˗ˏˋ Doug Belshaw ˎˊ˗ 💥☠️✊:I'm looking to talk to someone, ideally from an agency or small cooperative, who has switched to Nextcloud.
I'm interested in how people have things like Time Tracking and Deck configured for project/client work.
(please boost!)
Pretty telling that despite ~50 boosts of the above post, it seems there's not many people *using* Nextcloud? 🤔
If @weareopencoop do end up using it, perhaps we should write a guide that starts where this one from @homegrown ends?
Eduardo Mercovich@dajbelshaw @weareopencoop @homegrown
I do, but I don't use Deck or Time Tracking... 😅
Dave Lane 
🇳🇿@dajbelshaw I know heaps of people using it here in NZ. I've run 4 of them. @weareopencoop @homegrown
@dajbelshaw sorry, that should be "I run 4 of them" and that's just right now. I set them up for other folks & orgs from time to time, too. It's critical infrastructure for me and the orgs I represent. Replaces Google Apps entirely. in@[email protected] @homegrown
@dajbelshaw @homegrown (actually, counting again, I run 5, and recently shut down a 6th demo instance)...
mike_hales 💔*!?¿*@lightweight @dajbelshaw @homegrown
As a small coop, meet.coop runs a NextCloud instance. It's essential as a repo for docs, internal and external (and Markdown is very handy, when the NextCloud app is working properly). But imho as a basis for teamwork collaboration (as distinct from doc sharing) I wouldn't say it was wonderful.
As a small coop, meet.coop runs a NextCloud instance. It's essential as a repo for docs, internal and external (and Markdown is very handy, when the NextCloud app is working properly). But imho as a basis for teamwork collaboration (as distinct from doc sharing) I wouldn't say it was wonderful.
@lightweight @dajbelshaw @homegrown
But then, I wouldn't say that shared calendars and kanban-ish apps were incredibly wonderful in general, either. The NextCloud toolset works. It's a kludge. Just like the web!
The browser UI is pretty stale? Without local editing in a proper editor, the web UI would be a complete pain? The web interface for OpenOffice is awful.
Grow Your Own Services 🌱@mike_hales @lightweight @dajbelshaw
Are there any alternatives you'd prefer?
@homegrown
fair Q!
The short answer is, I've not assembled a set of tools that I individually feel have good affordances, which have enough in common UI-wise to work nicely as a toolset. Compromises all the time! Multiple platforms in the browser seems like a nice idea until the web UI comes into play, and some then are pretty inelegant or overcomplex. For me the UI of OnlyOffice in NextCloud falls into that class.
1of3 ?
@lightweight
@dajbelshaw
@homegrown 2of3 ?
I have an 'expanded trinity' as a framework.
https://learnstack.wiki.cafe/view/welcome-visitors/view/learning-space-and-toolstack/view/trinity/view/extended-trinity
But don't know how to populate that with a fully satisfactory set of tools. The categories are not watertight - that old workhorse Discourse for example can be made to do several jobs (not all of them equally cleanly).
@lightweight @dajbelshaw
I have an 'expanded trinity' as a framework.
https://learnstack.wiki.cafe/view/welcome-visitors/view/learning-space-and-toolstack/view/trinity/view/extended-trinity
But don't know how to populate that with a fully satisfactory set of tools. The categories are not watertight - that old workhorse Discourse for example can be made to do several jobs (not all of them equally cleanly).
@lightweight @dajbelshaw
@homegrown 3of4 ?
What @lightweight says about cost and improvement rate in nextCloud may be true. I'm not an admin, and don't deal with issues of those kinds.
But as a user, NextCloud's toolset for me distinctly unimpresses. Putting them under the same web UI doesn't make for either fluent navigation or elegant UI imo. The basic virtue is Cloud fileshare I feel - and navigation for that is klunky? I prefer to write in Markdown and that's good enough but only just.
@homegrown 4of4
'Serious' collaboration/coproduction tools like task allocation and progress, contribution accounting, value chain management and review, mapping tools, etc (getting into 'Specials' in the expanded trinity above https://learnstack.wiki.cafe/specials.html) aren't well provided for in general it seems to me, and certainly not in the NextCloud bundle.
@bhaugen will have views here I think.
