The Whiteboard

10:00 PM

I'm not sure stalking's much of an offence if it's just "Stack Exchange chat room stalking"

user41796

@AshleyNunn Sounded like he just needed to be gently smacked upside the head and taught that the behavior was unacceptable.

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit No. This kid definitely crossed a line.

Lightness Races in Orbit

huh, did VLQ get taken off SO questions?

Ixrec

@LightnessRacesinOrbit I have a bit of experience with an "e-stalker" unrelated to SE, they can be really disturbing

user15026

@GlenH7 Yeah, after a few "don't do this" smackings, he mostly stopped coming around, at least where I've been.

user15026

10:01 PM

And I'm okay with that.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ixrec the only time it's ever been heated in here has been a few political discussions; the fact that folks here feel comfortable even broaching the subject because we know the level of discourse here will stay above a certain level - or we'll simply change the subject - speaks to the expectations. Do remember - a part of P.SE's scope did (does still?) explicitly dictate the site is only for professionals which I think carries well into the culture.

Ampt

@GlenH7 Gah, I remember that day too.

Ixrec

yep, as those involved in the Mos freezing loved to point out, other chat rooms like this one have no trouble at all with political subjects

Lightness Races in Orbit

@Ixrec o.O

Ampt

That's it, I'm freezing the room. We've all been here WAY too long.

Ixrec

10:02 PM

lol

see, if you'd said that a few weeks ago, I'd have been afraid you actually planned on doing something

user41796

@Ixrec it really does come back to the individuals

Jimmy Hoffa

wonder if I could find record of the first time I joined..

user41796

Can room owners freeze a room?

Ampt

@JimmyHoffa Search for messages said by you, sort by newest, go to the oldest page

Ixrec

@GlenH7 no, but they can set it to "gallery" mode where only designated users can talk, I think

Jimmy Hoffa

10:03 PM

@Ampt can't search without a search string

Lightness Races in Orbit

Hey everybody announce what you're doing this fine Friday night

Jimmy Hoffa

And it doesn't pop up a box every time asking you to use your real name. In fact, there's no way to set your name at all. You just have to keep reminding people who you are.

Lightness Races in Orbit

user41796

@Ixrec yes, that's right. I remember Yannis warning MichaelT, Jimmy, and I about that after he made us room owners. Basically threatened us with severe beatings if we did that.

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit Setting up a christmas tree

Ampt

10:05 PM

So he single handedly made the Triumvirate?

Didn't know that

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 that's my 'morrow; some friends coming over to help us out with it.

user41796

cool

Ampt

you guys were already Room Owners by the time I joined up

Lightness Races in Orbit

I'm a super room owner. It means my power is so great you can't even see that I'm a room owner.

Here, I'll prove it and do a room owner thing.

Ixrec

@LightnessRacesinOrbit it'd be cool if mods had the power to go undercover

Lightness Races in Orbit

10:06 PM

There! Did you see it? No, of course not: because it was hidden too! I'm so powerful ha ha ha

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit This is about where I or one of the other mods starts messing with your messages and purge the history. :-D

user41796

And I'm just kidding about that

Lightness Races in Orbit

Are you though

user41796

Yes, because I'm too busy trying to get an excel workbook talking nicely with my web server

Lightness Races in Orbit

I thought you were setting up a Christmas tree

the Lounge is right - the mods are full of lies!!

Ampt

10:07 PM

@LightnessRacesinOrbit and I may have gotten a little upset at him when he did that to me once or twice.

Lightness Races in Orbit

@Ampt but you can't prove it because he messed with your messages and purged the history, right?

Aaron Hall

They should have made @LightnessRacesinOrbit a room owner of Lounge

Ampt

@LightnessRacesinOrbit No, which is why I was not thrilled with it at all.

Jan 9 '12 at 17:10, by Andy

any asp.net mvc programmer here?

First sighting of Andy ever?

Aaron Hall

They wouldn't have had to bomb the place otherwise

user41796

@AaronHall I thought almost all of the regulars there were made room owners

user41796

10:09 PM

@Ampt Andy the troll? Dunno. I think he started as Andy Harglesis but also used tons of throw-away accounts for trolling.

Aaron Hall

LightnessRacesinOrbit probably disagreed too much with the room culture.

