I figured I should post here about what the purpose of this site is and how to go about using it...
Spam / Registration issues.
As many people may or may not be aware on the internet there is a significant amount of people who register on phpBB and dozens of other websites to spam the forums with pornographic content advertising their sites or "affiliate" porn sites. In addition there is significant numbers of other sites involving pharmaceuticals, gold, penny stocks, etc. About 6 weeks after launching this website they started registering here. Within about a month there were upwards of 100+ registrations per day and 20-30 spam postings from 3-5 of those registrations. Why the numbers are not higher I don't know and consider myself lucky.
Ultimately I found a few automated methods of analyzing the origins of the various spammers collecting information about who they claimed to be vs known spam originators and blocking them registering. These methods should not impact legitimate users from registering and a few of the spammers still get through occasionally which make me believe legitimate users should be able to register as well.
Why are we here?
First of all the site was created so that I had a place to post about my coffee roaster experience while building a roast control computer. My other hope was that it could serve as a place for others to share their experiences too. There are plenty of other sites out there that discuss coffee origins, roast profiles, different roasters and the occasionally the various tools and modifications. It is my hope that this site focuses on the technical "guts" of various roasters and how to modify them as the main focus.
I've been running several other hobby related websites over the years and do so simply to share information and intend this site to be here for quite some time.
How to use the site.
For the moment the best way for users to use this site is to register a forum account. In that account you are expected to comment anywhere you wish and once you've done so I'll eventually clear your account for posting without moderation. The moderation is in place to stop spammers from taking over which is a big problem for forums out there that don't have professional staff to monitor the site.
When you've been cleared from the moderation queue you should then be able to create posts of your own where you can begin writing about your own project and attaching screen shots, photos, etc. While I use PIC32 for my project you can post about any devices you wish be it 8/16/32 bit Microchip brand devices, Arduino, Propeller, Basic Stamp, PICAXE, and any of the dozens of microcontrollers out there. You can even talk about methods that take off the shelf computer attachable devices that you use from your PC to log results or even just a bunch of manual switches and dimmers if that's what you're using.
My goal is for this site to be a repository of "geeks" that love their coffee then posting their control systems that they either piece together or design themselves. As more people use it I'll try to streamline the methods for sharing information adding a few apps to share things.