There have been some sad, some interesting, and imo, some exciting developments, since the last time we posted about this: viewtopic.php?f=21&t=33639
Unfortunately, we have had no response from microUgly, despite multiple messages being sent, over the past 7 months. So using this forum as a starting place for the new forum seems like a lost cause. However, doctormo, and some other Inkscape developers have been busy little bees, and have created a Django-based forum, on the website. (Django is the....well it's either code or software, I'm not sure which, which the Inkscape website is made from.) This means that members of the website (gallery) are automatically members of the forum (and vice versa).
Using such a brand new forum would unfortunately mean that it will not include the contents which we have created here, day by day, and year by year. But we think they will not be lost. Work is underway, as we "speak," to create an archive from this forum, and it will be available in the new forum, as a resource. (Of course, the Wayback Machine would be available as well.) Since this new archive is technology beyond my understanding, I can't say much about it. But from what I've seen, it looks and acts just like this forum, except it's read-only -- it can't be posted in.
So keeping in mind that we would not be losing the contents of this forum as a resource, we'd like you to have a look at the new forum, and help us to develop it better (than we can do without your help). (And when I say "we"....well, you know I don't mean that I'm helping with the coding

Note that this is not fully featured forum software, like phpBB or SMF. That literally could take years to develop. We could use phpBB or SMF (or any other existing) forum software, on the Inkscape project's new servers. But they would not be integrated with the website. And forum members who wanted to upload images would need 2 accounts -- one for the forum and one for the gallery. With an integrated forum like this, only one account is needed for both.
What we would invite everyone to do, when you have a chance, is start "kicking the tires". Make sure that it contains all the features which we use here, which you can't live without.
I've been giving developers my comments over the last few weeks, and trying to think of everything that I think we can't live without. But I also know that we all use the forum differently. Each member here has some different combination of features which they depend on, to do their work quickly and efficiently. So we want to try and include as many features which we can't live without, as possible.
Here's the current front page: https://inkscape.org/forums/
As you're testing it out, if you have questions which might take a bit of discussion, please post them in the Vector Cafe board. You'll see that there already is a sticky topic there, where doctormo indicates he would like you to list any missing features in a single line (or list of single lines). But if you have questions or longer comments, please feel free to just start new messages. Sometimes the features might already be there, but you didn't find them yet, and that could take some discussion, as well as your suggestions for improving it might take some discussion.
Just for clarity, right now, we need missing forum features, as opposed to items which might fall under the category of styling or polish. Styling work is underway as well, but just not published or ready for review yet. Moderation features aren't available for everyone yet, unfortunately. But hopefully they soon will be.
Note that the existing boards in the new forum are mostly just made-up titles. When the time comes, we (our forum community, together with the larger Inkscape community) can collaborate to create the best combination of categories and boards for the new forum. My best guess is that they will look a lot like what we have here, because after all, it has stood the test of time! Although we all know some updating is needed, here and there.
And speaking of to-do list, we also still need to make the rules or guidelines or CoC, or whatever we will call them. Someday soon, we'll finally have it all together!
If you haven't already registered for the website, you will have to register there, to test the new forum. But if you're already registered, you should be able to log right in.
Please let us know what features you think are needed, to be able to use this new forum, in the same way which we now use InkscapeForum. Thanks for your help