@lightweight @dajbelshaw
@lightweight commented
> aren't afraid of hosting your own (if you're a tech business, you shouldn't be)
meet.coop is a kinda tech business (platform coop, provisioning video meeting spaces) and we have great admins. But in my broader experience admins are not necessarily great at figuring what the toolsets will look-and-feel like for non-geek users. Often may be prepared to hack & juggle more than lay people are. And favour admin rather than use considerations?
Yes, that's certainly true. That said, under normal circumstances, the selection of tools for a business is handled by non-technical people, and we see businesses developing a 100% dependence on finely polished bona fide turds like MSFT Sharepoint... so it cuts both ways. The way I see it, if a business has internal tech ability it's immediately an outlier, with advantages over its competitors. 1/2 @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
@mike_hales I agree, tools can be rough to start with, but can also be tuned to be precisely what a business needs (the feedback loop can be very tight and responsive!), rather than the normal pattern (usually a US-based corp designing speculatively for a global audience): changing businesses practices to suit the very expensive tool (creating complete lock-in). I far prefer the former option... 2/2
@lightweight
> changing [work] practices to suit the . . tool
This is a powerful dynamic for sure. We users spend way too much energy learning to be servants to the tools we get given!
Even in a 'tech' coop like meet.coop, our admins are concerned with running our production stack. We have zero development capacity for the internal toolset. We get by on NextCloud Discourse Matrix chat Kimai Sogo mail Wordpress - hosted for us by an external (coop) organisation
@lightweight
There's very rarely a proper and properly informed dialogue about this (users easily get lost in the multiplicity of apps and dont see enough of them 'in anger' to make good judgements about their affordances).
So admins tend to get their way, and build the stack that looks good to them? Who knows what a good toolset for collaboration really would look like! FLOSS tools tend to be trickled-down from geek domains, not developed to meet users' needs?
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
There's very rarely a proper and properly informed dialogue about this (users easily get lost in the multiplicity of apps and dont see enough of them 'in anger' to make good judgements about their affordances).
So admins tend to get their way, and build the stack that looks good to them? Who knows what a good toolset for collaboration really would look like! FLOSS tools tend to be trickled-down from geek domains, not developed to meet users' needs?
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
As I see it, end users seldom know what's possible, and only know the tools they've had foisted upon them. Most are more attached to what they know than what they could know - they value familiarity over quality. It's up to the 'geeks' who understand what's possible to innovate and demonstrate the value of that to end users. 1/2
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
@mike_hales I have more confidence in the affinity of people within the same community or company to work with feedback than working across the world where a multinational corp tells you what you're going to use and tells you it's the best for you. (while making extra revenue by surveilling you and actively engaging in influencing your gov't to hamper its competitors illegal wherever possible) 2/2 @homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
@lightweight
For sure I don't want to see anybody depending on the corporates for their tools. But a 'tech' coop (platform coop) can easily have zero internal capacity for developing or configuring the internal toolstack. I would say admins generally - FLOSS or otherwise - are pretty poor at building a community of well-informed users, capable of driving sensible choices of tools and affordances - even if admins were paid the hours to do that kind of work.
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
For sure I don't want to see anybody depending on the corporates for their tools. But a 'tech' coop (platform coop) can easily have zero internal capacity for developing or configuring the internal toolstack. I would say admins generally - FLOSS or otherwise - are pretty poor at building a community of well-informed users, capable of driving sensible choices of tools and affordances - even if admins were paid the hours to do that kind of work.
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
I wonder what FLOSS-based platform coops (and platform-building coops) feel about being the poor relations when it comes to their own internal tools? Do we tend to fall back on cumulative years of sweat equity - the 'free' but poorly coordinated and discontinuous labour of committed community members, FLOSS developers and coop members - for the configuring of our own means of doing what we hope will be good work?
@mike_hales if you're wanting to prove the viability of co-ops, then yes, I'd say you have to be "prefigurative": the means you use to achieve your ends must be compatible with those ends if you want to inspire others. In other words (to borrow a rather coarse 'startup' phrase), we have to eat our own dog-food. @FreeScholar @jamiem @Wtebbens @homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
bhaugen@lightweight @mike_hales @FreeScholar @jamiem @Wtebbens @homegrown @dajbelshaw
This is another fascinating thread, following closely after that strategy thread: (which I hope I can find again...)
Anyway, consider a cooperative project to create viable infrastructure for cooperatives. Why not? @bonfire would be a good starting point and they have already offered to work on it.