Lightness Races in Orbit

@AaronHall I was once, briefly

@AaronHall yes the majority of the hypocrites in charge were too busy accusing me of things that they were in fact the ones doing, to like me very much

although I did nearly win a vote once

truth be told I had very little interest in it. and a position never opened up except this one time that Shog came in and removed most of the owners after another "drama", putting me up (and a couple of others) as interim owners for the weekend

of course one of the more passive aggressive troublemakers (who had managed to retain ownership) restored the status quo not thirty minutes later, so that was that

I had intended to let things settle a little before doing anything rash. this bloke hates the mods so wanted everything back to the way it had been. and Shog was now asleep/getting drunk.

Ixrec

what do you think would happen if the Lounge was simply nuked from orbit, non-temporarily?

Lightness Races in Orbit

of course the fact that this guy is on the passive aggressive team means he was inappropriately thanked for this action by moderators afterwards :( :sniff:

@Ixrec They'd start another room.

Aaron Hall

There will just be another room

user41796

10:13 PM

I thought the lounge had an extended freeze for a while anyway at some point

Lightness Races in Orbit

Chatban all the regulars and look out for sockpuppets for a month or two (not that they'll be hard to spot).

If they finally move to IRC or something I'll hear about it.

Mission accomplished at that point.

Aaron Hall

They did move to IRC, didn't they?

Lightness Races in Orbit

@AaronHall No

Ampt

@LightnessRacesinOrbit What gave me away?

Jimmy Hoffa

I think this might be my first message in here from digging:

Nov 2 '12 at 23:31, by Jimmy Hoffa

I don't think there likely are any real good OOP design books which are focussed in PHP. Would it be a valid question to ask if any actually exist? I'm just curious, as when people get their head around good design principles they've generally moved past working in PHP it seems. Though perhaps that's just my bias against php...

Ixrec

10:14 PM

that's a good way to start out

Lightness Races in Orbit

Hmm, transcript does imply they have a new IRC room. It is also clear that they haven't "moved", though, since the transcript itself is still busy.

Aaron Hall

PHP stands for Personal Home Page... so I think that's a fine comment.

Lightness Races in Orbit

hah, okay so they started up #loungecpp because I was holding ##loungecpp rofl

Ixrec

wat

Lightness Races in Orbit

Well I stand corrected - seems there's a sort of half-hearted split going on. I wouldn't expect things to change too much, though.

in Lounge<C++> on Stack Overflow Chat, Dec 6 at 11:13, by sbi

@Puppy Look, there have been many such problems, and they all have, indeed, blown over. But in a sense, they haven't. Every time this happens, this room's inhabitants get a bit more cynically frustrated about the meta police, about this Merkan bigotry, about this insensitive slapping of users who have not broken any rules, except those in the head of some bigots. So every such incident, no matter how stupid and temporarily, does push off the users here a bit more.

lol

Ampt

10:18 PM

...

FFS

Jimmy Hoffa

@LightnessRacesinOrbit if the transcript stays busy I see no issue, so long as they stop being TL in there and start being a C++ place

Lightness Races in Orbit

@JimmyHoffa good luck with that

actually they're mostly into Haskell, which goes some way towards explaining the moronity

no offence

Okay next person to remove a chat message I am going to hellban.

Ampt

Nov 19 '12 at 15:13, by MichaelT

re: writing a "career advice" do people want a single "this is what P.SE thinks?" or a multitude of "different perspectives on career development"?

Lightness Races in Orbit

SE has hellbans. Enjoy yours.

Ampt

that's gotta be MichaelT's first

Ixrec

10:20 PM

(removed)

Ampt

Dec 31 '12 at 14:05, by GlenH7

@JayBazuzi - the 2nd part of your question is unanswerable by P.SE, sorry. That having been said, 4 - 5 years is a long time for something to exist and not receive a takedown request. Copyright / trademark / patent must all be enforced without discrimination. You can rely upon the precedent of that fork existing for so long as basis for using in your project. Worst case is that you'd be liable for a cease & desist at some point later in life but you wouldn't be liable for damages.

There's Glens I think

all within 2 months of eachother haha

user41796

Sounds about right

Jimmy Hoffa

@LightnessRacesinOrbit eh? How ya mean? And yeah, I don't expect them to keep it clean (people like that just...can't...) but just saying, it's not the room, it's the people left to it.

user41796

We also started on the main site within a few months of each other as well

Lightness Races in Orbit

@JimmyHoffa I'm getting a notification that you've said something, but the hellban means I can't read it.

