Hi all, First off - this is not flame bait or a troll. It's a genuine question. Since the forum gateway was introduced, it is my opinion that this list is getting flooded with newbie questions. Check the "I just installed Ubuntu" thread for a typical example. I wish to silently remove all wine-forum posts and their replies from my inbox. I plan to filter based on From: wineforum-user at winehq.org and the phrase "@forum.winehq.org" appearing anywhere in Message-ID:, In-Reply-To: or From: Not knowing how the gateway is configured, my question is: will this be enough? Now the explanation why. I spend my days at work answering newbie questions. I've done my requisite 1000s of hours in the past, now it's someone else's turn. I'm not asking for the gateway to be undone - those users have a perfect right to ask questions and get answers. If this is the place, then that is fine. I just don't want to see the questions anymore, and I don't want to unsubscribe either (the list itself is great as-is). So lets please not turn this into an "Alan is a great big newbie-hating spawn-of-Satan jerk" thread, OK? -- Alan McKinnon alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com
Dan Kegel
2008-Feb-27 18:36 UTC
[Wine] Alan is a great big newbie-hating spawn-of-Satan jerk (was: Mailing list <-> forum gateway)
[note subject change :-] On Wed, Feb 27, 2008 at 9:58 AM, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon at gmail.com> wrote:> I wish to silently remove all wine-forum posts and their replies from my > inbox. I plan to filter based on > From: wineforum-user at winehq.org > and the phrase "@forum.winehq.org" appearing anywhere in Message-ID:, > In-Reply-To: or From: > > Not knowing how the gateway is configured, my question is: will this be > enough?Give it a shot and find out! I just did a search for wineforum-user at winehq.org in gmail, and it seemed to pick up most of 'em. - Dan
Hi, En/na Alan McKinnon ha escrit:> Since the forum gateway was introduced, it is my opinion that this list > is getting flooded with newbie questions. Check the "I just installed > Ubuntu" thread for a typical example. > > > Now the explanation why. I spend my days at work answering newbie > questions. I've done my requisite 1000s of hours in the past, now it's > someone else's turn. I'm not asking for the gateway to be undone - > those users have a perfect right to ask questions and get answers. If > this is the place, then that is fine. I just don't want to see the > questions anymore, and I don't want to unsubscribe either (the list > itself is great as-is). >I am a wine newbie and I suscribed to this list just one month ago. Since then, I have been surprised by the kindness and nice attitude of the answers to all the newbie questions. Specially surprised me the very positive answers to some bad-formed, unclear, already answered and with an unadequate subject questions. It would be a pity for us, newbies, that all experienced users just flee now, that's why I think that it could be interesting for everybody ( both newbies as myself and also experienced users of wine ) that some specifical forum rules and FAQ were written in order to direct newbies to the direct source of information, specially having in mind the huge amount of info we can find so clearly written in the WineHQ webpage. For example, in one of the linux forums I have used the last years, when you try to open a new thread, you get a message like this (translating from spanish): Please check the forum rules before sending a new problem: -Search in Google before asking. -Write a descriptive title. -Write correctly. -Don't publish your question in more than one forum. -If you find the solution to your problem send advise of which it was. -For more information read the forum rules. (link to forum rules). And people is scolded when they do not follow this rules. Maybe some of this things could be done for the winehq forums, in order to avoid other people being obliged to do what Alan had to do. Maybe this is not exactly what you were talking about, I will have to change the subject or open a new thread in the forum, in that case ... Best, Marc ///
Mark, I'd like to add one point to your list: "-apply common sense." --hasi.