@mike_hales
I would argue that a tech/platform coop without internal development capacity is missing a mission-critical core capability. It's a bit like an artistic coop without anyone able to craft suitable branding... There are some things an organisation with a long-term aspiration shouldn't outsource.
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
I would argue that a tech/platform coop without internal development capacity is missing a mission-critical core capability. It's a bit like an artistic coop without anyone able to craft suitable branding... There are some things an organisation with a long-term aspiration shouldn't outsource.
@homegrown @bhaugen @dajbelshaw
Moved to @@mike_hales guess it depends on what you're comparing it to. I'd say that NextCloud is absurdly featureful and its app ecosystem is very diverse. There are aspects which aren't brilliant, however, I'd say that compared to proprietary options it's on a par (and it costs a LOT less for users, and had several orders of magnitude less spent on its development). Also, it improves at a much faster rate than the alternatives. I'm pretty impressed by the OnlyOffice interface. @dajbelshaw @homegrown
@mike_hales @dajbelshaw @homegrown I'd say if you're a small (or large) organisation wanting to be independent of big tech (which I'd strongly advocate for - see https://davelane.nz/mshostage) & aren't afraid of hosting your own (if you're a tech business, you shouldn't be) I'd build my infrastructure around NextCloud & MailCow along with a bunch of other #FOSS services depending on what you need, see https://tech.oeru.org/oeru-web-services-february-2021
Guessing professional people will look at my site and think it's a bit too informal and hobbyist, but there's already so much business-oriented Nextcloud stuff on https://nextcloud.com that I'm trying to do something different.
Maybe you could do something in between these two extremes, aimed at serious but smaller organisations?
Downes 🍁@dajbelshaw @weareopencoop @homegrown Well the guide is nice and all, but then you get to step 10 and think "holy crap, I'm not going to do this."
@Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Thanks for feedback!
You mean the warning about legal issues? Sorry, I wasn't intending to scare people off!
I wasn't sure whether to put that in or not, but I thought it's better to be aware of it in advance rather than having any nasty surprises.
I'm guessing most people will never have problems though, so I don't know if it's overdoing the warning... 🤔
@homegrown I wouldn't say it's a necessary thing to include - it's true of every other service as well. @Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
@homegrown I would, however, point out that if you use your own NextCloud, you won't be having your (or your fellow users, e.g. you kids, if they're also using it, as mine do) data surveilled and used to build advertising (and or National Security) profiles.... to me that's a *huge* privacy/sovereignty win. @Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
@lightweight @homegrown @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Oh I agree.
My main comment here is that the big legal warning is totally unnecessary and needlessly scares people off using what is actually a better alternative.
@lightweight @Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Yeah, definitely. I covered this in the "why" page (https://growyourown.services/why-growing-your-own-services-is-a-good-idea/), it's linked to at the start of the guide.
@lightweight @Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
I guess, cos my site is aimed at beginners, I'm concerned they might not realise that hosting can carry legal responsibilities in some countries.
It's a tough one... I'll see if I can phrase it in a more friendly way...
@lightweight @Downes @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Right, I've rephrased it a bit so the basic info is there but hopefully less scary.
@homegrown @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
I wouldn't have mentioned it at all. The minute you say 'you need a legal expert' people will tune out. And I wouldn't blame them - I don't want to use anything I need a legal expert to understand.
And honestly, I don't think the warning is necessary - or, more accurately, it's no more necessary that it would be for doing anything else online, or in general. Hosting your own site isn't some special big legal deal. IMO.
@Downes @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
The thing is... you do sort of need to be aware that hosting your own service does potentially carry legal responsibilities?
I am not a lawyer, but it feels unwise to start an online service and then let strangers upload whatever they want there?
Many countries have specific laws banning certain kinds of content.
@homegrown @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
*everything* carries legal consequences.
And yes, it's a bad idea to let strangers post content to your site. But not just because of legal reasons. That would be the least of your concerns.
How's this for a better approach: instead of warning about vague and unspecified legal issues, say something about it being good practice limiting access to your site to verified and registered users, ie., to people you trust. Don't mention lawyers.
@homegrown @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop p.s. though I may sound overly critical, I think you're going a good thing with Grow Your Own Services https://growyourown.services
@Downes @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Don't worry about criticism, it's really useful!
@Downes @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
I will give this another go 😁
@Downes @lightweight @dajbelshaw @weareopencoop
Okay, I've redone it again.
I do think it's important to say "I am not a lawyer" when touching on legal issues, especially if it's in a beginner's guide.