Ixrec

10:22 PM

not much of a hellban if it still goes BONG

Lightness Races in Orbit

@GlenH7 New year 2013? Children!

@Ixrec It's more of a gentle chime.

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit Oddly enough, I had been listening to Jeff & Joel as they first discussed starting up SO. But I wasn't doing enough development work at the time to where I thought I could meaningfully contribute, so I didn't participate in the beta. And it was quite a while before I came back around.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 is so? I don't believe I ever noticed

user41796

@JimmyHoffa Yeah, we're all fairly close IIRC

Jimmy Hoffa

the thing with the chat is before we popped in; it just didn't have consistency so people would drop in and out

Ampt

10:26 PM

that feel when you realize Chat.SE profiles have a "First joined date"

Lightness Races in Orbit

> [Chat.SE] user since 2012-03-04

user41796

@Ampt I can make that (message) disappear if it helps. :-)

Lightness Races in Orbit

oh wow, total fail. [Chat.SE] expands to Server Fault.

> [Chat.SO] user since 2011-01-03

Ampt

Jul 1 '13 at 18:55, by Ampt

Yeah, I usually leave a lot of comments, but I'm trying to give good answers to subjects I know a little bit about

aha

Ixrec

Server Fault

Ampt

10:29 PM

there's mine

Ixrec

whoa, you're right

wtf is that about

Ampt

Apparently I had a chat account for like 2 weeks before I actually chatted

What is this black magic

user41796

Wasn't server fault the first SE site?

Ampt

Programmers

Lightness Races in Orbit

0

Q: In chat, "[Chat.SE]" expands to a Server Fault link

As the title says. Write "[Chat.SE] roflcopter" in the input box. Press enter. Chat message appears, rendered as "Server Fault roflcopter". Roflcopter.

@GlenH7 yes.

Jimmy Hoffa

10:30 PM

@Ampt looks like I had one for a year before.. so not particularly useful

Ixrec

nice touch

Ampt

Ok I'm done for the day

Have a good weekend progs

user41796

See ya

Lightness Races in Orbit

night Ampt

hope you're less ampt up tomorrow

Aaron Hall

(removed) is annoying.

user41796

10:37 PM

You didn't miss anything

Aaron Hall

You're just saying that. It was actually really important. You just don't want me to know. :P

user41796

Well, obviously. But the polite thing for me to do is to tell you that you didn't miss anything about [ chat.se ] expanding out and roflcopters.

Lightness Races in Orbit

@JarrodRoberson Lemme just tell you how I see SO. I see it as mostly a tech support site for beginners who don't know how to use a debugger. Boring -- the 10,000th segfault from someone who doesn't know what a debugger is. Questions about best practices whether they are about how to effectively use a language feature or a design pattern are at least interesting. They at least invite answers which require some time and thought invested into them. I'm mainly desperate for interesting material -- and a best practices question seems like an oasis in contrast to an MCVE Q from one who doesn't... — Ike yesterday

Oh my.

@GlenH7 :D

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit Coming from someone who started their answer with:

user41796

> I must admit, I love best practices questions!

user41796

10:40 PM

I was about to invite them over to Progs until I read that.

user41796

I actually chastised a candidate once during an interview who kept using the term "best practices" as the end all be all

Lightness Races in Orbit

@GlenH7 that, "passion since a young age" and wanting to have sex with design patterns is an instant "no" when I'm hiring

user41796

Used it as an opportunity to ask about "what makes a best practice then?" Was not the level of conversation that they had expected

Lightness Races in Orbit

heh

so what did you say to chastise them about it?

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit Yeah, intimate familiarity with design patterns is a red flag

Aaron Hall

10:42 PM

You may have chased away someone who really cares about good code, but that's a good followon question.

what did they allege makes a best practice?

