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IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

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Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#181

Post by dfar1 »

Renaud wrote: post #40
dfar1 wrote: post #30

"With over 40-thousand questions tagged "Internet Explorer", and dozens more asked every day, it has proven to be a great place to find reliable help." The announcement makes it seem that they are proud of how many questions are out there about IE issues.

As of just now: * tag [internet-explorer]: 27,934 questions * tag [google-chrome]: 28,153 questions Since the number of questions is your metric for attributing shame, that surely imply that chrome is much worse than IE, especially considering the long legaccy and larger install base of IE vs Chrome... Or, I don't know, could it be possible that the number of questions reflects more than just how bad a piece of softw…

Looks like some people took my comment very personal. Notice that not anywhere I mentioned other browsers, and whether having a lot of issues is a good or bad thing. It's just weird the way they made the announcement.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#182

Post by k-mcgrady »

anonbanker wrote: post #180
k-mcgrady wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What OS would you want to run on it? I can't think of something better suited. Android apps aren't optimised well for a large tablet and iOS is too focused to work well on a device that is supposed to allow you to replace your laptop. You could run a linux distro but I don't know of many that are touch optimised very well (Ubuntu has something in the works but I read recently it's definitely not ready for primetime y…

I used kubuntu. plasma active on a surface 3 is divine.

Maybe I was wrong about Linux then! Are apps optimised in any way? Is this up to devs or does the OS/window manager do any of the work.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#183

Post by dec0dedab0de »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #169
dec0dedab0de wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the Surface tablets and Nokia's Lumia devices are really high quality. I agree, I would buy a surface pro if I could get it without windows.

What OS would you want to run on it? I can't think of something better suited. Android apps aren't optimised well for a large tablet and iOS is too focused to work well on a device that is supposed to allow you to replace your laptop. You could run a linux distro but I don't know of many that are touch optimised very well (Ubuntu has something in the works but I read recently it's definitely not ready for primetime y…

I would likely run Ubuntu or LinuxMint. I came really close to buying the system76 Darter Touch when it was available, but the fact that it didn't convert into a tablet was the deal breaker.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#184

Post by dionidium »

robertwharvey wrote: post #179
bunderbunder wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's one easy fix for this, and several other problems with SO: Don't close duplicate questions. Just cross-reference them. Reasons: - Gets rid of the "This was closed because of trigger-happy moderators failing to distinguish between 'similar' and 'identical'" problem by making that situation impossible. - Improves answer discovery for users: If Google gets you to almost, but not quite, the right question, cross-…

That's exactly what closing duplicates does: cross references it to the original. If someone wants to post new information, they can do it on the original.

Yes, they can. But they won't. (For various reasons, but primarily because it won't get any attention. Nobody likes yelling into the void.)

An alternative to shaming is that you could just accept this great new content that a volunteer is giving you.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#185

Post by shagie »

Perdition wrote: post #139
robertwharvey wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because Stack Overflow is not a discussion forum. It is, in fact, quite the opposite. Think back; remember the time when you actually got usable, timely help on a forum? Can't think of any? I didn't think so. Why? Because forums are flooded with useless, mindless crap, like users who can't be bothered to form complete sentences, who can't be bothered to do fundamental research or learn the most basic skills of…

I get useful timely help from forums all the time. I find voting systems tend to squelch most of the idiots on technically focused forums.

The key difference though is that you got timely help from a forum by asking a question. However, as the next person trying to find the answer to the same question, I would have to wade through multiple forums with pages of answers (the answer you got was on page 3 of 5) with people asking clarification and the tangent from someone else (on page 2) about drivers I care nothing about.

Stack Overflow was designed so that the next person with the same question could find the answer more easily. The next person could avoid having to go through Sun's Java forums, and CodeRanch, and /r/Java, and /r/JavaHelp and the comments of someone's blog post, and ... Too many places with too much tangental knowledge that wasn't well indexed. Despite the idiots and trolls having posts removed,

With Stack Overflow, one knows that if they ask a question there (admittedly, that fits within the focus and quality guidelines) they will get an answer - not someone commenting on another comment that is indistinguishable from an answer (comments vs answers). And if they search Stack Overflow, and find the question that has an answer - it is an answer. That is the key value proposition of Stack Overflow in that the next person who has the same question as you do can find it easily.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#186

Post by shagie »

dionidium wrote: post #184
robertwharvey wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly what closing duplicates does: cross references it to the original. If someone wants to post new information, they can do it on the original.

