The Hangar

Stack Exchange

12:42

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On this question, I added definition. Is that a tag we should have? The summary would be something like: Definitions of common aviation terms for reference by those new to the industry Or something to that effect

discussion

Jo 7

13:19

Hi guys!

Just been reviewing some questions.

Jay Carr

@casey - And thanks for clearing up the helicopter bit, forgot to say that yesterday.

@Farhan - Ahhh the internet age... If it can't be said in 144 characters or less, it's not worth saying.

Stack Exchange

18:48

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Q: What's the logic behind revising a post many times?

If you have 2000 or more rep, you can see the most edited posts. Some of the posts have been edited upto 20 times, by the OP only. What's the logic behind doing this? I don't have any problem with it. Just curious to know!

discussion

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Q: Should we have easily searchable questions here?

Area 51 metrics suggest that we should have over 90% traffic from search engines. Now, suppose that you are a user, who is not associated with Aviation.SE in anyway. You search for something like "How is an aircraft tracked in sky?" Since Aviation.SE has one of the best SEO ratings, our results ...

discussion

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Q: Should we broaden our scope to include questions related to artillery used in defense aviation as well?

This question got me thinking this. As there are passengers to commercial aviation, the same is the relation of bombs to bombers. So, should we consider such questions about the artillery on-topic as well? Artillery is very much why defense-aviation and bomber prosper!

discussion feature-request scope

voretaq7

Wow, I didn't expect that altimeter thing to be so popular :-)

FreeMan

19:06

@voretaq7 Whachutalkinbout, Willis? I ask good questions!!!

and you give good answers!

voretaq7

19:19

@FreeMan I'm surprised nobody'd asked it before. I had to talk to 2 instructors and a mechanic to get to the point where I figured I understood the differences "well enough" so I was happy to write it down for the next curious soul :)

Dan Hulme

what question are we talking about?

it's not the "does the altitude change if you don't touch the altimeter" one, is it?

voretaq7

(the mechanic was the one who pointed out that there are "non-sensitive" altimeters with Kollsman windows so you can't always rely on that. "Three pointers and a Kollsman window" seems to be a good indicator though)

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Q: What is the difference between "sensitive" and "non-sensitive" altimeters?

In this answer reference was made to "sensitive" and "non-sensitive" altimeters. What is the definition of each, what are the differences, and why would one be used in preference to the other? And why isn't it called an "insensitive" altimeter?

flight-instruments terminology altimeter

that one

Dan Hulme

maybe I am lucky: I have only ever used one with a hundreds hand and a pressure adjustment, and I didn't know there was any other kind

voretaq7

And if anyone knows what TSO (if any) covers "non-sensitive" altimeters I'd love to know. (It might be in C10b but I'm not spending 15 bucks for a copy of the TSO to find out. I'm a cheap bastard. :P)

FreeMan

@voretaq7 well, thanks for sharing!

I had pictured a "sensitive" altimeter quietly sobbing in the corner of the hanger after a rough landing because it wasn't accurate enough...

;)

voretaq7

19:24

@DanHulme I've seen non-sensitive ones in "classic" planes (like cubs) around here, but even those usually when the altimeter dies they pop in a sensitive one because the shops have those on the shelf.

I've never seen one like the white-faced one I found the picture of (where the face of the instrument turns with the knob) in person - THAT would freak me out.

@FreeMan The sensitive altimeter tells you it's OK, everyone makes bad landings every now and then, you'll do better next time.

The non-sensitive altimeter calls you an asshole and tells all the other instruments what a lousy pilot you are :)

FreeMan

lol

Dan Hulme

if you are looking at the alti during the landing you are probably doing it wrong

unless you have a radar alti, and probably even then?

voretaq7

@DanHulme maybe in a zero-visibility Cat III approach, but if you can see out the window that's generally where you should be looking :)

Dan Hulme

@voretaq7 window? what's that? :-p

voretaq7

@DanHulme What I don't want to look out of right now because it's overcast and depressing.

