Anything thatâs not directly connected to any of the phone products (FP1/FP2), the company itself or an OS/apprecommendations would go into the super category.
Why is nobody else interested in such a big decision? @moderators should give their opinion, and I also invite @trust_level_4 and @trust_level_3 to share their views. Otherwise this happens (this is a threat! ):
*Actually something very Austrian:
** Though I would avoid the namings âGeneralâ and âUnrelatedâ because they are not self-explanatory.
Why do you think we need this separate from FP2 help?
To avoid confusion (is this a guide or not?) we could make a super category for all wikis and a sub-category for wikis.
I fully agree with these. I think the rule should be: Fixing something that got broken â help. âFixingâ/Improving something that doesnât work for everybody the way it is designed â DIY.
Ok, thanks for the honesty! Im just worried that in the end people, who are accustomed to the status quo, are confused or point out inconsistencies that @paulakreuzer and me hadnât considered.
Do you want to discriminate the little article??? Iâm not insisting on it, but at least for phone and company it would make it clear that the category is not about each and every phone, but about Fairphoneâs product. Iâm fine without it, too.
Oh, do you mean that we simply should have a structure like this, where issues with the Google-infected OS and with the hardware go into a âgeneralâ FP2 subcategory of help (like it is now with FP2 Help)? Visual:
Super category
Sub-category
Help (mostly individual requests)
FP1
FP2 (OS with Google / hardware issues)
OpenOS
LineageOS
Alternative OSes
I first thought that there should be one Android 6 category and one hardware category, but this setup is probably better from a non-technically-inclined FP2 userâs perspective (reason: how should one know from the first moment whether it is software or hardware failure?).
Since the â List of local repair shops that are familiar with Fairphones (by City) is not a guide per-se, Iâd put it where people in need would find it helpful: the Help category. The Help super category should host all such topics that arenât guides, but are still relevant for both FP1 and FP2 (canât think of many other topics atm).
I do care, but thatâs not something Iâm good at. I trust the people who are mods and use the forums a lot to take care of this. I never even use the categories TBH. I just look at my notifications and the recent threadsâŠ
I suppose it is important the categories work well for the new people, but also for regulars and moderators. I take it you can see the viewpoint of all 3 interest groups. I mean, someone whoâs really new here ainât gonna read this specific thread.
I like the latest suggestion for Help and Guides super-categories, preferably with having the same subcategories for both.
I would also support the suggested Hardware sub-category.
Lately Iâm far more limited in the time I can spend on the forum. Iâm just not finding time.
I personally hardly interact with the categories system. Iâm curious how many people actually do. In any case, the opinion of the current users is more important than mine. My limited use is not because the system is lacking, it is more that other tools already help me get to where I want to go.
I agree with @johannes in every aspect.
Yet, there is just one point, that makes me wonder:
Why the âsuperâ-category Cafe?
I can understand, that itâs a local (Vienna) thing, but in general this name lacks the explanatory factor, that all the other super-categories have. Plus, just from the name, there is no evident distinction between Community and Cafe, as both names imply a social meeting point.
Therfore I would opt for another name. If I understand correct, that this category is for topics around Fairphone, but not Fairphone in itself, itâs something like a Fairphone Orbit? (Well, that - as a name - would not really be more explanatory, just more different from Community.)
The categorisation of the forum just doesnât excite me
I personally wouldnât expend so much effort on trying to have a clean & tidy forum. While the sub-cats are useful, I donât think that means we should always have them for each super-cat. It just means you (I say you because I never move or categorise topics) spend loads of time doing something which doesnât necessarily mean very much to everyone.
As long as you donât call it coffeeshop I like the word Lounge more (but whatever floats your boat); cafe and lounge would refer to casual chat. On another forum we had a place called (translated) âcanteenâ.
I donât interact with the categories system directly âI just check New and subscribe to those threads I like, so updates appear on Latestâ. For what Iâve read here, Iâm not the only one. I think moderators and categorizing-people like you both are more aware of the categories in a daily basis.
Iâm specially lousy at classifying things. I always struggle at putting things in their right box (for who?). But since you are empathetic people and you are doing a thorought work considering new visitors, Iâll just make some observations, completely IMHO:
Since we have sub-s, we should try to keep super-s at a minimum or they will conquer us humans and generic and broad to avoid paralysis by analysis.
Making super-s verbs will express actions, engaging new people and embracing multiple sub-s coherently: âI came to the forum to discuss about the company and to participate in software development and local communitiesâ.
I like that idea a lot, but I would be more strict about it.
Discuss
The Products
The Company
The Industry
The Forum
The World
Participate (in)
Local Communities
Software Development
Hardware Tinkering (DIY)
other Community Projects
Beta Testing
The Angels Program
(get) Help (with) (including guides)
FP1
FP2
a specific OS (mostly just guides)
Buy/Sell
PS: I guess the biggest difference just from a what-goes-where point of view would be that a lot of topics would move from Community/Participate to Discuss.
I think I can agree with many of the last remarks.
The categories donât interest me: I only use the âlatestâ view, where I can see the topics I track (and the new ones). The forum grew so much, I donât try to read everything anymoreâŠ
Further, this topic itself seemed interesting, but it went on too quick. I think there where already 15 or 20 (long!) posts when I visited the forum the first time after this topic was created. This was not very encouraging to take part in the discussion
On topic, I donât feel the need for change. If it would be done, I agree with @Roboe: âactiveâ supercategories seem more logic.
All in all, I would advise not to spend too much effort in it. (new) Users will keep making mistakes, even if itâs the most logic and intuitive system imaginable
See this is what I mean about making these decisions, in order to understand the âmazeâ you have to understand the logic of the persons that designed them.
I do think we need to keep things simple, and also avoid doing things that make it harder (and therefore less accessible) without the âknowledgeâ.
At heart we need
A place to get help
A place people can participate/share/discuss android & other osâs, testing/bugs and hardware things non help related
A place to discuss fairphone things
A place to discuss anything else
A place to buy/sell
Sub-cats beyond this are not essential for all of these
).
Guides or Help
):
(to finding common ground among just the two of us 
I think the rule should be: Fixing something that got broken â help. âFixingâ/Improving something that doesnât work for everybody the way it is designed â DIY.
Im just worried that in the end people, who are accustomed to the status quo, are confused or point out inconsistencies that 
Iâm not insisting on it, but at least for phone and company it would make it clear that the category is not about each and every phone, but about Fairphoneâs product. Iâm fine without it, too. 
I at least use them a lot:
I like the word Lounge more (but whatever floats your boat); cafe and lounge would refer to casual chat. On another forum we had a place called (translated) âcanteenâ.
s, we should try to keep super-
