Ban this user - it's another "me too" post [j/k]

http://www.internettablettalk.com/fo...6&postcount=17




This is the best idea yet "Wait ONE week till you can complain/cry for someone's attention for help." I agree it'll be the easiest way of self-moderation. Could also state when signing up that: In the meantime, you may want to join #noobs for some instant help-on-help action; or search the forums and wikis (provide links) for answers to your problems since they WILL have been solved somewhere.

Could also add a confirmation page to any new posts being made by new users (say those with less than 10 posts) - one that lists a set of guidelines to follow before clicking the "submit post" button e.g.
1) Have you searched the forums?
2) Have you searched the forums?
3) Have you searched the forums?
3) etc...

Couple that with a word-search type confirmation text-box to fill:
"Enter the 3rd word along the fifth guideline above: _____"


Sorted self-moderation.

There's another thing. I've seen duplicate posts, gone to find the info myself because I know another post exists - - and lo and behold the search functionality sucks! Needle in a haystack!

Instead of saying "Did you search?!" like a lot of socially ******ed Linux communities, why not "Please search, here's a link to the original post."

('cause really. If you can't find it, they can't.)

I agree with this, I have actually searched to try to find the link to post and have had to give up. So for me to always expect newcomers to find what I can’t is unrealistic. Though they could at least try.

Whichever way you come at it, the forum is a mess. Right down to not being able to browse it comfortably on the device.

When it comes to matters Nokia Internet Tablet related, do the words ‘pissup’, ‘brewery’, ‘organise’ have resonance with anyone else?

Yep. It's the September that never ended.

I will second that the search functionality can be unreliable. Sometimes no results are offered when you try to be specific.

My thoughts:
- permanent sticky in each forum section to please look through the front two - three pages do and try a search before posting
- permanent FAQ sticky with links to FAQ questions, wiki, tutorials, ...
- temporarily pin hot topics with a clear topic description to catch more OS 2008 or whatever not working responses. Things fall of the front page and new people will simply post a new thread.
- volunteers who simply & calmly point out (as in without any attitude):
* Please see this thread: [ thread link]
* Please check this search result: [search result link]

As a new user, and a linux newbie, I have 2 possible tthings that may help those of us who don't know what we are doing but are trying to learn. Rather than moderating the forum, would there be a way to establish volunteer guides or something. All new posts by new users would be directed to these guides who could either point the new user to the right thread or answer the question, whichever is more appropriate.

When I have posted questions that are not in the right place, or are not complete enough to answer, it is not usually because I haveent tried to find the answer, more likely it was because I didn't know enough to form a valid search.

Just my 2 cents. I will go back to reading ang learning more.

I agree.

The forum default doesn't render properly width wise on the device, which I find really puzzling, as it is otherwise pretty polished (and I think a paid for custom theme). You have to change to classic to eliminate the horizontal scroll bar.

Text fonts could be a tick bigger to read more comfortably.

Page navigation requires pin point precision to hit that tiny little page # and I personally would prefer that all pages are listed (so not 1 2 3 ... 25). I've set my forum preference to 40 (the allowed maximum) post per page to remedy this somewhat. Still, on the desktop I'd probably prefer to get all posts at once.

Searching becomes tricky as the amount of data on the forum increases. I found this a pretty significant problem on oesf.org (Zaurus forums) - I knew a post existed, but it took me a long long time to come up with exactly the right search terms to find it again. Generally this is because there are lots of extraneous threads around with lots of the same search terms (but no answers...).

What about if whoever starts a new thread to ask a question, once they find the answer, commit to add this information in a nice cleaned up form to the wiki....?

It would be a way of getting stuff added (assuming people will play along) without the old people having to rack their brains and think about what people might want to know about

I've got some experience moderating popular fora (I cringe everytime I see "forums"), and I have an opinion, which I consistently over-value.

Moderating is an unappreciated art. It's extremely difficult to seem welcoming or helpfull as you delete someone's thread/post/whatever or limit their potential actions, regardless of intent. It's an incredibly fine line to walk, and you're going to create nearly as many problems as you solve with heavy-handed moderation.

Limiting the user's ability to create new threads, while initially attractive, sets a bad tone. It treats everyone as a potential troublemaker, which can very quickly become a self-fufilling prophecy.

As others have mentioned, the search function leaves much to be desired. I have faced nearly insurmountable difficulties in finding threads I know to have existed. This is compounded by how the topics are, IMO, overly divided and less than concise about their intended content.

My suggestion would be to add a static link to the wiki at the top of the page, along with a friendly reminder to use the search function before posting new topics. Such a reminder and link could be shown directly to the user and require confirmation before a new thread is created. More flies with honey, as they say.

Actually, "forums" isn't even half as cringely as "foras". One could even argue that the former is at least somewhat consistent in its use of plural, while the latter should be taken out and shot.

Besides, Latin is Greek to most postmoderns.