[Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

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[Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Mon Apr 27, 2009 4:25 am

So what do you think of the new forum rules? Have any suggestions on improving? Any refinements?
Let's discuss!
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Mon Apr 27, 2009 1:25 pm

They seem pretty straightforward - I think this is a great start. Moderators will always be needed to clean up after those who post before they read (or search)...

I really like the [Goodie] tag that Midas used - this could also be used for tips and tricks later.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Mon Apr 27, 2009 5:19 pm

toddclausen wrote:They seem pretty straightforward - I think this is a great start. Moderators will always be needed to clean up after those who post before they read (or search)...


Great! I really feel relieved that you support the initiative. A few things still need to be specified in my opinion:
- no ALL CAPS subjects
- how many upvotes does a suggestion need in order to be included on the roadmap.

I really like the [Goodie] tag that Midas used - this could also be used for tips and tricks later.

Well, it was me :oops: I have a nasty habit of editing other people's subject lines, sorry ;)
But I think that having "tags" like [Suggestion], [Goodie], [Ann], [Administrative] helps while reading the forum.
And it will also be of great help when we outgrow this one forum and need to split it into several.

Should we have a [Talk] tag for general discussions, what do you think?
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Mon Apr 27, 2009 8:20 pm

CintaNotes Developer wrote:
toddclausen wrote:They seem pretty straightforward - I think this is a great start. Moderators will always be needed to clean up after those who post before they read (or search)...


Great! I really feel relieved that you support the initiative. A few things still need to be specified in my opinion:
- no ALL CAPS subjects
- how many upvotes does a suggestion need in order to be included on the roadmap.

I really like the [Goodie] tag that Midas used - this could also be used for tips and tricks later.

Well, it was me :oops: I have a nasty habit of editing other people's subject lines, sorry ;)
But I think that having "tags" like [Suggestion], [Goodie], [Ann], [Administrative] helps while reading the forum.
And it will also be of great help when we outgrow this one forum and need to split it into several.

Should we have a [Talk] tag for general discussions, what do you think?

I agree with the no all caps idea, unless we have an emergency announcement such as "this version will corrupt your data" kind of thing. Thoughts?

I don't yet have an opinion on the number of upvotes - we should think about what percentage of the forum participants we want to weigh in on the item, also if everyone votes overwhelmingly (+2) would that mean it would require fewer votes than something with mixed response? Most of us that frequent the forum are also power users, and also need to think about features that would have the greatest appeal for general users and keep things simple overall!

I personally like the idea of a [Talk] tag, I wonder if we should use [Announce] or [Announcement] as we are spelling everything else out like [Administrative] and [Suggestion] Agree this will help in the future WHEN :D we need to split up the forum!
-Todd
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby kranor » Tue Apr 28, 2009 6:38 am

I really like the post tagging I think it is time to build a generic list for people to use with the mods able to add these tags to subject lines as required (with a PM to topic creator)
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby Noddy330 » Tue Apr 28, 2009 6:45 am

I think the new rules work well, though sometimes the suggestion seems to change after I have voted. I hope you are influenced by, but not directed by votes. Nod
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Tue Apr 28, 2009 1:55 pm

Noddy330 wrote:I think the new rules work well, though sometimes the suggestion seems to change after I have voted. I hope you are influenced by, but not directed by votes. Nod

I agree with Nod here. As I have said before, those of us who frequent forum are more likely to be power users. We need to think of things that are useful not only to us, but create overall value without making things more challenging for the casual user. I think Alex should first and foremost focus on creating a robust and easy for anyone to use tool, then add the goodies for us! Hopefully the mods can work with the posters to refine their suggestions to the point we understand them before we vote!

EDIT: After thinking about this for a while...should we create the poll only after Alex and the mods clearly understand the suggestion? as well as how it might be implemented and ultimately affect the overall program? This would make the poll very clear to all voting on the topic - hopefully.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby Noddy330 » Tue Apr 28, 2009 3:04 pm

toddclausen wrote:
Noddy330 wrote:I think the new rules work well, though sometimes the suggestion seems to change after I have voted. I hope you are influenced by, but not directed by votes. Nod

I agree with Nod here. As I have said before, those of us who frequent forum are more likely to be power users. We need to think of things that are useful not only to us, but create overall value without making things more challenging for the casual user. I think Alex should first and foremost focus on creating a robust and easy for anyone to use tool, then add the goodies for us! Hopefully the mods can work with the posters to refine their suggestions to the point we understand them before we vote!
EDIT: After thinking about this for a while...should we create the poll only after Alex and the mods clearly understand the suggestion? as well as how it might be implemented and ultimately affect the overall program? This would make the poll very clear to all voting on the topic - hopefully.

Agreed. Your final suggestion sounds ideal - but it will be more work. Nod
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Tue Apr 28, 2009 3:16 pm

Yes, coming to think of it.. We need some kind of workflow for suggestions, and it really sounds reasonable that creating the poll should be on me and the mods.
Often I well understand the user's problem, but the proposed solution is really imperfect, and clear vision on all pros and cons is essential to make a weighted choice. I think this final solution (as a result of the whole discussion) should be added to the initial post of the topic by the mods, providing more or less detailed view on implementation, with all its pros and cons.

I won't go far for an example - in the topic about extending search method, the votes changed dramatically when I pointed out that the implementation will most probably make search slower.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby ale » Tue Apr 28, 2009 4:25 pm

I think new rules are ok and the roadmap is very useful and very well laid out!

