The Adobe Community and Forums

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As I’m going through my feeds I always see pretty interesting posts from Channel 9, Microsoft’s Forum-based community for a lot of their developer stuff. I’m always impressed by the number of active users and the breadth of what they talk about. Sometimes it’s us (Adobe), sometimes it’s technical support for Silverlight and sometimes it’s talk about the latest developer stuff from Microsoft.

We have forums but the Adobe/Macromedia community has always been centered around blogs and mailing lists more than forums.  I don’t spend much time on Adobe’s forums though I try to check every once and a while to provide tech support. So I wanted to throw a question out to all of you. Do you use the forums we have? Do you like forums or do the various blogs and mailing lists fit your needs?

I feel like forums foster a better community but it doesn’t seem to have taken root in our current forums, so I’d like to hear your thoughts.

[tags]Channel 9, Forums, Adobe[/tags]

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  • Dusty

    The Adobe forums are some of the ugliest, worst forums that I’ve ever had the mis-pleasure of using. There’s a reason they aren’t used, and it’s because they’re a pain to use.

    (I’m not saying that I’d use forums if they were better, as I like the mailing lists, blogs, and the new chatopica blog plugin… but I know many people who prefer forums.)

  • http://danny-t.co.uk DannyT

    Whilst perhaps not so bluntly,I agree with Dusty. The Adobe forums are un-forum-luke and to me appear cold and uninviting. I attempted to use them YEARS ago (macromedia forums anyway) and the response was non-existant I guess since then I’ve just never bothered.

  • http://blog.digitalbackcountry.com Ryan Stewart

    Awesome, thanks a lot for the feedback guys.

  • Mirko

    I agree that Adobe forums are un-forum-look (another word for ugly :) ) which makes them inefficient, but there are a lot of really helpful people who always helped me when i asked for advice.

    Best regards

  • http://cani.pl Janek

    I’d rather use actionscript.org instead of Adobe forums. I think that’s because it’s more functional and more inviting than the Adobe ones.

  • Brian Swartzfager

    I’ve never been impressed with the Adobe forums either, and Adobe SHOULD have the authoritative, most visited forums when it comes to their products and services.

    I say get the best Adobe developers together and recreate the forums using the latest and greatest in Adobe tech, and don’t limit yourselves to the conventional: make a whole new breed of forum. Heck, make an AIR client for it so user can track or keep discussion threads that interest them and read them off-line if need be.

  • http://www.creative-restraint.co.uk Andy Allan

    I used to spend a fair bit of time answering posts on the forums, but having never liked them, not to mention them having more downtime than the proverbially lady of the night, well, I gave up on them.

  • http://danny-t.co.uk DannyT

    Brian’s idea is an excellent one. So many possibilities to make a truely community-valuable showcase here.

  • http://weblogs.macromedia.com John Dowdell

    The history’s actually deeper than that… let’s face-to-face when I get back. (I’m on stylus right now…. ;-)

    jd

  • http://polygeek.com polyGeek

    Adobe has forums? Who knew. :-)

    I don’t have any resources that I rely on for troubleshooting other than just doing a Google search. And more often than not I end up at Actionscript.org or finding a blog post that answers my question.

  • http://www.sti-media.com/blog/ Graeme

    I also used to visit the forums and answer questions but like everybody else says, those forums are not very friendly or nice to use and lack a lot of what normal forums have. No matter how good you are you will never get to be a moderator or anything like that.

    I say rebuild the forums so that they look like other forums and have the same kind of functionality and get more of the community experts involved to moderate the forums. Adobe has lots of good ACE’s in their list, they should ask them to support them along with a usual list of people from Adobe.

    I agree that Adobe should have the best forums for their products. I also realize that making a comment like this will not see any change (if there was going to be any at all) for months and months. But good luck with it either way.

    Graeme

  • http://www.brandonellis.org/ Brandon Ellis

    Have to agree. If the forums were better, I’d prolly post more but I think another problem is the lack of community on the Adobe forums (atleast in the Flash and Flex areas). Not seeing much of ‘take a penny, give a penny’ going on. Same folks always ask for help but never offer to others. Gets old and reminds me why I like blogging better.

