IMHO - and this is at least partly informed by what I've witnessed in the last couple of days...
There's a lot of people who are less than comfortable using computers, who are avid model engineers. Partly, I believe that's an age thing - a lot of people are of my parents' generation, who might have only been using computers actively for the last dozen - or fewer - years. Trying to explain what a forum is can be an interesting challenge, just as they might find it challenging to explain some more esoteric machining manoeuvre to a relative greenhorn such as myself. Even amongst my generation, and younger generations, there are still a number of people who find using computers to be something they really don't much like doing, and asking them to decipher some of the boards we have could well be something that puts them off. I've spent 40 years designing and writing software, about 30 of those professionally, and a significant amount of time designing user interfaces, often for people just like I've described, who want things simple, straightforward and quite possibly in a large font! Truth be told, I'm not much of a fan of the UI of this very forum (or any others that use SMF) - it was chosen largely because a) it's free, b) it's functional, and c) well supported. It even supports themes, which we've never really investigated here, but ultimately that's still just a shiny new skin over the same thing. Like wearing a spiderman costume - now you look a bit more like spiderman, but you still can't shoot webs out of your wrists...
Anyway - the point I am laboriously coming around to is this: We should always listen to people's feedback, even if it's just one person making that feedback, and try to gauge it as people who are not using the forum daily & have been for years; but as the considered opinion of someone who is sufficiently invested that they feel emboldened enough to make suggestions. I absolutely do NOT want this place to be seen as some kind of holy ground where the lofty owners live on untouchable pedestals, who know The Holy And Only Truth. I WANT to be challenged about what this place offers, how it offers it, and what people thing we can do to improve it. Anyone who has met me knows I'm no fount of wisdom. I may know my software onions, and just about enough machining practice to be thoroughly dangerous to me and those around me... and yes, I've picked up a few UI skills along the way.
In this particular case - the ask is not that big: Just a "general help" board which is a bit more broad-brush than the more specific boards; but not quite so "free-wheeling" as Chatterbox - and, honestly, I wouldn't go to Chatterbox if I wanted help on something, I always saw that board as more of a "pub table", where almost any subject (religion and politics excluded) can be talked about between people sharing an interest outside machine tools and engines. So, to summarise, I don't think adding one more board is going to hurt the user interface any more than it already hurts; and we can look at it in 6 monnths to a year's time - and sure, if no-one's using it, we can take it away again.
The old saying "there ain't no such thing as a free lunch" doesn't apply here. It costs nothing to add a new board; and if it's only got tumbleweed in it after a period of time, there's no cost to archiving it off.
Anyway, all that said - I've got to head out shortly for a dinner with a nice gentleman who's flown all the way from Australia simply to see us at MMEX, and have a free lunch on MEM's dime
(kidding of course, it's more like happy happenchance that he's in the vicinity while we are).