Yes, they can . But they won't . (For various reasons, but primarily because it won't get any attention. Nobody likes yelling into the void.) An alternative to shaming is that you could just accept this great new content that a volunteer is giving you.

There is a badge for exactly that - Necromancer ( http://stackoverflow.com/help/badges/17/necromancer ): Answered a question more than 60 days later with score of 5 or more.

Whenever a question gets a new post it gets bumped up to the top of the activity again - the same amount of possible attention as when an hour old question gets a new answer too.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#187

Post by dionidium »

robertwharvey wrote: post #122
sajt wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Stack Overflow has been getting worse and worse in recent years. Their community is outright hostile to active discussion. Only directly answerable questions are tolerated. Microsoft is (as always) a few years late to the party.

That's because Stack Overflow is not a discussion forum. It is, in fact, quite the opposite. Think back; remember the time when you actually got usable, timely help on a forum? Can't think of any? I didn't think so. Why? Because forums are flooded with useless, mindless crap, like users who can't be bothered to form complete sentences, who can't be bothered to do fundamental research or learn the most basic skills of…

Make no mistake about it: SO's attention to broken windows was revolutionary. But the system is out of control. For example, comments are now silently deleted because, as one mod told me, SO "is about content, not people." Anybody who thinks a site that relies on volunteer contributions isn't about people is so far down the wrong path it's hard to know what to say to them.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#188

Post by shagie »

teh_klev wrote: post #151
fishtoaster wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was one of the early mods on programmers.stackexchange.com that was kinda-sorta aimed at being just that. Some participants wanted explicitly that, where offending questions would be automatically moved to P.SE. Others wanted "anything that'd be off-topic on SO" as the key criteria for P.SE. A lot of the early questions there were pulled directly from previously-closed questions on StackOverflow. Over time, though,…

Oh boy, P.SE had some seriously bad birthing pains. Speaking as a former diamond mod on Stack Overflow, I got spanked a few times by a particular former and overbearing P.SE mod for migrating what seemed like perfectly on-topic questions that were clearly not great for SO. Eventually I gave up and to this day yet I am still unclear what is considered on/off-topic on P.SE.

Back in April there was some discussion on meta.P.SE about updating the help center ( http://meta.programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/6590/ ) which resulted in some changes ( http://meta.programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/6604/ ). There's also a post trying to explain the spirit behind all of the reasons and interpretations (and history of those interpretations) the site has of the different close reasons ( http://meta.programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/6483/ ). If there is still confusion about what is and isn't on topic, asking another meta question or stopping into P.SE's chat room would likely meet with a good reception.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#189

Post by dionidium »

shagie wrote: post #186
dionidium wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they can . But they won't . (For various reasons, but primarily because it won't get any attention. Nobody likes yelling into the void.) An alternative to shaming is that you could just accept this great new content that a volunteer is giving you.

There is a badge for exactly that - Necromancer ( http://stackoverflow.com/help/badges/17/necromancer ): Answered a question more than 60 days later with score of 5 or more. Whenever a question gets a new post it gets bumped up to the top of the activity again - the same amount of possible attention as when an hour old question gets a new answer too.

Yes. I shouldn't have said nobody. I actually like answering old questions, for example. I've earned that badge 10 times :)

What it really comes down to, though, is that when somebody asks a new question, I want to answer their new question, with all of its subtleties, in response to its particular phrasing, in its context.

Re: IE Web Development Support Moving to Stack Overflow

#190

Post by k-mcgrady »

dec0dedab0de wrote: post #183
k-mcgrady wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What OS would you want to run on it? I can't think of something better suited. Android apps aren't optimised well for a large tablet and iOS is too focused to work well on a device that is supposed to allow you to replace your laptop. You could run a linux distro but I don't know of many that are touch optimised very well (Ubuntu has something in the works but I read recently it's definitely not ready for primetime y…

I would likely run Ubuntu or LinuxMint. I came really close to buying the system76 Darter Touch when it was available, but the fact that it didn't convert into a tablet was the deal breaker.

Interesting how many responses suggested running Linux. I wouldn't have thought it would even be worth trying on a tablet. First I've seen the system76 Darter Touch. I guess with Unity Ubuntu is quite touch friendly now.
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