  • http://adamkinney.com Adam Kinney

    Definitely the experience of using the forums sways most from using them. I’ve tried a couple times to use for Photoshop issues, but I never find myself coming back to find responses. Which also means I’m not going to hang out there to give answers. Get it fixed man! :)

  • http://www.simplifiedchaos.com Todd

    I go to the Adobe forums when I’m looking for help with problems.

    I’m still trying to get a hold of how to find stuff in People’s blogs, as there’s so much good material out there. I know about technolorat, but not really sure of any other ways of searching through blogs. Especially, when I semi-remember reading someone’s blog 5 months ago about a topic I’m now facing.

    Any ideas anyone? How do you manage all the content on the blogs?

  • http://hat6.com Dusty

    MXNA is a good start, and another aggregator has come online: All Your Flex Are Belong To Us. This was started because MXNA is down A LOT! It updates it’s feed list from MXNA, but it aggregates a LOT of blogs, and doesn’t seem to have category-specific feeds.

    (Ryan: That would be #1 on my wishlist, MXNA that doesn’t die several times a day… in fact, it’s down right now, which is why I came by to comment)

  • http://www.flashmagazine.com Jensa

    I would guess that most people rather hang out at forums such as Ultrashock, Flashkit, Were-here and Flashden. that’s where the action is. These sites has thousands of active members that love to answer any question you may have. That’s also where the Flash community came from.

    Blogs are just a new, specialized kind of forum the way I see it. More fragmented in the way that there are fewer members, but those that follow a blog are often specialized in that area. A blog’s not the same as a forum though. There’s more of a community feel to forums. Blogs are not place to “hang out”, but rather visit if there is something of interest there.

    J

  • http://www.super-videos.net Richerd

    This is very nice, I agree that Adobe forums are un-forum-look which makes them inefficient, but there are a lot of really have helpful people he is always helped me when i asked for problem.

  • http://www.swfflex.com Christopher Keeler

    I used the forums quite a bit back when Macromedia had them, and they were great for getting answers to ColdFusion code problems. Now, I find them not so good for AS3 or Flex, and use Google to find pretty much what I need.

    See you at the next 360 event.
    -CK

  • http://pdsassoc.com Dave Saunders

    I’ve been associated with Adobe forums since the Aldus forum on CompuServe in the ’80s. The above comments are distressing but let’s look at some specifics:

    1. There are currently two completely different forums, the old MacroMedia forums and the old Adobe forums. They use completely different underlying technologies and have dramatically different look and feel. So, when commenting that you don’t like the forums, it would help to mention which you use.

    2. A recent effort to rework and unite the forums fell on its face for a variety of reasons, but the main one was performance. The performance of the new forums was so bad that all the other issues (good and bad) were basically ignored as the team tried in vain to get the performance even close the that achieved by the old Adobe forums (which are now live again).

    3. Sure, the old Adobe forums are a bit ugly, but they fly (which hasn’t always been true). And once you get used to their structure, they’re very efficient. Most of the noise about the recent redesign decried the cosmetic improvements that simply wasted space in the name of form over function.

    4. The old Macromedia forums are so bad when used from the Web that the vast majority of its users access them by NNTP. The old Adobe forums provide NNTP, so NNTP users should see just about no difference from one to the other (although the Web-dominant user community on the old Adobe side frowns heavily about autoquotes, which some NNTP user find off-putting).

    Yes, the forums should be merged. Yes, the look should be modernized, but the efficiency benefits of the current adobeforums.com look should be preserved. Let’s hope the team has learned from the space wasting and navigation nightmares of the recently aborted new look.

    But the new look was not all bad. In particular, it provided a more inviting way into the forums than there is now. The existing forums provide no mechanism for making a general announcement, for example. And a newcomer is often completely befuddled by the structure of the existing forums.

