Back in April of 2010, Joel shared our assumptions about the role of small sites in the newly minted Stack Exchange network:
If a site does not have enough activity at the end of 90 days, it will be closed down. Any existing Q&A will be archived and made available for download, but the site...
The main page of the site says that there are (currently) 207 Questions. When I hover on the links though, there is a number, which I am guessing is assigned sequentially. Many recent questions are in the 1300 range. One is 872, there is a 211 and a 14. If "question sequence numbers" are over 130...
I made an edit suggestion on the site interpersonal.stackexchange.com and after submitting it I realized that it's not making the post look any different than before.
So "What is so embarrassing about that?" you may ask.
There is a chance that RC ♦ may see that edit.
This is how I think it will go down:
RC ♦ - (Checking the reviews and comes across my edit) his response: "What is this????"
I noticed that having a HNQ here is a mixed blessing. I've had "off the wall" comments and answers from people with 101 rep, indicating that they come from elsewhere in SE. However they probably aren't teachers and so have different concerns. They were once students, of course, so have valid opinions - but different.
@Buffy Yeah, I've noticed a spate of answers from people who clearly know basically nothing about teaching there. HNQs are a mixed blessing, but they bring us strong people, too. Out of curiosity, how did you come by the site?
It wasn't a complaint, actually, and @EllenSpertus I agree about the local students. One difference, though is that they are committed, not just drive-by commentators. And, yes, a variety of views is especially important for the kinds of questions I want to ask.
I was pointed here by a colleague who promoted it, though either he isn't here or is hidden behind an alter-ego.
@thesecretmaster we always learn something new. we might learn that HNQs bring opinionated comments, and sometimes we even see them bring a whole stream of goodies (Buffy and Bennett are the ones that I have in mind ;))
I note that it isn't possible to send private messages to individuals here (unless you are one of the masters of the universe). I'm pretty sure that was a design choice. It was probably a good one, but I've wanted to do so several times.
@Buffy That was one of my biggest frustrations until I was named a mod two weeks ago. And even now, we're basically not supposed to unless extreme circumstances are involved.
It is deliberate, and I suppose it keeps the whole mechanism focused on QA, which is the site's raison d'etre
@Buffy Mods can create private rooms, but only for moderation purposes. After you hit a rep threshold you can create rooms where everyone can read but only somepeople can talk. You can also invite a user to chat from their chat profile.
Update
A follow-up to this post has been made here: "The Goal of Teams: Our Follow-Up to Your Questions"
TL;DR:
We're proposing a new area called Teams. The goal is to allow groups (of varying sizes) to publicly share about themselves (who they are and what they build) on Stack Overflow. Con...
I might support the team idea, but was thinking of something more immediate and temporary, not requiring approval from anyone but the participants, but with mods overlooking the conversation (generally fly-on-the-wall).
Not surprised the US users are taking the day off, but it is a regular day in the EU. I assume from this that a huge fraction of our members are from the Americas.
Not quite what I was looking for. Sharing real identities wouldn't be protected from general knowledge. I noticed one user "outing" another whose profile suggested they wanted anonymity. I didn't care for that, even though guessing the identity was easy enough.
But then, I know the "target". I still thought his wishes should have been respected.
Some users here can probably guess who I am just from what I say, of course, as we have had many interactions in the past. Still, I want to "hide" behind Buffy
As the community grows it will become more and more true.
@ItamarG3 You should custom flag the post and explain if you haven't already... Honestly anyone approving that without paying attention should be given a break from reviewing
Easy enough to to miss, since it wasn't obvious that it was a screen name that was extended. And pretty obvious to anyone who knows a (David A) educator from Brooklyn.
Anyway, I might want to be outed to one or two people as we seem to share world view, but carrying on anonymously in comments is frowned upon and possibly disruptive. I've sinned there a few times, of course.
And of course, Jesse knows David for a fact as we all chat on the SIGCSE list.
I would guess that a lot of teachers here would be recognized by their students even behind pseudonyms just from what we say. They have heard it all before.
Semi-related question that someone here might know. Is it allowed to have a second, isolated account to use on one site that remains disconnected to the other sites?
Having multiple accounts is fine... as long as you don't use it to do things you couldn't do anyway (voting for yourself; answering your own questions etc.)
Yes.
The normal restrictions on multiple accounts apply. You are allowed to have multiple accounts, but:
there is no official support for that; it's down to you to ensure they're separated enough to not get merged
if you're doing something with one that you would be prevented from doing with t...
I dunno if anyone here cares anything about leTour, but something amazing happened today. Peter Sagan, one of my personal favorites, is second in every individual category.
What are engaging sources of data with which students can explore, develop questions, analyze, and draw conclusions in an intro CS course? I'm looking for flat files like XLSX or CSV, or relational databases in an environment that permits selection and export of a flat file.
Kelly Powers asked ...
Bit odd, of course, since he answers his own question, but a pretty valuable resource for anyone who wants it. It got an up vote, but not a lot of other action (yet).
Oddly (perhaps) enough he is one of the people that I'd like to talk with IRL. There is such a real person, but I gave up in trying to find an email address to reach him. We seem to share a world view, but I don't know him.
@ItamarG3 Also, in this case, he was basically just sharing a great resource the he had gleaned at a conference. So, he was adding useful information into our silo. This is a good example of why shopping list questions aren't always bad, and why there's always a judgement call involved
I thought it was a tool to gather useful content in one place when a question looking for such would be too broad or shopping list. In this case he's not really looking for answers, but sharing information
Not something I'd have expected, I guess? :P I don't know about you but there have been more than a few exams I've taken where I've felt like I forgot everything the day afterwards
Oh, yes. I dislike that system very much. My UK-based friends all suffered through that. And when my wife studied at Oxford for a semester, she has to do that as well. Law School here still works that way, though.
I don't use tests much, bur for assignments I always permit re-do (almost recursively). Even after the assignment is discussed. Just do-ing the work, even after being told how, adds learning imo
I never felt the need to cap it, but many re-dos could still get you 90. But you had to keep up on the other work while you re-worked stuff, of course.
It let some students recover from a disaster. But some others tended to get caught in a loop and I had to step in and advise moving on.
Mostly, as both a student and prof, I've been in non-rigid systems. I once took a physics course in which my exam grade pattern was (approx) F, D, C, B, A. Luckily the prof graded on the trend, not the average.
Luckily for me he had few constraints - and that wasn't any stated policy.
Yeah, you'll find that some of them are great, some less so. And you'll also find that some of the not-so-great-ones turn into really valuable members if they actually stick around. There really is quite a learning curve here.
That's why I try so hard to be as welcoming as I can be to first time users, even if their first answer or question isn't great.
Back in April of 2010, Joel shared our assumptions about the role of small sites in the newly minted Stack Exchange network:
If a site does not have enough activity at the end of 90 days, it will be closed down. Any existing Q&A will be archived and made available for download, but the site...
Update
A follow-up to this post has been made here: "The Goal of Teams: Our Follow-Up to Your Questions"
TL;DR:
We're proposing a new area called Teams. The goal is to allow groups (of varying sizes) to publicly share about themselves (who they are and what they build) on Stack Overflow. Con...
Yes.
The normal restrictions on multiple accounts apply. You are allowed to have multiple accounts, but:
there is no official support for that; it's down to you to ensure they're separated enough to not get merged
if you're doing something with one that you would be prevented from doing with t...
What are engaging sources of data with which students can explore, develop questions, analyze, and draw conclusions in an intro CS course? I'm looking for flat files like XLSX or CSV, or relational databases in an environment that permits selection and export of a flat file.
Kelly Powers asked ...