Yea. I miss here on the Forums messages how to post threads. Maybe we could block typical titles like "Help me" when posting here on Forums. Note the forum is new and has just started. I hope the problem get better since I like the Idea of combining mailing lists and Forums.> Please check the forum rules before sending a new problem: > -Search in Google before asking. > -Write a descriptive title. > -Write correctly. > -Don't publish your question in more than one forum. > -If you find the solution to your problem send advise of which it was. > -For more information read the forum rules. (link to forum rules).Good Idea! cheers Peter
On Wed, Feb 27, 2008 at 12:58 PM, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon at gmail.com> wrote:> Hi all, > > First off - this is not flame bait or a troll. It's a genuine question. > > Since the forum gateway was introduced, it is my opinion that this list > is getting flooded with newbie questions. Check the "I just installed > Ubuntu" thread for a typical example. > > I wish to silently remove all wine-forum posts and their replies from my > inbox. I plan to filter based on > From: wineforum-user at winehq.org > and the phrase "@forum.winehq.org" appearing anywhere in Message-ID:, > In-Reply-To: or From: > > Not knowing how the gateway is configured, my question is: will this be > enough? > > Now the explanation why. I spend my days at work answering newbie > questions. I've done my requisite 1000s of hours in the past, now it's > someone else's turn. I'm not asking for the gateway to be undone - > those users have a perfect right to ask questions and get answers. If > this is the place, then that is fine. I just don't want to see the > questions anymore, and I don't want to unsubscribe either (the list > itself is great as-is). > > So lets please not turn this into an "Alan is a great big newbie-hating > spawn-of-Satan jerk" thread, OK? > > > -- > Alan McKinnon > alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com > > >If I read this right, it appears Alan would like a way to filter the extremely "noob" questions from the "legit" ones. In my opinion, its not a bad idea as long as people know how to escalate concerns to his inbox. Quite often, its a "new user" that finds a bug thats worth rising a stir about. -Tres -- - Tres.Finocchiaro at gmail.com
to list as well, whoops! ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> Date: 2 Mar 2008 17:31 Subject: Re: [Wine] Mailing list <-> forum gateway To: "A. Tres Finocchiaro" <tres.finocchiaro at gmail.com> On 02/03/2008, A. Tres Finocchiaro <tres.finocchiaro at gmail.com> wrote: > If I read this right, it appears Alan would like a way to filter the > extremely "noob" questions from the "legit" ones. > In my opinion, its not a bad idea as long as people know how to > escalate concerns to his inbox. Quite often, its a "new user" that > finds a bug thats worth rising a stir about. Although we've had a lot more list traffic with the forum gateway in place, to me it looks like much the same level of stuff - some highly technically adept users, some users who seem to be recent converts from Windows and have heard of Wine and are trying it for that last annoying app - just *much more of it*. It's good to see Dan Kegel keeping an eye on wine-users, I hope other devs will glance in occasionally for a useful indicator of just who makes up the Wine user population and what they need - much better than trying to guess what a user *might* need or find useful, or extrapolating only from one's own level of technical skill. - d.
Alan McKinnon wrote:> On Sunday 02 March 2008, A. Tres Finocchiaro wrote: > > > If I read this right, it appears Alan would like a way to filter the > > extremely "noob" questions from the "legit" ones. > > > > That's about right. Or expressed another way - and painting with very > broad strokes here - the majority of new user questions are along the > lines of "What is Wine? How do I install it? How do I use it?" A good > and current FAQ or a forum is a good way to answer these questions. >Then you should think about un-subscribing from the wine-users. That is the list for users to seek help. If you saying you can only help these users and not other users just because they know less about wine - you should rethink why you subscribed to the list in the first place. This is a pointless conversation. Splitting mailing list to "noobs" and "experts" will never work, as noobs will always think they are experts, and wise-versa.
Renaud (Ron) OLGIATI wrote:> On Sunday 02 March 2008, my mailbox was graced by a missive > from "vitamin" <wineforum-user at winehq.org> who wrote: > > > > Then you should think about un-subscribing from the wine-users. That is the > > list for users to seek help. If you saying you can only help these users > > and not other users just because they know less about wine - you should > > rethink why you subscribed to the list in the first place. > > > > This is a pointless conversation. Splitting mailing list to "noobs" and > > "experts" will never work, as noobs will always think they are experts, and > > wise-versa. > > > > The list was, before the forum link, a place where serious wine-users could > discuss problems. > > With the forum link we have been flooded with beginners queries that barely > merit a RTFM / RTFFAQ and the nois/signal ratio has become very strong. > > Which leads me to reconsider my membership of this list, as it is now mainly a > waste of time for advanced users; in which case I would also feel compelled > to remove myself from the various apps I am maintainer of. > > Cheers, > > Ron. > -- > Blame San Andreas: > it's all his fault. > > -- http://www.olgiati-in-paraguay.org --Then why don't you use forum instead and ask to make a separate section for advanced users? It's easy on forum to move topics around. It's impossible to do so on the list. The whole point of forum was to attract more new users to Wine. And to not further divide users into groups.