Ixrec

isn't "familiarity" with design patterns a good thing? they are actually somewhat useful when you don't idolize them

user41796

@LightnessRacesinOrbit Pointed out that you have to understand the why behind a supposed best practice to truly understand if it applies in that case or not. And that you can't blindly accept something simply because someone declared it to be "best"

Lightness Races in Orbit

@GlenH7 Why not? I heard that was the best practice for dealing with best practices.

user41796

@AaronHall Someone on the internet said so is what their justification boiled down to

Lightness Races in Orbit

@Ixrec :whoosh:

Aaron Hall

10:44 PM

A lot of times in my answers about Python I recommend certain strategies for accomplishing an intent over other strategies, and I provide the reasoning for it. I sometimes use the phrase, "best practice."

user41796

I'm okay with that because you can back the claim with a why based in experience

Aaron Hall

Actually, I don't even appeal to my experience, I try to prove it with code.

user41796

But just because you read some blog by some person on the interwebs somewhere who didn't provide any other justification is not sufficient to call something a best practice

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ixrec the problem is people rarely strive for that thoughtful middle ground you just described. It's either "I'm just going to memorize and spout this stuff because it has been decided as best!" or "I don't really get it, hey friend, do you get it? No? Ok, then we agree it's nonsense except singleton, global state makes things easier."

Aaron Hall

And that's what the majority of the people who use the term mean by it?

user41796

10:46 PM

@AaronHall Ask more often when you hear the term. You might be surprised at what you find out.

Jimmy Hoffa

goes back to as I mentioned the other day: Cognitive load of not following the crowd. Most people don't want to hassle with it, and many will look down upon you for doing so ("no no, you just don't understand design patterns if you don't think they are the best food since sliced cheesecake", "Best practices should be followed rigidly or else you're going to make mistakes! I knew somebody who didn't once, it was horrible!")

Aaron Hall

that makes sense, "best practices" is a term taught in business school, and business school undergrads don't have the best academic reputations.

user41796

@JimmyHoffa and you gotta ~~catch~~ use 'em all!

Jimmy Hoffa

> You don't do what everyone else does ?? You must be stupid ! Everyone does it this way, I guess you don't understand how people are doing things...

I've heard that exact sentiment too many times...

user41796

Which is why I dislike blind adherence to "best practices."

Aaron Hall

10:50 PM

that's social proof, not best practices

user41796

@AaronHall See, you're wrong. 'cause everyone knows that that's the best practice, amirite?

user41796

I joke. But I've seen that a bit too much.

Duga

This is a perfect question for Programmers.SE, as far as I can tell. Without an MCVE, it doesn't really belong here. — Lightness Races in Orbit 53 secs ago

Lightness Races in Orbit

@gnat You're up.

Aaron Hall

lol

user41796

10:51 PM

@Duga C5 is a null pointer, not a heisenbug. Poor OP. With some editing, that might be on topic here

Jimmy Hoffa

@LightnessRacesinOrbit ...what is MCVE?

Lightness Races in Orbit

@JimmyHoffa a testcase

Aaron Hall

Minimal Complete Verifiable Example

Jimmy Hoffa

ah

user41796

I'd want to scope that down so it's not a "how do I debug?" question

Duga

10:57 PM

@duffymo If you look at the original post it is an extremely low quality question and is obviously a homework question. It is not just me who thinks so. This question should have been closed in the first place. As for the answer I down voted and left the comment because I believe in learning than copying and pasting. As for low rep anyone can get more reps on this site if they wanted. Obviously rep points are more important to you than actually helping someone learn. The OP didnt even reply to any comments or anything other than saying thank you to already written code. I HATE BAD PROGRAMMERS — khuderm 36 secs ago

Jimmy Hoffa

@Duga It's Friday, here's your MCVE

user41796

@JimmyHoffa Since Duga's a bot, would she consider that offensive?

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 it's Friday for @Duga too.

Drunk robots at DARPA Robot Competition

►

That one's for you @Duga

Aaron Hall

those pics/videos take up a lot of screen real estate.

Jimmy Hoffa

9 hours ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

Dec 7 at 16:42, by Jimmy Hoffa

Nov 6 at 20:35, by enderland

2 days ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

yesterday, by MichaelT

Jul 28 '14 at 18:52, by Jimmy Hoffa

<--- Helping.

does that wash enough of it away?

if not, I could always...help more... :)

Ixrec

11:03 PM

eventually that's going to hit the right edge of the chat

Aaron Hall

37 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

9 hours ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

Dec 7 at 16:42, by Jimmy Hoffa

Nov 6 at 20:35, by enderland

2 days ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

yesterday, by MichaelT

Jul 28 '14 at 18:52, by Jimmy Hoffa

<--- Helping.

