We are thrilled to announce a major change for the Minarca and Rdiffweb communities: we are leaving Google Groups and moving to Discourse!
Why the change?
Google Groups served us well, but it had one major limitation: it was only accessible to people with a Google account. This created an unnecessary barrier for many users who wanted to participate in discussions, ask questions, or get support.
Discourse solves this problem. It is:
- Open to everyone—no Google account required to view or participate
- Easier to find — Discourse is designed to rank well in search engines, which means your questions and their answers can help future users who find them through a simple Google search
- Better organized — categories, tags, and threaded discussions make it easier to find information
- More interactive — notifications, badges, and “likes” enhance the community experience
Our goal is simple: to grow the community and make it easier to get help, share ideas, and contribute—regardless of the tools or accounts used.
One community, not two
If you've been following Minarca and Rdiffweb for a while, you'll notice another change: we're merging the Minarca and Rdiffweb communities into a single forum.
This is part of a broader effort I'm making to reduce the burden of maintaining two nearly identical projects. For some time now, we've had:
- 2 Git repositories
- 2 websites
- 2 forums
- 2 sets of documentation
... all in the service of products that, under the hood, are nearly identical. Minarca started out as a user-friendly front end for Rdiffweb, but maintaining everything in duplicate has become an increasing burden—a burden that takes time that could be spent improving the software.
As a first step, I've already merged the Git repositories into a single repository, starting with version 7 of Rdiffweb. This repository now includes both minarca-server and rdiffweb, which allows us to build, test, and release both products together. This already significantly reduces the effort required to release updates.
Merging the communities is a logical next step. Rather than spreading our attention (and support!) across two separate spaces, we’ll have a single place where users of both projects can help each other, share tips, and shape the future of the software.
What You Can Do
- Join the forum: https://minarca.discourse.group/
- Ask questions—no question is too small
- Share your setup — tell us how you use Minarca or Rdiffweb
- Submit Feature Requests — Help Us Prioritize What Matters Most
- Help others—if you know the answer, share it!
Thank you
To everyone who has been part of our Google Group over the years—thank you. Your questions, feedback, and contributions have helped make Minarca and Rdiffweb what they are today. I look forward to continuing this journey with you on our new platform.
See you soon on Discourse! 🎉