Then we all should stop whining about noob users and start helping them! For our resident snobs who think they are special - they are welcome to start their own list/forum etc. So far there was only few who complained. Did those few bothered to look how many new users where registered on forum? And how many posts came from them? I think this conversation is over. Just the number of new users and new posts tells the story - the forum here to stay.
On Sun, Mar 2, 2008 at 7:57 PM, vitamin <wineforum-user at winehq.org> wrote:> Then we all should stop whining about noob users and start helping them! For our resident snobs who think they are special - they are welcome to start their own list/forum etc. So far there was only few who complained. Did those few bothered to look how many new users where registered on forum? And how many posts came from them? > > I think this conversation is over. Just the number of new users and new posts tells the story - the forum here to stay. >+1
vitamin wrote:> Then we all should stop whining about noob users and start helping them! For our resident snobs who think they are special - they are welcome to start their own list/forum etc. So far there was only few who complained. Did those few bothered to look how many new users where registered on forum? And how many posts came from them? > > I think this conversation is over. Just the number of new users and new posts tells the story - the forum here to stay. > >Vitamin: Thank you for saying what needed to be said. +1 for the fora <--> Mailing list gateway. +1 for the newcomer questions. However, we should provide a FAQ to help those who need help from us. I am going to start a new thread for that. James McKenzie
I think the down sides various people have mentioned about separating it a little are overblown. Suppose they were to add to the forum a beginner's category which is disconnected from the mailing list: 1. The segregation would be no worse than pre-gateway. There was a relative lack of maintainers and devs on forums before the gateway and there would only continue to be. The maintains who have left have shown that the status quo isn't really better either. 2. Yes, some users may misjudge whether their question belongs inside or outside the beginner's section, but I doubt there would be so many as to be a serious problem. The beginner's section could have sticky topics with links to beginner FAQs. If somebody asks a question that isn't likely to be answered in the beginner's section, a moderator can move it to the section that is linked to the mailing list. I think that's as close as it can realisticly get to what the gateway was supposed to accomplish without driving more knowledgable people away. -Sterling Christensen On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 3:53 PM, Austin English <austinenglish at gmail.com> wrote:> On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 4:51 PM, Mark Knecht <markknecht at gmail.com> wrote: > > > > On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 1:52 PM, Dan Kegel <dank at kegel.com> wrote: > > > On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 2:21 AM, Renaud (Ron) OLGIATI > > > <renaud at olgiati-in-paraguay.org> wrote: > > > > Mailing list now getting clogged up with beginners questions. > > > > > > > > For me that's it, I'm leaving, and you'll have to find new > maintainers for the > > > > apps I maintained. > > > > > > Hmm. That's two people who are upset by the > > > increase in newbie questions. > > > > > > I'm starting to think that perhaps we do need > > > to map the existing forum to a wine-users-newbies list. > > > I think that amount of segmentation might in fact > > > be useful. > > > - Dan > > > > What am I missing here? I have received maybe 10 messages (just a > > guess. Maybe more.) in the last couple of days. It doesn't seem (to me > > anyway) that this is enough to cause anyone heartburn but clearly > > Renaud is upset by this. I receive something in the range of 250-300 > > messages a day so I hardly see the increase but there have been a few > > more. > > > > Am I not receiving all the messages? > > > > Anyway, I wouldn't want app maintainers quiting over something like > > this, nor would I prefer to have newbies be without the help of > > maintainers also. Instead of changing the users list maybe there needs > > to be some sort of maintainers list for folks like Ranaud? > > > > I'm perfectly happy with whatever you do but if there are two lists > > let me know how to get signed up for whatever the new one is. > > > > Cheers, > > Mark > > > > > > I don't think we should be turning away those seeking help...That's > the whole point of wine-users/the forum. If you didn't want to help, > you shouldn't have signed up for it. Putting a couple warnings/links > to the FAQ/etc should help the situation. > >-------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.winehq.org/pipermail/wine-users/attachments/20080303/15da18d2/attachment.htm
I think that on the forum side there does need to be a sticky setting some basic rules (ie check AppDB first, use meaningful subject name, etc). Having said that the people who are more likely to ask the questions that really infuriate people are also more likely not to read the rules first. What you do to educate those people I don't know but if you find a solution I'm sure every forum/list maintainer in the world would like a copy of it :) It would be a shame to split the list/forum as the problem is with a minority who won't follow rules and guidelines but just blunder in with their "help plz pac-man don't work" post with roughly the same message text (ie no helpful information regarding versions, etc).