@TimothyMuellerHarder: sorry about that... I was trying to link someone to an answer on stackexchange, but there wasn't one already available (and that question seems valid on our site), so I created my own.
I thought the whole purpose of the challenge was to get new people to the site
Which is one of things I'm wondering... is the goal to attract a bunch of new users (in which case we do want to add simple questions and answers) or do we want the site to focus on more complex problems?
True @jmlumpkin, but I found people looking for answers to these simple questions, and I wanted to link them to our site. The problem was that there was no place to link them to, since we didn't have that question asked/answered.
If questions are so simple that the answer readily appears at the top of a Google search or, gasp, via a quick search of the relavant documentation, we should think twice before posting it here.
@Senseful I didn't fully see it that way. With the current promotion, you could also easily have people add questions/answers to basically 'game' the system. I think the questions would have to be even simpler though. As in, how do I update apps on my iPhone.
@DanielL I can actually see how its a serious question too, as in, SMS didn't work over Wifi. Also (on a side note), reminds me of when MMS came to the iPhone, and certain bloggers noted that 'sending a picture through MMS over wifi was faster'.
@DanielL Not in the case that it 'aways' happens, which is where my SO comment came into play. On StackOverflow, so many people basically want you to write code for them, without even doing a simple web search. I really hope that the asker has done some research, and needs this as another resource.
I guess the misunderstanding I have is that I like one source of info rather than many. For example, whenever I have a programming question, I like finding results on SO, because I know that the community would have mentioned anything wrong with the answers on that page. The problem is that if you have only one source of info, it has to deal with both the complex and the simple questions. Is this something we are trying to avoid on Apple.SE?
@jmlumpkin It's a serious enough question, but my answer is comically short. Of all my posts, I'd hardly hold it up as my best quality work. But it got 13 votes, and then I got 11 for an equally basic "This is what Apple says on their web page" answer, and far fewer on much harder questions.
@Senseful I don't think so, and I like your relation to SO in that case. Although I couldn't imagine getting all my programming help from SO. In where you said (earlier) that the question wasn't here and so you made it, I would have almost told the person 'hey, I have a great place for you to ask it', almost in a 'give a man a fish, he eats for a day, teach a man to fish...', etc
@jaberg I wish I could move that many points a day, just life doesn't allow it :) I actually remember the day @DanielL took this answer away from me. apple.stackexchange.com/questions/2476/mac-or-macintosh/… . Was like 'oh my, how did I loose points!'
@jaberg is there a mobile interface? or just a lot of pinch to zoom?
Cyberduck (Free)
A great free FTP client. This is my go-to application. Anytime I need FTP access, I use Cyberduck. It's not quite as lightweight as Fugu, but it adds a lot more functionality than Fugu. I also really like the Growl integration with Cyberduck.
Fugu (Free)
Awesome little FTP c...
Cyberduck (Free)
A great free FTP client. This is my go-to application. Anytime I need FTP access, I use Cyberduck. It's not quite as lightweight as Fugu, but it adds a lot more functionality than Fugu. I also really like the Growl integration with Cyberduck.
Fugu (Free)
Awesome little FTP c...
Good night iPhone. Good night keys. Good night new iPad. Good night old iPad. Good night v5 pen which is always in my back pocket. Good night MacBook. Good night 24" Dell monstrosity which looks tiny next to the iMac I use at work. Good night VC13. Good night Facebook. Good night to all the folks analyzing the strange correlation between all of the items in this post. Good night Hashem; thanks for everything. Oh, and of course, Good night moon.
Double tapping the home button on the lock screen shows you both media controls, and a camera icon to the right of the unlock swiping track. Not only is the Camera available from the lock screen, but as soon as you push the home button, it whisks you right back to the lock screen. So nobody can g...
Seriously my friend, I have no problems with your deleting my response to that question. It was probably ill-considered on my part. But the crap questions we're getting as a result of this contest are really getting to me.
So the big promotion is getting far more participation than I ever expected was possible. This is a big win, and CHAOS pulled off an amazing thing here. Kudos for all your planning work! Less than a week into the contest, there are already as many people at level 2 as I expected would be there by...
My strategy is to knock them down—but the "we want to build a community" advocates keep overriding me. I'm in agreement with Joel—*sometimes you just* knowsomeone isn't going to become a valued part of the community (Paraphrased from a recent SE podcast)
Question voting costs nothing in rep - up or down.
Pick the ones you like - raise them to the top. Offer to help the ones you don't like - but it's really the free internet. I think it's great so many people are trying to see what questions are useful, which are needing answers.
Don't worry about the contest - it doesn't matter since these questions are going to be here for a long time. Just like when we close a question - it's just temporary - on hold for fixing.
And - remember - we're optimizing for answers - not questions. They are the fertilizer for great answers - so if stuff seems really bad - you can flag it, but most of the things I see is saveable - even if it's going to take some time.
@DanielL hey now - no need for pejorative terms - even silly ones.
Yah - so let me turn that around - why would we care if it's a bad question - if I feel something wasn't made with care or smartly - the worst thing i could do is totally ignore it.
@jaberg I'm too optimistic to see it that way - but I totally get (i think) your perspective on it. I think I'm too simple to get all in a huff most of the time. It does happen, but not much here lately is getting to me.
You know - we had a saying in sailing when people were learning to tie rope. " If you don't know how to tie knots, tie lots"
@bmike It's likely a lack of real problems that has me worked up—or maybe just that I don't want to deal with real problems—but I have no tolerance for stupid, nor do I feel I need to go out of my way to fix it.