However, I hope this is a bit less scary though! I've used your phrase about limiting it to people you trust 👍
Bren@dajbelshaw I am not sure you can say much about Nextcloud adoption in general based on the lack of response to your question. It sounded like you were looking for:
- An agency or cooperative
- That (by implication) provides services
- This is using Nextcloud
- That had been using something else first
- That is using Deck and/or Time Tracking
- That is using Fedi
- That is interested in sharing configs
This is a very specific set of people that I would expect to be fairly small.
@dajbelshaw I'm using Nextcloud at work and home. I'd be happy to talk about it, especially since you just made me aware of Time Tracker and I need one.
E.g. Work switched from Trello to self-hosted GitLab issue boards. Later we got Nextcloud (switching from nothing/local files) and tried Deck, but we like how issue tracking works in GitLab so we didn't switch again, even though it is arguably weird to have a GitLab project with a bunch of issues but no source code.
Kelson's Sorta Old Account@dajbelshaw I use it at home for file syncing, notes, contacts and bookmarks.
5uie1 
@dajbelshaw @weareopencoop @homegrown We've tried switching to NextCloud twice in two different contexts, fairly large closely working team and small intercontinental team, in both cases it just didn't stick for different reasons. Right from adoption (use and configuration of a new client across multiple devices such as phone and laptop) to ease of retrieval and access. One consistent grouse we heard was the "lack of polish". Would be great to learn from folks who have succeeded.
Coyote of Winter@dajbelshaw Nextcloud itself has a number of case studies on its website, they might be of interest.
@dajbelshaw At the risk of telling you things you already know, I would encourage you to reach out to Nextcloud as well. Often they will be willing to hook you up to a customer with your use case. Marija Puselja is their head of PR, likely she can get you to the right person. Also Jos Poortvliet, their director of marketing and one of the founders may be able to help.
Claudius (legacy account)@dajbelshaw a while ago, I wrote a tiny script that would read an IMAP folder and create Deck cards for each email. It was intended as a shared support inbox.
People would mail to "[email protected]" and that would turn into a card automatically, and people would just take a card, work on it... and so on.
The code is here, but I have not worked on it in a while:
https://codeberg.org/ccoenen/nextcloud-deck-inbox
Jordan (Damn Good Tech)@dajbelshaw I was using that initially for my business, but found the framework was pretty fragile...it was hard to get streamlined updates.
Now I use a combo of ProtonVPN (calendar, email), ActivityWatcher, and Mega.nz
Anfeald@dajbelshaw I use Nextcloud but I find Deck too basic, I do like Wekan pretty well.
@Anfeald Ah yes, WeKan...
I'm a volunteer in a small non-profit but I'm not in charge of what they use for IT. The ethos there seems to be "Google is free so why would anyone use anything else?"
As it's not my decision I don't say anything, but it's kind of sad how people are conditioned to just accept this, without questioning why Google's services are "free".
I'm trying to work at this from the other end by writing things like https://growyourown.services/why-growing-your-own-services-is-a-good-idea.
If I can change even a few minds it would be great.
@dajbelshaw we're using it extensively at the OER Foundation... for pretty much everything (except kanban and video conf). OnlyOffice is superb. Happy to explain what it all looks like - and even show you if you're interested. @weareopencoop @homegrown
@dajbelshaw I should note we're a 4 person organisation, too, all distributed, and we collaborate with lots of folks around the world. @weareopencoop @homegrown
Jan Penfrat@dajbelshaw @homegrown I work at a nonprofit that uses Nextcloud extensively with some 20 users and ~100gb of data. We tried the Decks app but folks were more inclined to use simple task lists in the end. Happy to tell you more about our usage over DM.
Jürgen Haas@dajbelshaw
Still looking for somebody to talk about it? Think we have some experience to share @lakedrops
Still looking for somebody to talk about it? Think we have some experience to share @lakedrops
Wouter Tebbens ⁂@dajbelshaw
Doug, at meet.coop and CommonsCloud.coop we use NextCloud. At the first for our ops team and the 2nd as a service to our members.
At meet.coop we track hours through kimai, on oss timetracker server. Didn't test out the NC app for that, did you?
Alex Enkerli@dajbelshaw We'd be interested as well from Adte.ca as we're a tiny association on F/LOSS in Higher Ed which has been switching to Collabora and checking CRM/membership solutions (CiviCRM, Odoo...).