Jimmy Hoffa

18 secs ago, by Ixrec

...chat supports circular references?

Aaron Hall

There, that's better.

Ixrec

...chat supports circular references?

Aaron Hall

recursion :)

Shog9

11:08 PM

Chat supports some interesting stuff...

Jul 28 '14 at 18:52, by Jimmy Hoffa

4 mins ago, by Aaron Hall

37 secs ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

9 hours ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

Dec 7 at 16:42, by Jimmy Hoffa

Nov 6 at 20:35, by enderland

2 days ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

yesterday, by MichaelT

Jul 28 '14 at 18:52, by Jimmy Hoffa

<--- Helping.

user41796

@Shog9 GAH! Don't encourage them!

Jimmy Hoffa

21 hours ago, by Jimmy Hoffa

@LightnessRacesinOrbit no more scotch and coffee antics... I would be forced to toil away my time writing code like I did before SE...the horror; take it back shog, take it back!

No do close the chatternets... :( Just make TL 302 to a book about morals or something

Aaron Hall

@Shog9 I'm citing you in my profile nowadays.

@JimmyHoffa c'mon...

user41796

@Shog9 - how long does it usually take you to process various incidents and then come back with your much higher level analysis of the situation(s)? After reading the MSE, MSO, and MSFF posts about the various chat drama, I was really impressed at the level you took the discussion to.

Shog9

@GlenH7 depends on the situation

user41796

11:14 PM

That's fair. I think the MSFF one is what really impressed me the most. That was quite a heated situation, and your analysis of it quickly moved past the weeds and took it to where the conversation belonged

Shog9

I spend a lot of time reading what others' are saying, and trying to understand what's missing. Sometimes, that takes a while - especially when no one's talking.

user41796

The whole analogy of sitting in a tavern / bar somewhere seemed very apt

Lightness Races in Orbit

@Duga rofl

Aaron Hall

@Shog9 I propose a chat rule - anything said can't be deleted for 10 seconds.

Jimmy Hoffa

@GlenH7 dibs:

Lightness Races in Orbit

11:15 PM

@AaronHall Where?

Shog9

@GlenH7 yeah, it's what that community needed to hear, I think - they were full of personalities that you might find in a bar, loudly talking to anyone who'll listen, until the owner gently encourages them to leave.

Aaron Hall

On the main site, that's why I called it a chat rule. :P

Shog9

it's an analogy that falls apart elsewhere though

Lightness Races in Orbit

@AaronHall Look more closely at the message I'm replying to!

Shog9

@AaronHall no one calls me Heyer, btw ;-)

user41796

11:17 PM

@Shog9 The diversity of room culture is what makes it a thorny beast to rein in.

Aaron Hall

@Shog9 I do. I value real world personalities.

Lightness Races in Orbit

AHA!

NOW I KNOW WHO SHOG IS

Aaron Hall

OMG, you never read his profile?

Lightness Races in Orbit

@AaronHall No?

Aaron Hall

:P Like gag me with a spoon.

Shog9

11:19 PM

@GlenH7 yeah... That's where I'm trying to kinda sit back and listen for a while with the current discussion. SE traditionally works best when a lot of folks sorta all understand how things are supposed to work and convey that notion to new folks as they come in; that's not always happening in chat though, and my gut feeling is we have too many different ideas about what chat is.

So, worth listening to all of them.

Jimmy Hoffa

Teams? How long has that been a thing? I should check in on SO more often...

Shog9

a month maybe?

user41796

@Shog9 One more bug to put in your ear is how room owners are able to be selected. I haven't been keeping up with the MSE thread to see if that's been mentioned. But having a single toxic room owner enables other similarly minded room owners to be selected.

Aaron Hall

I think there needs to be a mechanism to do room moderation other than "room owner".

Jimmy Hoffa

@Shog9 they provide anything interesting? Can I make a The Whiteboard team? Or perhaps just a Coffee Day team...

Ixrec

11:20 PM

I wasn't entirely sure what answers you wanted on that MSE question, tbh that's the only reason I haven't posted any answers or comments myself

it seemed like another essay about why the flagging system needs work wasn't what you were after

user41796

sorry, misread that

Shog9

@Ixrec it isn't, really. The problems with flags invariably follow from the problems elsewhere; they'd be easy to fix if folks were on the same page about what they wanted.