    Regulars are forever telling newcomers to use the search feature. I can only guess that they never use it themselves because it is just about awful. So many technical words are also common words, and if you don’t know what something is called, how do you search for it.

    Were I to set priorities for the new forums they would be:

    1. Retain the efficiency of the current adobeforums.com
    2. Provide a more welcoming structure to ease the newcomer into the right forum(s) — I thought the aborted forums did a pretty good job of that, although there was needless space-wasting on some screens and more features are needed to help a new user post their first question in the right place (perhaps even finding them the answer so they don’t even need to post).
    3. Provide a mechanism to make general annoucements so that, for example, when the forums are down for maintenance, you get to hear about it.
    4. Continue to support NNTP and perhaps find some automatic way of handling the auto-quote dichotomy.

    Dave

  • Don McCahill

    Dave has some wide advice. Many of the postings complaining about the forums seem to be about the former macromedia side (based on the applications mentioned).

    I have used both sides. I like the Adobe side, and find that it provides a lot of helpful advice. Adobe must be saving a fortune in the tech support being provided freely by the users.

    The MM side forums were never as popular with me. It just seemed to be a pain to have to log in to respond, so I just didn’t in most cases, leaving some questions I could have answered unanswered. I don’t know why a cookie can keep track of me perfectly for years on the Adobe side, but not on the MM side.

    In the recent disasterous merger of the forums, which I felt took the worst of each side, I eventually gave up on my two or three visits a day, and went several weeks between visits. I know many other Adobe-side regulars also left, and may never return. Traffic seems much slower than before the disaster.

    There seems to be a concentrated effort at Adobe to adopt to the less-useful MM-side forums for some reason, and I fear that the failure last time will only be dealt with as a loading issue, rather than an interface one.

  • http://www.mindpalette.com Nate Baldwin

    I more or less agree with Dave and Don. I dislike the old Macromedia forum’s web interface enough to rarely visit even though I use some of the products featured there very regularly these days. On the other hand, I’ve always been very happy with the old Adobe forums (and I’ll admit to possibly being somewhat biased by being a host there). I love that they’re simple, fast (usually) and I can see a lot of information quickly without having to scroll through tons of extra interface/fluff/whitespace.

    The majority of the Macromedia/FuseTalk forum users have abandoned the web interface and are using newsreaders. The majority of the Adobe/WebX forum users use (and love) the web interface. There’s a reason for that :-)

    Yes, it needs a good update and overhaul, but because of the above, seems pretty clear which direction things should be steered toward.

  • http://www.vpea.org Phillip Jones

    Last years about this time they tried this. it fell as flat as it did this time. The the biggest problem for me was that you had to sign in 3 different time to read first message. Then sign in once for each message after. Then after they decided to go back to the familiar system they had the same problem. Turns out after going on the Forums Comment page that they were using three different aliases to the same web server. after they settled on the original one; once you are signed in you never have to do it again.

    I was fond of the fonts/styles used in the Macromedia system they were rough on my poor eyes. Even with glasses. I like the style used in the acrobat forums. I also own DreamWeaver as well so I had to deal with it as well. And had a different user Name. so until they can settle on one username and allow the user to create and edit it. and stick with just one location (so that cookies work properly) You’ll never get a new system to work.

  • Dave L

    As a long time user of the Adobe forums, I have to say that yes, there could be a better interface and yes, the search can be (greatly) improved.

    But, from the start, I’ve never really had that much of an issue finding information around the site.

    Also, I answer a lot of questions myself (in the Acrobat and Reader forums) and rarely see another users questions go unanswered. Normally, if that happens, it’s due to lack of information supplied by the user. Even then, most of the time someone will come in a drag enough info out of the user to be able to give them a solution to their issue.

  • Ian Burton

    I agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Saunders and Mr. McCahill. I have used the Adobe Forums for more than 15 years now and have no problems at all with access to responses about issues. Research for existing responses has worked quite well, although older responses seemed to be archived too quickly. Responses to posted issues was a simple task.