Dan Hulme

19:45

does your altimeter actually read 0 if you set the QFE? the ones on the tigers usually read somewhere either -50 ft or +50 ft

FreeMan

Not a pilot, @DanHulme, not a pilot, @voretaq7, just making a joke about the sensitive altimeter....

voretaq7

@DanHulme it should read field elevation (plus or minus "reasonable")

Dan Hulme

QFE, not QNH

voretaq7

@DanHulme oh yeah, then it should read zero (height) instead of field elevation (altitude)

. . . "but why would you want to do that?" :-P

Dan Hulme

(Cambridge is only 47 ft amsl anyway, so the difference between QNH and QFE is like 1 hPa)

Jay Carr

20:17

@voretaq7 You make the non-sensitive altimeter sound like a real tool... .... snicker...okay, I'll shut up now.

Bret Copeland

21:46

Hey all, if you have opinions on site graduation, please read and give input on this MSE post. This likely affects aviation.

6

Jay Carr

@BretCopeland Upvoted it (and the top answer), and I'm 100% behind that plan. Very sensible compromise all around.

voretaq7

@BretCopeland I think we should take a semester off to bum around Europe, maybe date a nice French model and do regretable things while drunk off our collective ass on wine.... What, it's not like college graduation?!

Bret Copeland

@JayCarr Might want to express what you agree with via a comment somewhere. The only part which seems to be controversial is when privilege levels should be raised.

Jay Carr

@BretCopeland There, added a comment :).

I wish there were some way to make that a "super featured" post on the main page...maybe with flashing lights and such so people would be sure to see it ;)

voretaq7

22:02

@BretCopeland the privilege level thing is tricky. I think it may need to be finer-grained than a "Beta / Graduated" switch. Definitely should be independent of design though.

Bret Copeland

I agree that it's tricky. I don't honestly have that strong of an opinion, but I want people who do to comment/answer.

Jay Carr

@voretaq7 I'd actually agree with that sentiment. But I figure if they push it back to "when you have a site design" we can always talk more about making things finer grained.

Hence the "throwing all possible support behind the proposed solution"

Bret Copeland

I like the idea of giving people a heads up "privilege levels are going up in 30 days" gives people the ability who are on the verge of losing something they want to scramble for more rep before it disappears.

voretaq7

Yeah, I'm not even all that worried about getting a design (because "Default Beta Blue" isn't a bad color for an Aviation site).

@BretCopeland Yeah, or making it a knob rather than a switch and ramping it up over time to keep the same proportion of "high rep" privileged users

we've got a good page full of 3K+ users which is the really big hurdle

Bret Copeland

Unfortunately, that would require code changes.

switch is easier to flip

ratchet freak

22:10

currently there are 3 levels of rep thresholds

private beta, public beta and graduated

voretaq7

@BretCopeland easier to flip, harder to modify (knob could be a simple multiplier for "fully graduated" numbers - but yeah it would require a code change to put in a knob so probably not happening any time soon :)

ratchet freak

I don't see a problem with adding a mature level between public beta and graduated

though depends on how the limits are implemented

voretaq7

@ratchetfreak One where Trusted User caps out at say 10k (50% of "fully graduated") would make sense

Jay Carr

Yeah, that's sensible.

It'd give me something to reach for anyway...

Bret Copeland

You can make the argument on that meta post if you want.

Jay Carr

22:13

Mostly I just want to have someone who is familiar with the site and it's needs controlling the "knob". I'm not a fan of just moving privledge requirements around because some other arbitrary goal has been achieved. I think the mods should just crank them up when it feels like the right time.

Bret Copeland

All of our rep requirements are settings named like:

Privileges.CommunityPostEditing.ReputationRequiredPrivateBeta
Privileges.CommunityPostEditing.ReputationRequiredPublic
Privileges.CommunityPostEditing.ReputationRequiredPublicBeta

Jay Carr

@BretCopeland I don't want to confused the issue at the moment... Maybe someone can be brave and post the idea on Meta after the discussion on this has died down.

Bret Copeland

Technically they can be changed on a per-site basis, but it's unusual for most privileges.

Jay Carr

See, I'd argue that should actually be the norm (if it's not stupid from a technical standpoint anyway...)

Each site is different, after all.

Bret Copeland

The goal is generally to reduce the amount of manual work.

Jay Carr

22:16

Yeah I hear you on that...