The only thing I would change about rules is the use of polls. I somewhat think there are too many polls and although they are optional, we seem to have a poll for each suggested feature

About the use of tagging for posts in the forum I think a tag like [Bug] and the others is needed when the post has a very specific purpose. I remember at the beginning the forum was unorganized, suggestions and bug reports were mixed everywhere, but I don't like the idea of tagging each and every post or general posts like [Talk]. I think posts without a special purpose or general talking would be fine being untagged (where we know No tag = general speaking and no special meaning)
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Tue Apr 28, 2009 5:51 pm

ale wrote:About the use of tagging for posts in the forum I think a tag like [Bug] and the others is needed when the post has a very specific purpose. I remember at the beginning the forum was unorganized, suggestions and bug reports were mixed everywhere, but I don't like the idea of tagging each and every post or general posts like [Talk]. I think posts without a special purpose or general talking would be fine being untagged (where we know No tag = general speaking and no special meaning)

I totally agree! Less work for Alex and the other mods...

Too bad there aren't other options for tagging that are less obvious to the general audience
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby kranor » Wed Apr 29, 2009 5:17 am

May I suggest this set of Tags :-

[BUG] = Bug report and Investigation
[GOODIE] = Tips or Tricks
[SUG] = Suggestion
[REQ] = Request for features or change
[ADMIN] = Administrative
[URG] = Urgent Messages for users (only to be used by Mods/Developer)
[?] = Used if user believes it should be tagged but does not know correct tag. Indicator to mods to tag correctly.
[POLL] = Votes

:?: :D
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Wed Apr 29, 2009 10:52 am

kranor wrote:May I suggest this set of Tags :-

[BUG] = Bug report and Investigation
[GOODIE] = Tips or Tricks
[SUG] = Suggestion
[REQ] = Request for features or change
[ADMIN] = Administrative
[URG] = Urgent Messages for users (only to be used by Mods/Developer)
[?] = Used if user believes it should be tagged but does not know correct tag. Indicator to mods to tag correctly.
[POLL] = Votes

:?: :D


Is there really a need to use all caps for tags? I wanted to suggest using lower case to be in concordance with CintaNotes itself ;)
And there's no need to abbreviate: it would make forum look cryptic to newcomers, and I've extended the max. subject length to 150 characters anyway.

So let "suggestion" remain this way, "req" is the same as "suggestion" and is therefore superfluous, "poll" is added automatically by phpbb and needn't be mentioned in the rules.

"urgent" - don't know if that's really needed, there's an option to make topic sticky or announcement. I guess the "announce" tag would be more appropriate.

[?] is a great idea, I'm totally for it.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby Midas » Mon May 04, 2009 12:54 pm

CintaNotes Developer wrote:[...]
Well, it was me :oops: I have a nasty habit of editing other people's subject lines, sorry ;)
But I think that having "tags" like [Suggestion], [Goodie], [Ann], [Administrative] helps while reading the forum.
And it will also be of great help when we outgrow this one forum and need to split it into several.

Should we have a [Talk] tag for general discussions, what do you think?

I totally agree and condone this -- after all this is CN forum, not some web-agora, so you should be allowed to rule it the way it suits you best (as long as some basic decency protocols are respected, that is)...

BTW, been away on vacations, now obviously ended... :cry:
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby Midas » Thu May 14, 2009 11:16 am

Could posting to the FAQ thread be restricted to mods, as a way to ensure selectivity and avoid further forum admin chores? What do you think?

Edit: removed spurious comment... :oops:
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby Midas » Thu May 14, 2009 11:24 am

So, per developer recommendation, new set of tags should be:

CintaNotes Developer wrote:
[bug] = Bug report and Investigation
[suggestion] = Suggestion
[goodie] = Tips or Tricks
[?] = Denoting user belief that thread should be tagged, and an appeal to mods for inserting correct tag

[announce] = Important message for users, to be used only by Mods/Developer
[administrative] = Administrative (idem)


Do mods agree on this?
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Thu May 14, 2009 12:35 pm

Midas wrote:So, per developer recommendation, new set of tags should be:

CintaNotes Developer wrote:
[bug] = Bug report and Investigation
[suggestion] = Suggestion
[goodie] = Tips or Tricks
[?] = Denoting user belief that thread should be tagged, and an appeal to mods for inserting correct tag

[announce] = Important message for users, to be used only by Mods/Developer
[admin] = Administrative (idem)


Do mods agree on this?


I agree, the only thing: I think that "administrative" is a bit more clear than "admin".
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby CintaNotes Developer » Thu May 14, 2009 12:39 pm

Midas wrote:Could posting to the FAQ thread be restricted to mods, as a way to ensure selectivity and avoid further forum admin chores? What do you think?

Edit: removed spurious comment... :oops:


No, I think everyone should be encouraged to share tips and tricks in an open way. E.g.: remember that post of mrthermister on how he used CN as a GTD capture system? I'd like to have more of such posts. Should any offtopic discussion start, it could be split into a separate thread by mods.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Thu May 14, 2009 12:47 pm

CintaNotes Developer wrote:I agree, the only thing: I think that "administrative" is a bit more clear than "admin".

I agree with Alex on this one, and agree with the above set with the addition of this change.
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Re: [Administrative] Let's Discuss Forum Rules

Postby toddclausen » Thu May 14, 2009 12:50 pm

CintaNotes Developer wrote:
Midas wrote:Could posting to the FAQ thread be restricted to mods, as a way to ensure selectivity and avoid further forum admin chores? What do you think?

Edit: removed spurious comment... :oops:


No, I think everyone should be encouraged to share tips and tricks in an open way. E.g.: remember that post of mrthermister on how he used CN as a GTD capture system? I'd like to have more of such posts. Should any offtopic discussion start, it could be split into a separate thread by mods.

I also think this should be open, as mods we can move off topic posts out of the thread and tag those new tips that come along as [goodie]
-Todd

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