    I state ignorance of broad-based forums issues. My observations and contributions have been limited to Acrobat and FrameMaker issues. In these areas quiet competence and community spirit have been the major factors of a successful support entity.

    I have seen some virulent postings around the PhotoShop product. I confess that I fail to understand this competitive “I know better than you, yah boo.” approach.

    I can understand that advanced applications need total commitment to skill development and that such paths to enlightenment can take many different routes, hence such diverse opinions. But, what happened to simple human dignity. Why the insults? Why are we attacking a company that has a vested interest in helping its product users?

    Please, get your act together. There are many experienced users in the Macromedia/Adobe community that can contribute advice to other users and forum professionals. Let’s be precise and constructive. We’re professionals above all, so why are people posting playground complaints?
    FWIW
    Ian Burton

  • Len Hewitt

    I’ve been around the forums almost as long as Dave – since Compuserve days, but post the Adobe-Aldus ‘merge’.

    I agree with all that Nate mentions, and whilst the present Adobe forums do not have quite the same ‘family’ atmosphere that the ancient Compuserve Adobe forums did, there is still very much a community within the adobeforums.com forums.

    Yes, the search facility leaves much to be desired, and no, they don’t look like every other forum on thge web (though I consider that a plus rather than a minus).

  • http://www.vanlieuphotography.com Dirck Van Lieu

    I like the form of the Adobe forums, but the content of the places I used to visit leaves something to be desired. The know-it-all attitude in some arenas puts me off. Internet-wide searches have been more fruitful than seeking advice and information in the Adobe Forums. Given the number of forums, I should not tar them all with the same brush; the old LiveMotion forum was extraordinarily helpful.

    I have been a member of the Macromedia forums since January of ’04, and posted perhaps three times, never with an answer. Just today I searched the Flash forum and a full page of returns yielded lots of posts asking similar questions but no answers. Many of the topics had zero replies since 2005. Several topics were answered with lectures about searching, giving advice such as “if you don’t like it here,leave.”

    Forums may build communities, but when the community becomes the focus instead of the application and its use, they diminish in relevance.

    I find the “old” style Adobe forums to be easy to navigate and easy to read. The MM style is a nightmare to me, but I’m sure it’s because the Adobe ones were the first of any kind I had ever seen. Still my favorite interface even if just used for following the bickering…

  • Ramón G Castañeda

    It’s interesting that some people who hardly use or visit the Adobe forums, as they say themselves, are making negative comments about them.

    As for the layout, I like the design of the current Adobe forums a lot better than space wasting layouts such as this blog and the gosh-awful Macromedia forums.

    Sorry, I only came here because this blog was specifically pointed out to us. Will not bother you in the future.

  • http://www.vpea.org Phillip M. Jones, C.E.T.

    I asked several question about DreamWeaver. Never did get any usable answers.

    However; I am a constant visitor to the Acrobat Mac Forum. often giving suggestions, Answers, and like everyone else fusing as well. The biggest irritation, to me other than these failed attempts to fix something that doesn’t need fixing; Is the regular moderators I guess you call them (or experts). Have a tendency to apologize to much for Adobe , when they really need to put Adobe’s feet to the fire.

  • Odders

    I am a big fan of forums, but only if they are usable. In my mind there is two real simple steps to getting the forums going, 1) make them suck less by making them function like a normal forum, and 2) start evangelizing the changes once the change are made.’

    Some decent categorization wouldn’t go astray either.

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  • http://www.acksite.com Dirck Van Lieu

    Excuse me, is this the dead letter office?

  • Anonymous

    Is this blog an example of evangelism at Adobe?

  • Dirck Van Lieu

    Didn’t intend to post as “anonymous” above.

  • Pingback: Anonymous

  • Jefbak

    Well the adobe forums have been down for over a day now with the same “check back at 1pm pst” message I saw yesterday. Since I am learning Spry this is a pain. I don’t know any other spry resources on the web.

    The adobe lab forums seem to be much better than the regular forums in my experience. I would like to see more experts and moderating (especially on the often mean photoshop forum). Adobe should invest in that area as a PR issue.