[RFC] Remove Gitter and Slack

[jameslamb]

This project's README currently says that you can use Gitter and Slack to ask questions about LightGBM.

the Slack auto-joining at https://lightgbm-slack-autojoin.herokuapp.com/ appears to be broken:

And gitter (https://gitter.im/Microsoft/LightGBM) has little activity.

I believe these should be removed, and that the README should be adjusted in the following way:

• remove references to Gitter
• remove references to Slack
• encourage use of GitHub issues for bug reports and feature requests
• encourage use of lightgbm tag on Stack Overflow for general questions

I'm opening this issue to start a discussion on it. What do you think?

[StrikerRUS]

I'm +1 for closing inactive projects.

the Slack auto-joining at https://lightgbm-slack-autojoin.herokuapp.com/ appears to be broken:

FYI, every month this link is broken for ~5 last days due to free Heroku tariff (search dev Slack for more details).

[guolinke]

I am +1

[jameslamb]

Re-opening so we can discuss.

Early last month, I posted in the LightGBM Slack and Gitter saying that they would be shut down around February 15 (#3710 (comment)). Now that that date has passed, I think we should delete them.

Who owns those spaces and has the permissions to shut them down?

[StrikerRUS]

@henry0312 Could you please help with Slack (according to #595)?

[StrikerRUS]

Bump

ping @chivee @guolinke @henry0312 @Laurae2 (I don't think any other maintainers have permissions).

[StrikerRUS]

kindly reminder @henry0312

[StrikerRUS]

@shiyu1994 Could you please check, maybe you have enough permissions to remove Gitter?

[shiyu1994]

LightGBM Gitter room is now deleted.

[jameslamb]

Excellent, thank you!

@henry0312 are you able to help us remove LightGBM Slack?

These two:

• https://lightgbm-slack-autojoin.herokuapp.com/
• https://lightgbm.slack.com/

[jameslamb]

@guolinke do you have administrative access to LightGBM Slack? Seems like you should, from #595 (comment).

Or is it only @henry0312 that is able to take these down?

[guolinke]

@jameslamb I will check it.

[guolinke]

@jameslamb It seems only primary owner can delete it, so only @henry0312 can delete it.
However, I was able to remove users from slack, and it seems I need to remove them one by one 😢

[jameslamb]

Ok thanks for checking! Don't spend the time removing users one by one. We can keep trying to contact @henry0312 to permanently remove this slack space.

[guolinke]

@jameslamb I also add you to the workspace owner. you can also check what we can do.

[jameslamb]

Thanks! I checked and see the same thing you do...I'm not able to delete this workspace.

Maybe @henry0312 has muted notifications from LightGBM...I'll try emailing them. If that doesn't work, I will try asking Slack support directly to help us.

[jameslamb]

I sent another email today, also archived all but the #general channel in that slack.

[jameslamb]

I tried submitting a request to Slack support tonight at https://lightgbm.slack.com/help/requests, to see if they'll make me the workspace owner in lightgbm.slack.com.

It's been 2.5+ years of trying to contact @henry0312 with no response... I hope Slack will agree that that workspace is abandoned and allow me to permanently delete it.

[jameslamb]

Slack support already responded... they won't help us.

If you’re unable to get in touch with the Workspace Primary Owner or they are not able to login, I’m afraid there isn’t anything else that we can do to help.

Per our Main Service Agreement and Privacy Policy, the Workspace Primary Owner is ""Customer"" and the data controller for a workspace. As such, the Workspace Primary Owner has the highest level of authority, including the ability to delete a workspace.

If you wish to have this role transferred to another person, this action needs to be taken by the current Workspace Primary Owner.

Given that, I just went into the settings and did everything I could think of that I have power to do to effectively make this workspace useless.

• deactivated all accounts except myself, @henry0312 , and @guolinke
• turned off every action possible (like capturing analytics, setting up slack bot responses, etc.)
• set as many permissions as possible to workspace owners only
• set message and file retention to the lowest possible setting (delete after 90 days)
• deleted the #github channel (so now #general is the only one)
• removed the Google Drive app from the workspace

I hope that one day @henry0312 will be able to help us permanently delete this. But since there's nothing else we can do without that help, I don't think there's any value in keeping this issue open. I'm closing this.