[answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

jheller · 2015-12-16 15:36:22

And actually more of help starting a discussion about it: how to manage the number of unanswered / unsolved questions?

Any ideas: feel free to add below / discuss.

Last edited by jheller (2015-12-18 11:31:43)

ewaller · 2015-12-16 15:41:32

The person who starts the thread is responsible for changing the title to add [SOLVED]. Or [ABANDONED], or whatever. Who else would know when a problem is actually solved?

Also, we ask that people not use the term CLOSED. That is too easily confused with the CLOSED flag that is attached to the title by FluxBB when a moderator closes and lock a thread.

Edit: As to the number of unanswered questions? I suppose it depends. These are highly active forums that benefit from the services of many highly talented people from around the world. If an answer is not forthcoming, it is probably up to the person who starts the thread to provide more information. Also, tangential to that, the best way to kill help is to ignore specific requests from members trying to help. As for me, if I ask for the output of some command, or the contents of some configuration file and the request is ignored I generally won't contribute further.

Last edited by ewaller (2015-12-16 15:46:26)

jheller · 2015-12-16 18:37:24

ewaller wrote:

The person who starts the thread is responsible for changing the title to add [SOLVED]. Or [ABANDONED], or whatever. Who else would know when a problem is actually solved?
Also, we ask that people not use the term CLOSED. That is too easily confused with the CLOSED flag that is attached to the title by FluxBB when a moderator closes and lock a thread.
Edit: As to the number of unanswered questions? I suppose it depends. These are highly active forums that benefit from the services of many highly talented people from around the world. If an answer is not forthcoming, it is probably up to the person who starts the thread to provide more information. Also, tangential to that, the best way to kill help is to ignore specific requests from members trying to help. As for me, if I ask for the output of some command, or the contents of some configuration file and the request is ignored I generally won't contribute further.

Nou doubt about appreciation for the effort from the talents around to help out of course! I'm a big advocate of open source and all.

From user perspective though, how well are we doing? Is there some statistics that can be used to show how many threats are answered, as in benchmarking, or do we need to review the way outstanding questions are managed in the first place perhaps?

Just thinking out loud...

jasonwryan · 2015-12-16 19:48:48

jheller wrote:

From user perspective though, how well are we doing? Is there some statistics that can be used to show how many threats are answered, as in benchmarking, or do we need to review the way outstanding questions are managed in the first place perhaps?

Just counting solved threads doesn't give you an accurate picture of how the community works. It is the quality of the assistance that matters. There are a heap of unanswered threads; many of them are ignored because the answer is readily available in the documentation, whether that be the man pages or the wiki or just an Internet search.

Take a look at the Community Contributions forum, or the stickied thread in Programming and Scripting: that is where you see the richness and scope of the contribution of the Arch community, not just to Arch but to the wider GNU/Linux user base.

jheller · 2015-12-17 10:14:59

jasonwryan wrote:

jheller wrote:
From user perspective though, how well are we doing? Is there some statistics that can be used to show how many threats are answered, as in benchmarking, or do we need to review the way outstanding questions are managed in the first place perhaps?
Just counting solved threads doesn't give you an accurate picture of how the community works. It is the quality of the assistance that matters. There are a heap of unanswered threads; many of them are ignored because the answer is readily available in the documentation, whether that be the man pages or the wiki or just an Internet search.
Take a look at the Community Contributions forum, or the stickied thread in Programming and Scripting: that is where you see the richness and scope of the contribution of the Arch community, not just to Arch but to the wider GNU/Linux user base.

Yes, totally agree on depth / knowledge in general of the posts. I hope this post isn't regarded as offensive, that's not my intention, although I do sense some defensiveness?

Maybe first question to be answered: is there a problem?

From user perspective, I think there's always room for improvement. For instance, an elegant way of combining quality and quantity of threats is for the StackOverflow.com approach. Users can vote for the quality of answers, reply with comments / improve, and there's a way to tag a threat closed by way of voting as well.

Last edited by jheller (2015-12-17 10:15:44)

LCvanDinteren · 2015-12-17 10:37:11

I am very content with the Arch approach. I often get arch forum results from googling my problems. If the question has been answered, the answer that worked for the poster does not always work for everyone, however, any contribution in the thread may point others toward their own solution. Usually the first replies ask for more clarification/explanation, I have, in multiple occassions, slapped myself on the head after following those first, easy directions.

If you push the "best" answer upwards, you automatically push those first comments downwards. In addittion, in a lot of threads, there is no "one" solution. There is an exchange of information, multiple edits, finally leading to a working solution for the OP. This will likely not be the case for anyone blindly following directions for an issue that may be completely different but has the same initial symptoms.

