MathOverflow - 2022-05-06

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3:01 PM

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Q: I have a question which is a near fit for MathOverflow. What are some other resources I might consult?

What are some other resources which might be useful for somebody considering asking a MathOverflow question, especially if their question is not quite a perfect fit here? In asking this, I have several categories of resources in mind, including but not limited to: Both online and offline resourc...

discussion closed-questions asking-questions

Have you tried making sacrifices to long-forgotten gods? Statistically speaking, there's a better chance one of those is in charge of whatever thing you're trying to solve. — Asaf Karagila ♦ 2 days ago

I sacrificed a bull to Athena and an ibis to Thoth, but when they heard it wasn't on MathOverflow they were out of ideas — Tim Campion ♦ 2 days ago

I said long-forgotten, clearly not Athena and Thoth. I was thinking more pre-Columbian deities of the Americas. — Asaf Karagila ♦ 2 days ago

I was thinking what tags might be suitable here. I thought that maybe (closed-questions) and perhaps also (asking-questions). If it is intended as a FAQ post, (faq-proposed) could be added. — Martin Sleziak 2 days ago

Some resources for your second point (not research-level) are listed here: My question was closed on MO because it is not research level. Where should I ask instead? This post is linked also from Frequently Asked Questions: MathOverflow FAQ (current revision) and in the help center. — Martin Sleziak 2 days ago

When you mentioned discipline-specific mailing lists, you reminded me of this post: Mailing lists / Usenet groups for research math. (It is from 2017, quite a few things might have changed since then.) — Martin Sleziak yesterday

Maybe I am posting too many links, but still I'll add two posts from Mathematics Meta: What are some alternatives to math.stackexchange where discussions are allowed? and What is a good forum for math discussion? — Martin Sleziak yesterday

@MartinSleziak These links are fantastic, thanks! I guess the way I framed the question it might seem a bit daunting to try formatting them into the form of a (partial) answer. If you'd prefer not to write a (partial) answer yourself, I can try to compile some of these into a (partial) answer. Also, your suggestion that this might end up being something we could tag faq-proposed seems interesting. If it goes well enough, that may be exactly what we should do! — Tim Campion ♦ 15 mins ago

@TimCampion If the intention was to have one large CW answer where various users would contribute, I have no objection if somebody else starts. (Especially considering that I have a lot of CW posts, I should leave some space to other users.

Moreover, as the OP you have better idea what kind of answer you had in mind.

@MartinSleziak Ok, thanks, good to know! If it's left to me it might be a few days before I get around to it.

I copied the comments here - I suppose that at least some of them can be removed if those links are included in an answer. (They will be no longer needed.)

This is unrelated, but I noticed a minor inconsistency in your profile.

oh yes?

Your network profile: "I'm a sixth year math grad student at the University of Notre Dame. My advisor is Chris Schommer-Pries."

Ah yes!

3:06 PM

Your MO profile: "I'm a postdoctoral fellow in mathematics at Johns Hopkins University. My supervisor is Emily Riehl."

I've had difficulty several times in the past getting my profile changes to propagate properly to the network.

It is rather minor thing (I don't think many people look there) - but I suppose you intended to have the same information in both places.

So I'm not surprised if the last time I updated it, it failed to propagate properly.

Yes, I would definitely like to have the same information in both places.

Luckily for me, I only included some information into the profile on Mathematics and left it empty elsewhere.

Okay, I just tried updating my profile and selecting "propagate changes to all communities". Maybe it will work this time!

3:08 PM

Having some experience with SE, maybe now I would prefer to contribute anonymously and not under my real name - but that ship has sailed long time ago.

FWIW it's my MO profile which is up to date

I am not sure whether the network profile isn't in some way special.

In any case, we'll see.

oh, perhaps the network profile itself is not counted among the "public community profiles"

I see

Sorry for the barrage of the comments with links - once there is a CW answer, I can post edit additional links into that answer. (If I find some other suitable links...)

Oh, no problem at all!

3:11 PM

Re: it might be a few days before I get around to it.

A barrage of links was the main thing I was hoping for (besides tips on pre-Columbian deities)

This is a thing I've said before - it is good if a question gets some activity while it is at most 14 days old (and eligible for the community bulletin).

Ah good point

CB increases the visibility - and also the likelihood that there is some feedback.

Of course, as a mod you have the advantage that you can put any post into a community back even after 14 days using the featured tag.

But if we consider only the usual way how a question gets into CB, the 14-day limit is one of the conditions.

Very good point. The main reason it's on the back burner at the moment is that this week we've been taking some time to figure out how to spruce up the "on-topic" help page, and thinking some more about adding another close reason, and that's taking up a lot of my bandwidth.

The help page update was suggested about a year ago meta.mathoverflow.net/questions/5011/…

3:14 PM

I see. It's good to hear that there is some activity in the mod team.

Just out of curiosity - the moderators discuss mostly using moderators@mathoverflow.net? Or in a private chatroom here on SE? Or both?

Yes, I fear I in particular have not been terribly active for some time. The end of the semester gives some opportunity.

Historically it's been mostly via email, but lately more and more via chat

That question was a long time ago - I do not remember much about it: Revising the help page on "What topics can I ask around here?"

BTW I noticed a recent edit of yours: mathoverflow.net/posts/394744/revisions In fact, I posted a related question on Meta Stack Exchange: How can I find the revisions history for the help center?

Yes, some of the information there is outdated, and it came up again when thinking about the possibility of a new close reason -- we realized that we haven't even written anywhwere that certain types of questions were off-topic.

Ah, I see

On the moderator end, it's straightforward to see the edit history

We're a bit unsure about what exactly should be included in that little burb anyway -- any feedback is welcome!

Yes. From the answer posted on Meta Stack Exchange I learned that regular users actually cannot see the revision history of things in the help center - with a very few exceptions.

As far as I can tell, that little blurb and the "on-topic" page in the help center are the only moderator-editable parts of the help center.

3:20 PM

I guess there should be a few more: What parts of the help center can site moderators edit?

IIRC the choice of the post in the tour can be done by the mods too.

Oh that's interesting.

Maybe we should think about customizing the tour a bit too.

Is the tour something which is automatically shown to new users?

If so that could be very useful indeed

Meta Stack Exchange: What determines the questions available for selection in the tour page? and Allow mods to edit a section of the about page.

Of course, both posts I linked above are relatively old - so some information might be outdated.

Thanks, that's very helpful!

Ok, I should probably get back to preparing test for the next week.

I've been feeling a bit silly, actually, thinking about this one help page, while I have the impression that it's not the page anybody is most likely to visit

Alright, take care!

3:24 PM

I am not sure which page the new users visit - maybe SE have some stats about that...?

Of course, if the mods want to increase visibility of some stuff, maybe the suggestion with the banner in the sidebar is one of the things worth considering.

In any case, I'll get back to playing with some polynomials.

Thanks for stopping by in chat - and see you later!

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