Background
Hyperledger is considering switching chat services. Hyperledger had previously considered moving to Element/Matrix, but that migration was canceled due to its inability to manage Hyperledger's volume. A Task Force was formed to research current chat channel usage in the community and explore options. This proposal recommends Hyperledger move from RocketChat to Discord.
Rationale
Why Move At All?
RocketChat has provided significant challenges for many community members with onboarding and user experience. Some of the challenges include log in issues, requiring a LFID to join, lack of usage of many channels. It is also a more costly platform than alternative platforms. Currently, there are many unused channels as well. In the interest of providing Hyperledger community with an easy communication mechanism. The goal for Hyperledger's chat channel is to allow the community members to collaborate easily and easily onboard new community members into the chat channel.
Why Discord?
There are a few high-level reasons for selecting Discord as a recommended chat platform for Hyperledger
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Feature Comparison between RocketChat and Discord can be found here.
Cost Details
Discord is less expensive than RocketChat. Expected costs are:
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Discord: $100/year for maximum server boost
Proposed Migration Plan
Send communications to Hyperledger community (publish blog post, notification in newsletters, and send notes in RocketChat channels). Give communication switch 1 month transition timeline. There should be communications on a weekly basis.
At the end of 1 month transition timeline, RocketChat will be archived and all communications will be directed to Hyperledger's Discord instance.
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Directions how to onboard into Discord and link to training for using Discord
Clear timeline expectations on RocketChat Archival
Mailing list to reach out to with questions/issues
Benefits for switching to Discord
Updating Links
The following are known places that will need to be updated to reflect the change to the Discord links:
- Hyperledger Website
- Hyperledger Landscape
- Hyperledger Wiki
Channel Cleanup
As part of the migration, we will also be taking the opportunity to clean up the channels.
Suggested Channel Organization and Naming
Categories
Discord provides the ability to group chat channels in categories. As such, we recommend the following categories:
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There are expected channels listed below for the respective groups. In addition to these channels, community members can add additional channels if they need.
Channels
Within the project category, we recommend a consistent set of chat channels.
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Within the Community category, separate text channels can be created for each specific community. The name of the channel should be prefixed with community- (e.g., community-india, community-meetup)
Chat Channel Expectations
The expectation is moving to Discord that this is the sole home for Hyperledger community's activities. We expect all Hyperledger community members and groups, including Special Interest Groups, Working Groups, Projects, etc. to operate their Hyperledger business on Hyperledger's Discord instance. We will be providing training and instructions to all teams to move their business to this chat channel forum. We understand there are some region-based challenges with using specific tools. We will accommodate those community members as needed.
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Have you had success moving your community to Discord? Yes/No
FAQs
- What is Discord's Authentication mechanism? Need to create account with phone number or email
- Will I still need a LFID?
- No, you don't need an LFID to login to Discord. You can still use your LFID to login to the Wiki.
- Will I need to log in to the server?
- Yes
- Is Anonymous review of chat available?
- No
- Will I still need a LFID?
- Will the search engines be able to see messages in Discord?
- No
- Can Discord be accessed across geographies?
- Yes, but it not available in China
- How can I create canned responses for Discord?
- Is possible
- How does search work in Discord? Are the messages available to search engines?
- search within discord yes, external engines no.
- Is there a limit to the number of messages that can be stored in Discord? How long is history of previous chat available?
- No, unknown but chat channels do not appear to be deleted for over a year.
- Will we be able to access the Discord server through https://chat.hyperledger.org?
- Sort of - we can do an embed or a redirect
- How does Discord work with LFX Insights?
- Not yet, on roadmap.
Follow-Ups
The Task Force will set up 30, 60 and 90 day reviews of the migration to assess progress of the adoption of the new chat channel. If there are further recommendations to assist the migration, the task force will share with the TSC.
References
You can review the Chat Task Force notes and materials here.
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