It's like googling for "I have no internet connection", finding some random thread where some guy completely messed up his configs, whereas the easy answer could be to plug in the cable.

Edit: I do think, however, that marking threads as solved could be simplified. I think there are quite some threads that have a solution but have not been marked as such, just because OP forgets to.
Perhaps a check-box? An alert after 3 days of non-activity in a thread?

Last edited by LCvanDinteren (2015-12-17 10:40:25)

jheller · 2015-12-17 16:07:59

ewaller wrote:

The person who starts the thread is responsible for changing the title to add [SOLVED]. Or [ABANDONED], or whatever. Who else would know when a problem is actually solved?

How can I actually edit a title to add [answered] to it? I did not find a way to do this yet.

LCvanDinteren wrote:

I do think, however, that marking threads as solved could be simplified. I think there are quite some threads that have a solution but have not been marked as such, just because OP forgets to.
Perhaps a check-box? An alert after 3 days of non-activity in a thread?

That would help other people looking for answered questions better. Actually, there's a couple of categories that could be beneficial to have I think (in an attemp to define this MECE):
- closed & answered
- closed due to inactivity
- open & active (e.g. discussion ongoing)
- open & inactive

ewaller · 2015-12-17 16:12:28

jheller wrote:

How can I actually edit a title to add [answered] to it? I did not find a way to do this yet.

Go to the first post in a thread that you started and use the edit function. When editing the first post, the ability to change the tread title exists.

If it is not your thread you can use the report function and ask the moderators to take action. On rare occasions we may change a title. We are actually loath to edit peoples posts unless there is something that must be redacted.

Trilby · 2015-12-17 16:18:17

There are a handful of users that have a horrendous habit of never marking their threads as solved, not acknowledging when it is solved (though this is revealed in their subsequent threads), not posting how it was solved or which suggestion worked (and thus not giving any indication of gratitude to those who provided the solution). Instead they drop the thread like a hot potato as soon as they get what they need out of it.

I'm very tempted to permaban such people. And I'd be justified in doing so as this behavior violates many rules - most impactful for me is the "Life is a 2 way street" philosophy. So if you see users doing this, feel free to give them a gentle or not so gentle reminder of their role in this community before I stumble onto their threads.

jasonwryan · 2015-12-17 17:01:10

jheller wrote:

From user perspective, I think there's always room for improvement. For instance, an elegant way of combining quality and quantity of threats is for the StackOverflow.com approach. Users can vote for the quality of answers, reply with comments / improve, and there's a way to tag a threat closed by way of voting as well.

Yes, but there is a critical difference; SE sites are wikis, we are a forum. There has been discussion in this board over the years about voting; opinion has been split as to its merits. There is one area where we do agree, if canonical information is uncovered/updated, it belongs on our wiki, not here.

jheller · 2015-12-17 19:44:12

jasonwryan wrote:

jheller wrote:
From user perspective, I think there's always room for improvement. For instance, an elegant way of combining quality and quantity of threats is for the StackOverflow.com approach. Users can vote for the quality of answers, reply with comments / improve, and there's a way to tag a threat closed by way of voting as well.
Yes, but there is a critical difference; SE sites are wikis, we are a forum. There has been discussion in this board over the years about voting; opinion has been split as to its merits. There is one area where we do agree, if canonical information is uncovered/updated, it belongs on our wiki, not here.

The reason for this discussion popping up once in a while I'd say is: a forum is too "open ended", and a wiki too canonical. There's no in-between option like a more managed system. It's a fundamental question if deviating from the status quo is in line with the spirit of the distribution perhaps.

Last edited by jheller (2015-12-17 19:46:30)

jheller · 2015-12-18 11:38:06

(...)

ewaller wrote:

the CLOSED flag that is attached to the title by FluxBB when a moderator closes and lock a thread.

Thanks all for providing input, it's clear to me now. I've modified the title to [answered] etc, and now it's up to a moderator to set the CLOSED flag as well.

Last edited by jheller (2015-12-18 11:38:28)

ewaller · 2015-12-18 16:11:30

Alright, I'll close it. If you ever need it reopened, use the report function for the thread and drop the moderators a note with your request.

Arch Linux

#1 2015-12-16 15:36:22

[answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#2 2015-12-16 15:41:32

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#3 2015-12-16 18:37:24

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#4 2015-12-16 19:48:48

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#5 2015-12-17 10:14:59

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#6 2015-12-17 10:37:11

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#7 2015-12-17 16:07:59

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#8 2015-12-17 16:12:28

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#9 2015-12-17 16:18:17

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#10 2015-12-17 17:01:10

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#11 2015-12-17 19:44:12

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#12 2015-12-18 11:38:06

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

#13 2015-12-18 16:11:30

Re: [answered] Who actually marks posts as "[SOLVED]"

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