Special User Sections > What's the Best?

Master Category List for the "What's the Best" section... please help finalize!

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LuckMan212:
OK, I think this is going to be a great and very useful section, if managed properly.  However, this area could very quickly become cluttered and difficult to navigate, unless it is organized.  What I would like to do is have this area arranged into several "top-level" category folders, and then within those folders, we can have threads for each specific class of program.  Mouser of course would have to arrange this, as it doesn't appear that I can create this structure myself, but I think the first thing that needs to be done is to get a complete and well-rounded list of groups and categories.  I tweaked the list from my original post a bit and have come up with the following "tree".  This tree can also serve as a launch-pad of sorts to take you directly to the related thread discussing that category (I have already linked the 2 categories that jgpaiva started)

Please- if you have a moment, could you post any additions or recommend any moves/splits/other changes?  It would be most appreciated! Once this list is more or less finalized, I along with jgpaiva will begin creating the starter threads for each category and then you guys can start posting your "best of" recommendations!  :Thmbsup:  Thanks!

System
 |
 +-- Best System Cleanup/Junk File Removing Utility
 +-- Best Compression Utility
 +-- Best CD/DVD recoding tool
 +-- Best File Manager/Explorer Replacement
 +-- Best Startup Mangement Utility (e.g. msconfig, Autoruns)
 +-- Best File/Directory Comparison Utility
 +-- Best Bulk File Renaming utility

Desktop Tools
 |
 +-- Best Dialog Box Extender
 +-- Best Clipboard extender
 +-- Best Wallpaper Manager/changer
 +-- Best Virtual Desktop/Window Manager
 +-- Best "window snapping" utility
 +-- Best "Magnifying glass" utility
 +-- Best Tray Clock Replacement program
 +-- Best Tray Icon Management Utility

Security/Anti-Malware
 |
 +-- Best Anti-Virus
 +-- Best Anti-Spyware
 +-- Best Software Firewall
 +-- Best Pop-up/Ad Blocker

Internet/Networking
 |
 +-- Best IM/jabber/chat client
 +-- Best Browser Plugin/Firefox Extension
 +-- Best RSS reader
 +-- Best FTP client
 +-- Best IRC client
 +-- Best Email Client
 +-- Best BitTorrent client
 +-- Best TCP/IP Toolbox Utility (ping/trace/portscan/dns lookup/etc)
 +-- Best Ethernet Packet Capture/Analysis Utility
 +-- Best Website Change-Monitoring App

Programming/Database
 |
 +-- Best General Text Editor/Notepad replacement
 +-- Best HTML/CSS editor
 +-- Best PHP editor
 +-- Best SQL DB management tool

Audio/Video
 |
 +-- Best Audio (MP3/WMA/AAC) player
 +-- Best Video Player
 +-- Best Audio Editor/Recording tool
 +-- Best MP3/Ogg/etc encoding software
 +-- Best MP3 management tool
 +-- Best DVD transcoding/rebuilding tool

Hard Drive
 |
 +-- Best Disk Partitoning Tool
 +-- Best Backup Software
 +-- Best Disk Imaging/Cloning Utility
 +-- Best Disk Space Analysis Utility
 +-- Best Data Recovery Utility
 +-- Best Defrag Utility

Graphics
 |
 +-- Best Image Editor
 +-- Best Font Viewer/Utility
 +-- Best Icon Editor
 +-- Best Photo Management Software
 +-- Best Screenshot Utility
 
Timers/Alarms/Reminders/Calendars/PIMs
 |
 +-- Best Phonebook/Addressbook program
 +-- Best Calendar program
 +-- Best "Sticky Notes" app
 +-- Best Clock/Stopwatch/Timer/Alarm utility
 +-- Best Task Scheduler/Cron-type Utility

Office
 |
 +-- Best word processor (there is a review at http://www.donationcoder....eviews/Archive/WordProcs/)
 +-- Best spreadsheet

mouser:
this thread itself is pure brilliance, with live links to the bestof threads..
we could create the sections as you say, or just have thiread as sticky in this section so people can consult it.

and then also link to this hyperlink chart from the review page.

LuckMan212:
oh arrgh! I just spent about 2 hrs writing my "Best Anti-Virus" starter thread and my blasted system froze while accessing the Trend Micro HouseCall (an online virus scanner) website!  :mad:  Not sure why it did that-- rarely happens to me.  Murphy's Law I suppose.  So I am in the process of rewriting as we speak... grr! 

Anyway, mouser I do think it would be useful to have the folders for the major (bolded) categories shown above, however please hold off on creating them for now, I would like to wait and hopefully get some more users to comment on whether I have forgotten any categories etc.

I will continue to link/update the tree above and it can be used as a "launch pad" into the specific threads but I think having the categories grouped by folder would just keep this whole section cleaner and easier to navigate.  But of course the final decision is yours.

mouser:
there is a real dilemna about creating subsections on the forum -
on one hand it adds real logical organization to the forum, but on the other hand it hides stuff away where people never wander in.

the areas that get attention are the main sections on the forum.  right now "what's the best" is a child section of "Mini-Reviews" but i think once this section starts to fill up, we will want to move it to a main section, either sibling with Mini-Reviews or mini-reviews as a child of it.

i think one thing arguing against actually making separate section for each category is the face that there will only be a few threads in each section.  so i think i'm still leaning towards just having a main chart like yours as the first thread in the section that people can refer to and leave the threads themselves unsorted..

another possibility would be to move the folder organization to a kind of wiki format, with links to the threads.

so that the idea would be a hierarchical wiki web type organization as you have proposed, with the wiki linking into the forum threads.

opinions?

LuckMan212:
ok you've sold me... I think I agree with you now.  This also has the advantage of the threads that are active bubbling to the top, regardless of what category they are in.  Let's leave it 'as-is' and see how it goes. 

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