Bret Copeland

Also, having consistency across the network is nice. You don't have to always lookup how much rep something requires on any given site.

Also, some rep requirements scale up with graduation, and some don't.

Jay Carr

Yeah, but... Counterpoint: I don't think usability should be simply sacrificed for better usability.

Oh?

Or maybe I need to learn more before yapping anymore...

ratchet freak

and having something scale with the amount of high rep users automatically would be strange

Bret Copeland

yeah, it would be weird.

Jay Carr

@ratchetfreak That's why I'd argue for a SE employeed moderator to be the arbiter on that.

One who has been around and knows the needs here.

voretaq7

22:19

@ratchetfreak Yeah I don't think it could be "automatic" in any meaningful sense

Jay Carr

(And probably has asked around a bit...mebbe...)

voretaq7

@JayCarr that would require every site to have a SE employee moderator - there are lots where there just aren't many employees interested in the field.

(though it would be nice if Stack could afford to hire an employee to basically be their representative on each site :)

Jay Carr

Fair enough

ratchet freak

isn't that what CMs are for?

Jay Carr

That does make it difficult, I don't think I'd trust someone who is only here as an enthusiast to be unbiased...

Bret Copeland

22:20

There are not really any SE-employed moderators.

ratchet freak

they are not site specific but I don't believe a single site has that much workload

Bret Copeland

There are some moderators who are SE employees, but it's certainly not what we're paid to do.

Jay Carr

Oh? You just like it here I guess? (I honestly had thought you were assigned here or something, and were just lucky because you like airplanes...)

Bret Copeland

I'm not even on the community team. I'm just a pilot who happens to work as a developer here.

Jay Carr

Ahhhh...

It must feel really weird to ask a question on SO when you work for SE.... </random aside>

Bret Copeland

22:22

I've never done it.

Jay Carr

Looked up answers on SO?

ratchet freak

made 48 answers though ;)

Jay Carr

Oh, and answered on SO, apparently :)

ratchet freak

Bret Copeland ♦, New York, NY

3.4k 1 10 22

node.js javascript socket.io express mongodb json jade

Bret Copeland

@JayCarr nah, we have SO blocked on the internal network.

ratchet freak

22:24

how do you push to production then?

Jay Carr

It's a prudent move, that place is just ridiculous and uninformative. Whoever thought a bunch of volunteers could answer code questions well was deluding themselves ;)

Bret Copeland

We outsource production to India. We prefer to concentrate our efforts on the April 1st and winter-bash features.

Jay Carr

I still approve, I just figured it would be better to just star the comment... Anyway, out of curiosity, are all devs at SE giving moderator privileges?

ratchet freak

I don't think so

Bret Copeland

All devs are given mod on MSE, but not necessarily other sites.

ratchet freak

22:28

only if they win the election or wine enough

Jay Carr

Ah darn, I was gonna say, that's almost enough incentive to apply for a job at SE.

Bret Copeland

There are some implicit privileges employees get though, such as mod-like powers on any meta site (even without a diamond), and being able to see deleted stuff even if you don't meet the rep requirements.

ratchet freak

@JayCarr if you want to work for SE: stackexchange.com/work-here#locations=remote&team=default

Jay Carr

@ratchetfreak Pf, if they aren't making me a super mod, I'm not interested anymore.

Bret Copeland

In terms of users basically goes Regular -> Employee -> Mod -> Developer

voretaq7

22:30

@BretCopeland -> DBA

Jay Carr

They should also give you extra rep so you can look super fancy.

voretaq7

Nobody challenges them what has SA rights on the SQL Server clusterfuck.

Bret Copeland

No such thing as a DBA account on the SE Network.

Jay Carr

No need?

voretaq7

@JayCarr exactly. DBA's don't NEED accounts :)

Jay Carr

22:31

They're a bit like Chuck Norris it seems.

ratchet freak

they give themselves all the upvotes from community user

Jay Carr

Heck, they could probably spawn a 1000 copies of community user to upvote their answers if they wanted to.

Bret Copeland

Difference between an application account and an active directory account.

Developer is the highest privilege level for a SE Network account.

Active Directory controls access to things like... servers.