From the perspective of the "stack exchange way" of having a very high bar for questions - we're seeing a lot of knot tying. I don't think it's bad - it's how a large group of people get involved and see. The people that see the site now - flooded with simple questions may not realize it. But it is sinking in to tons of new users. Four weeks from now - imagine how awesome it will be when the flood is over and we have some more people with rep - more experience across the board.
@bmike Again, I'm not sure I agree. One of the things that attracted me to AD/SE to begin with was the underlying concept that people would be expected to do the work themselves before asking the help of others.
We do bounce people from time to time (or ask them to take a time out) but in general people are behaving. Just keep flagging and voting and closing. When enough questions get closed or too many flags accrue (legitimate flags) we can and will step in for one to one remediation. It needs to be a continued pattern - so hang on before you start kicking assets off the boar ;-)
@DanielL What goes around comes around. Although I'm the winner this time, I hope that the selfless attitude of the regulars here results in an overall win for all of us.
Of course. We're all volunteering an insane amount of time helping other people solve computer problems. One might expect to find a bit of selflessness.
That being said, I'd be happy as a clam if you won an iPad, and wouldn't refuse one myself if it was delivered, but that's not why I'm here, nor is it why any of my friends are here.
@gentmatt: It's he. I've just got a Mac less than a year ago (I switched from a PC) and I've had all these questions I've been trying to figure out. I appreciate your help!
There a a couple tweaks that I couldn't live without. There's Zephyr, which adds a swipe-from-bottom gesture to bring up the multitasking bar, and then there's ScrollingBoard, which allows the dock to have more than four apps and scroll. Another one that was a big deal breaker was MultiCleaner. It makes it so only running apps are visible in the MultiTasking bar, and I can fully close an app with a gesture or button.
For the most part, though, I just like the feeling of being in control of my iPod.
Being able to access the entire file system and being able to modify anything gives me a sense of power.
I've been meaning to develop my own tweaks, but have never had the time to sit down and figure it out.
If I have Find my Mac set up and Bootcamp is installed as well, will my computer be trackable when I'm in Windows?
What happens if a thief steals my computer and remains in Windows all the time, will I never be able to track the laptop?
@Senseful The only low level security you can setup is setting an open firmware password. This way you cannot boot into the Windows partition without the password.
This could be useful if you don't use Windows that often.
yeah, i'm pretty sure I have that setup already. How secure are those firmware passwords though? I heard people saying that it's relatively easy to crack
You can remove the firmware password by changing the RAM configuration, booting up to the startup menu, shutting down and changing it back. Basically, if you have two 1GB chips of RAM in there now, you can remove one of the chips, start up holding alt/option, shut down and put the other chip back...
He doesn't really say what Macs this procedure can be applied to.
@gentmatt "A Q&A site for power users of Apple hardware and software" Don't know, but these needs to change. It's for "enthusiasts". Or "Fanboys", if you are a database administrator ;)
I think the promotion is a good thing, and I am calling it a promotion rather than a competition because the competetive element is potentially a bad thing here. However I have a few misgivings about the format:
"Realtime Updates" - This is some really great code, but it's intended purpose has ...
@DanielL Good Meta question, my answer is more a discussion piece, but I felt it important to kick out my thoughts somewhere that won't scroll off the top and only be there for the people who were around as I typed them.
Grrr, I have a "soft" question that I want to ask, but don't want to contribute to the lowered tone. So I will ask it here (no stealing!)
There are many places that the "linen" appears in iOS and OSX. On either of these, does anyone know of a way to replace it? I presume it;s just a PNG in a library folder somewhere. Can I swap it out whole sale across all places that use it with a nice hessian weave? Or does individual packages and components have independent resources of the identical texture?
@bmike this high bar, and sometimes the 'elitist' answers (espc. on programmers.se and so), have really turned me away from this network. Doesn't always need to have a high bar (not all questions have to be complex), and while great answers are what are needed, sometimes it comes at a cost of competition.
This is the twenty-fifth episode of the Ask Different Podcast. Your hosts this week are Kyle Cronin, Nathan Greenstein, and Mike Bradshaw.
This episode is all about the big news of the week: the new iPad. The first interesting thing about it is its name: iPad. Not iPad 3, not iPad 4G, just iPad. Officially, it’s the iPad 3rd Generation. We discuss our opinions of and experiences with the new naming convention, as well as how we plan to handle the tagging situation on Ask Different.
We move on to the meat of the new iPad and discuss its features. We list the major changes that were announced, and …
Thank you for posting this. This is almost exactly how I feel, and part of my convo in the chat last night.
I thought about it a little more, and think in some cases, we can even use the current tools and voting to almost regulate it. As in, if a user is just doing 'jeopardy' questions, we shoul...
@stuffe I think "power users" fits the description. To me, being a power user does not mean being an expert. I like Wikipedia's take on this: "A power user is a user of a personal computer who has the ability to use advanced features of programs which are beyond the abilities of "normal" users, but is not necessarily capable of programming and system administration. "
Cyberduck (Free)
A great free FTP client. This is my go-to application. Anytime I need FTP access, I use Cyberduck. It's not quite as lightweight as Fugu, but it adds a lot more functionality than Fugu. I also really like the Growl integration with Cyberduck.
Fugu (Free)
Awesome little FTP c...
I think the promotion is a good thing, and I am calling it a promotion rather than a competition because the competetive element is potentially a bad thing here. However I have a few misgivings about the format:
"Realtime Updates" - This is some really great code, but it's intended purpose has ...
