I am a fire horse BTW.

[ken_yap]

The application for Android, while cheap, is not free. I am not sure if it is open source or not, the forum software here must support it and of course, its intended for smart phones. A search of the openSUSE repositories finds no match for it either.

It's not necessarily a drawback that some tapatalk clients are not free. The Chrome addon appears to be free. There are lots of people who are reading the forums from non-free software and platforms, e.g. Windows, Apple, IE. However my real concern is that tapatalk might be a proprietary protocol. This would be a lock-in and something I would not want to encourage in a forum that discusses FOSS.

As for the future of web access, I think the mobiles already outnumber the desktops and that's the inevitable trend. For a forum like openSUSE, there may not be the urgency since presumably the target audience has a desktop. But I am not saying that forum access should be limited to desktops. I sometimes read mail on the move, so why not a forum? I however find the vBulletin layout unfriendly to space limited screens (e.g. last post link just next to the author link) so I've given up trying to read this forum on my smartphone.

[stakanov]

It's not necessarily a drawback that some tapatalk clients are not free. The Chrome addon appears to be free. There are lots of people who are reading the forums from non-free software and platforms, e.g. Windows, Apple, IE. However my real concern is that tapatalk might be a proprietary protocol. This would be a lock-in and something I would not want to encourage in a forum that discusses FOSS.

As for the future of web access, I think the mobiles already outnumber the desktops and that's the inevitable trend. For a forum like openSUSE, there may not be the urgency since presumably the target audience has a desktop. But I am not saying that forum access should be limited to desktops. I sometimes read mail on the move, so why not a forum? I however find the vBulletin layout unfriendly to space limited screens (e.g. last post link just next to the author link) so I've given up trying to read this forum on my smartphone.

Couldn't you use an nntp client to read the articles? Just intended as a general question as I tried to set it up and (a part of some design drawbacks) on the laptop, it seamed just a thing to easily integrate into a mail client or news reader. So, this questions is just by curiosity to see if it is technically easy and possible in Android and i-Phone. Anybody tried?

[ken_yap]

There are several drawbacks with using NNTP on smartphones. Sometimes I want to follow interesting links. I don't know if NNTP clients support forwarding links to the browser. And why should I when the forum is already available in HTML form? Similarly I might want to forward a forum article to someone. I don't know if the NNTP text has a link to the web version. Also what if the article has some screenshots? Does NNTP support inline graphics?

I respect the NNTP users' right to use their chosen interface but I regard it as a backward step on a smartphone. All that is needed is a page layout that is optimised for space limited devices. Many websites have filled this need by providing an alternative site for mobiles and redirecting you there when they detect that you have such a device.

[stakanov]

There are several drawbacks with using NNTP on smartphones. Sometimes I want to follow interesting links. I don't know if NNTP clients support forwarding links to the browser. And why should I when the forum is already available in HTML form? Similarly I might want to forward a forum article to someone. I don't know if the NNTP text has a link to the web version. Also what if the article has some screenshots? Does NNTP support inline graphics?

I respect the NNTP users' right to use their chosen interface but I regard it as a backward step on a smartphone. All that is needed is a page layout that is optimised for space limited devices. Many websites have filled this need by providing an alternative site for mobiles and redirecting you there when they detect that you have such a device.

Opera Mobile in a certain sense provides this feature of resizing. But of course with limitations on privacy.
I am not using nntp on a day by day basis, so I do share your view about the issues you listed. That said, the design for limited space is a problem even with laptops (I have a 12" one and with KDE 4 these screens may be troublesome and with KDE3.5 they are too, sometimes.
What you say would be a WAP interface, but WAP was quite a flop AFAIK.
Should the SmartPhone producers provide solutions to make web pages accessible or should websites be forced to adapt to limitations of static smartphone OSs? Nice dilemma.

[ken_yap]

Should the SmartPhone producers provide solutions to make web pages accessible or should websites be forced to adapt to limitations of static smartphone OSs? Nice dilemma.

I think the market has already spoken. If you don't cater for smartphones, you lose customers. Really, many websites are overdesigned and overdecorated. The limitation of space has forced website designers to think again about what visitors really want to do on the site. And you'll find that it's often just 5% of the functionality offered. I sometimes even read a mobile site on a desktop because it minimal, no annoying ads, sidebars, and similar frills.

In a sense the smartphone apps are a move in the other direction from a do-everything web browser. An app is specialised to do only a small set of tasks, e.g. buying a pizza, checking the weather forecast. So instead of collecting bookmarks, people collect apps. And why not?

[stakanov]

I think the market has already spoken. If you don't cater for smartphones, you lose customers. Really, many websites are overdesigned and overdecorated. The limitation of space has forced website designers to think again about what visitors really want to do on the site. And you'll find that it's often just 5% of the functionality offered. I sometimes even read a mobile site on a desktop because it minimal, no annoying ads, sidebars, and similar frills.

I agree about the "flash" illness, blinking adds, stupid and redundant design. Whether this bring the designers to design better or to create a bloated and disfunctional environment to smartphone.....time will tell.

In a sense the smartphone apps are a move in the other direction from a do-everything web browser. An app is specialised to do only a small set of tasks, e.g. buying a pizza, checking the weather forecast. So instead of collecting bookmarks, people collect apps. And why not?

Why not? Because every app has to be payed (there is no free lunch) and the fragmentation does not allow to combine functions, which reduces usefulness to a greater extend.
But I feel we are hijacking the thread of the O.P. as much as I do enjoy this exchange.