The two are completely unrelated.

Jay Carr

I assume you keep the application persistence data on the servers though, right? So...in theory they could go nuts and rewrite everything.

Which'd be a pain but...is theoretically doable.

Bret Copeland

@JayCarr you know how often I use my mod powers on a site other than aviation? Almost never.

Jay Carr

22:36

:( Just ruining all my little fantasies Bret, RUINING THEM!

But yeah, I'm guessing most people who work at SE have better things to do with their time than site around and cheat at the points game.

ratchet freak

especially because they already won the points game

voretaq7

@JayCarr . . . and this is why all the foreign keys are ON DELETE RESTRICT instead of ON DELETE CASCADE - to make it painful :-)

Bret Copeland

Currently there is 1 flag on Aviation, 10 on Ask Ubuntu, and 1596 on Stack Overflow. Moderating isn't particularly glamorous.

ratchet freak

diamond trumps points

Jay Carr

lol, I look at that and my first thought is, "hey Aviation.SE is doing pretty well!" But I'm guessing Ask Ubuntu has more users... I know SO does.

ratchet freak

22:39

only 1.6k flags on SO?

Jay Carr

@voretaq7 making the job harder to make gaming the system harder...weee!

voretaq7

@JayCarr Flags are more a measure of how much crap is generated by the community (and how slackerish the mods are feeling)

Jay Carr

So we are nothing but quality people with quality mods! Right!?

ratchet freak

aka come September that will spike

Bret Copeland

@ratchetfreak it's typically between 1-2k

Jay Carr

22:40

I think we should be bumped to the front of the design line for that (though not the privledges line, that can wait.)

voretaq7

It's like the review queues on SF: I could clean them out but that's such a soul-crushing task there's only so long you can do it before you want to just bludgeon people with a wrench while shouting "HAVE YOU READ THE GODDAMN MANUAL?!" :)

2

and then your wrench is all dirty and you have to go buy a new one.

Bret Copeland

There was an internal proposal about having the review queue be able to clear more mod flags. I don't remember the exact proposal.

ratchet freak

I'm on the fence on when the aviation threshold increase I'm already where I'd want to be when it graduates (over 10k is fine for me)

voretaq7

@BretCopeland I know Shog was talking about exposing more stuff in the review queues a while back, it's an interesting idea on big sites like SO

Bret Copeland

I think most people are getting pretty close on this site to being in good position for a rep level bump.

Jay Carr

22:44

Do you mean to the full thing or to the hypothetical "halfway" between here and full rep requirements.

Bret Copeland

full thing

Jay Carr

Man, I don't know where I'd dig up another 15k points.

SE's point structure is not very friendly to people who are curious as opposed to people who know the answers....

Which I guess makes sense, but isn't very helpful to me :)

Bret Copeland

I'm not saying people wouldn't lose anything, but the most important privilege for making the site work is probably close votes, and that only goes up to 3k.

Jay Carr

I just like being able to help clear the queue... And I don't think I'd be up to that level yet.

Bret Copeland

Ideally we'd have more users over 20k before making the switch, but we'll see how things play out with the MSE post.

ratchet freak

22:48

@JayCarr that's 10k

Jay Carr

I guess I only need around 4k for that. Going is just getting slower these days, I'm kind of out of questions.

Which is funny, because you'd think I'd now know all the answers but...rather I just sit around and read answers to questions from people much smarter (or at least more esoteric) than myself.

Bret Copeland

Currently 5 users over 20k, 14 over 10k.

ratchet freak

wait you can review close votes at 3k

Bret Copeland

Wow, Peter broke 40k. He's just cruising.

Jay Carr

Jeez. How many is a good number?

Bret Copeland

22:51

I have no idea.

Jay Carr

@ratchetfreak Oh, I can review the queue at 3k?

Bret Copeland

Depends largely on how active those users are in moderating.

Jay Carr

Huh, do you have statistics on who is active in moderating?

ratchet freak

5 active reviewer beats a hundred that don't even know it's there

Jay Carr

Yeah

ratchet freak

22:52

aviation.stackexchange.com/review/close/stats

Jay Carr

Wow, that certainly gives a new perspective on things.

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