Ixrec

fair enough

Shog9

@GlenH7 yeah... A difference there between small rooms and larger ones. For a room with maybe 3-10 people in it, RO is less important.

Ixrec

the only thing I had to add was that, at least of the flags I've seen, over half are completely frivolous, which robs them of any semblance of being a legitimate indicator that someone crossed a line

Jimmy Hoffa

11:23 PM

@Shog9 on a more serious note; has SO thought about doing anything regarding the FGITW problem from a feature standpoint of late? I know it's something that has been talked over ad nauseum for years - but only recently has SO seemed to be committing to a robust feature-development-plan so seems things they talk about recently are more likely to actually come to fruition

Shog9

@JimmyHoffa not really, not yet anyway. Just a way to show off your allegiances.

Ixrec

but it's true we probably can't solve that problem without some agreement on the line first

Shog9

@JimmyHoffa you have to consider FGITW a problem first...

Jimmy Hoffa

@Shog9 badges. Fun. Can users make them? We want hats, I would proudly wear a coffee mug team badge on my SO profile

Shog9

35

Q: The Teams Private Beta is Starting

The Teams private beta is starting now! Here’s what a Team page looks like: What’s Happening Now? For Users That Are Enrolled in the Beta: If you are enrolled in the beta, you should have received (or will shortly receive) an email with instructions regarding how to create your Team. You wil...

discussion teams

Jimmy Hoffa

11:24 PM

@Shog9 ah, is that SO's agreed on perspective of it? From a business standpoint and community standpoint it absolutely isn't a problem I understand, but I thought it was something SO did see as an issue - I could have been wrong though. I've stayed away from SO for years so I don't keep up...

Shog9

@JimmyHoffa getting an answer to your question FAST is something an awful lot of folks rather appreciate. Competing for that spot is also fun for a lot of folks.

For those that aren't interested, it's easy enough to opt out (although less obvious than it should be)

Have you seen the new nav?

Jimmy Hoffa

don't believe so

Ixrec

anecdotally, I've heard multiple people who (unlike me) are invested in SO claim that the FGITW problem discourages quality answers to the point that they no longer have any desire to participate in the site; while I have no way of quantifying that it certainly seems like that would qualify as a problem

Shog9

242

Q: New Navigation Release Candidate

TLDR: We overhauled the navigation again. To get it you need to opt in via the user preferences page, and we want your general feedback (love it / hate it) after you try it for a few days. We are planning to deploy it before the end of the year, and your feedback is important. New new nav: bac...

discussion new-nav

Jimmy Hoffa

@Shog9 how do you "opt out" ? I opted out by switching over to P.SE years ago, not aware of another approach

Shog9

11:27 PM

Biggest problem on SO is finding what you're after. Whether that's the newest question you can FGITW, or an interesting question you can chew on for a while.

Jimmy Hoffa

@Ixrec depends on the site goal really. As he said above, they want people to get answers and quickly, which is reasonable and beneficial to many people..

Shog9

so we're reworking the navigation to try & address that.

Aaron Hall

@Shog9 I've visited the Lounge, I've seen people I think are worthy of moderating present, but they didn't have authority to do anything.

user41796

That's very cool. Might actually encourage me to participate on SO more

Jimmy Hoffa

@Shog9 ah - so there is something of recent that may aid with FGITW

Shog9

11:28 PM

if that's what you're after, yes

gnat

yesterday, by GlenH7

okay, when do we get our 3 votes to close back?

Shog9

@gnat did Jon post his post mortem yet?

user41796

@gnat I think that's up to us to have that conversation with Jon

Shog9

might wanna wait a little bit, just to give the results time to settle

user41796

@Shog9 Nope, not yet

Ixrec

11:29 PM

@GlenH7 any idea where we go to do that? I haven't seen him here since...week 2 of the experiment?

Shog9

A week to a month for stuff to get edited / reopened / deleted

gnat

@Shog9 not yet. And I'm not holding my breath for it, there could be simply a lot of food for thought there for him

Shog9

let's wait on it then. Lotta stuff happening this month, and holidays & so on

user41796

@Ixrec We have the usual options - could ping him on the original question with a comment. Any of the mods could ping him in TL. Worst case is that I or one of the other non-progs-mods could super ping him here.

user41796

@gnat I don't want the analysis rushed - there's a very good potential of making a permanent change for our site and possibly other SE sites. My fear is that rushing things would push us towards not getting the change.

gnat

11:31 PM

@GlenH7 agree about 200%

user41796

All in all, I think it was very positive for the site. And it allowed the regular community moderation group to focus on higher value activities for the site instead of scrubbing out close worthy questions.

Ixrec

I'm glad it happened because at least for that short while it made me care about the site again; it was actually a place worth visiting and contributing to because the junk got cleaned up

right now I'm just really nervous that we'll never get back to that state, but still hoping

gnat

@GlenH7 I particularly enjoyed editing to reopen. Haven't had so much fun with this for over a year. Felt like in good old days, before that friggin' "SE Quality Project" started pushing garbage towards non-SO sites

Ixrec

what exactly was the "SE Quality Project"? all I remember is SO getting Triage

user41796

I sincerely hope the numbers show that things like edits went up during the experiment. I think that would be a solid reason to make it a permanent change.

Ixrec

11:36 PM

Jon's latest meta answer already shows that

he sounded very positive about it

Aaron Hall

Which answer?

Ixrec

6

A: The number of votes required to close and reopen questions is temporarily reduced . . . for science!

I wasn't going to update the experiment this week, but the results this week were so encouraging I can't help myself: Week posted Qs Closed Close Rate Closed->Edited Reopened Cl->Ed->Re Deletion Rate ----------- --- ------ ---------- -------------- -------- ---------- ------------- 2015-10-12 ...

gnat

@Ixrec Triage is part of it. And more sophisticated question blocks etc etc. meta.stackexchange.com/tags/se-quality-project/info Improvements in SO close queue are formally not a part of it but tightly coupled

Lightness Races in Orbit

The Sith Themes - The Imperial March / Empire Day

►

enjoy

Aaron Hall

Yeah, that seems cool and legit.

user41796

11:37 PM

@Ixrec I missed that

Ixrec

@gnat was any part of it not exclusive to SO?

gnat

@Ixrec part for rolling q-blocks went network wide

Aaron Hall

There's some injustice in answers posted 6 months ago buried next to answers that were posted 6 years ago that both have double-digit range upvotes.

gnat

@AaronHall you probably use "wrong" sort order. Like many (most?) active site users do...

7

Q: How many votes and flags are cast by users preferring particular answer order (active / oldest / votes)?

Answers sort order "sticks", meaning that system stores it somehow, so that it is possible to get statistics related to its usage. I would like to know how many (percentage) of votes and flags are cast by users who prefer "active", "oldest" and "votes" sort order respectively. I expect this to ...

support flags voting statistics answer-order

...and frankly, I hope to find out that most votes and flags are cast by folks using different (default) order. :) That would mean I can worry less about a bunch of quality issues that are "amplified" by my (active) sort order — gnat Mar 5 at 22:07

Aaron Hall

how does the system define "latest activity?"

trivial edits? comments? That doesn't seem ideal either.

I guess there's some injustice in new answers supplanting old ones too, but the site seems to be based on the proposition that "how it works" is the best answers are at the top.

gnat

11:51 PM

@AaronHall for "active" answers sorting, by edits

Aaron Hall

I'd replace the current vote sort order and replace it with something like recent vote velocity

Yes, I'd replace it twice, redundantly.

gnat

@AaronHall well, as for me, I'd "replace" current approach of how system handles multiple answers. Try questions with 4 or less answers, it's easy to notice that any sort order works reasonably well for these. Things get worse when there are more answers than that...

2

Q: The system supports questions with multiple answers poorly (and is becoming worse at it)

TL;DR Can the system do something to help us more efficiently handle quality of the content in questions with multiple answers? Recently I've seen notes from Stack Exchange staff about how it would be nice if site would allow for broader, softer kind questions. This was said by Robert Cartaino...

discussion answer-quality quality

Lightness Races in Orbit

I have no idea what this is asking. You just sort of launch into trying to back up your proposal without actually clearly stating what it is. What does "handle quality of the content" mean? And what's not "efficient" about how it's currently performed? And what in heck does "question has multiple answers" have to do with anything? — Lightness Races in Orbit 18 secs ago

Aaron Hall

Yeah, you need a free downvote per day

we need to get our users in more of a habit of downvoting

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