It is sometimes a little embarrassing answering Questions -

[BlinkinCat]

There are no doubt users out there who feel as I do - keen to help in the forums but a little (or a lot) doubtful about whether they have sufficient skill in any particular subject.

Of course we should not offer help if our knowledge of a subject is particularly limited but at the same time we may be keen to have a go to help - However it does become embarrassing when after offering help, the following poster then steps in with a far more insightful answer.

With the number of <50 posters presently being encouraged to help on the forums to increase their post count, the situation arises that an over enthusiastic poster will at times not give the perfect answer.

So we have a dilemma - I hope the more skilled of you among us will be a little forgiving in accepting that an enthusiastic poster is better by a least having a go - perhaps he/she can be gently reminded of where their information is not necessarily sound.

So that's about it, although I would be interested in hearing other points of view on this subject -

Cheers - :)

[haqking]

There are no doubt users out there who feel as I do - keen to help in the forums but a little (or a lot) doubtful about whether they have sufficient skill in any particular subject.

Of course we should not offer help if our knowledge of a subject is particularly limited but at the same time we may be keen to have a go to help - However it does become embarrassing when after offering help, the following poster then steps in with a far more insightful answer.

With the number of <50 posters presently being encouraged to help on the forums to increase their post count, the situation arises that an over enthusiastic poster will at times not give the perfect answer.

So we have a dilemma - I hope the more skilled of you among us will be a little forgiving in accepting that an enthusiastic poster is better by a least having a go - perhaps he/she can be gently reminded of where their information is not necessarily sound.

So that's about it, although I would be interested in hearing other points of view on this subject -

Cheers - :)

There is always someone with more insight and experience. Post counts do not a informed answer make either.

You have 100+ beans, i have 3000+ beans, but that does not in anyway mean my answers are more informed or insightful than yours maybe. A linux guru for 20 years might have just joined the forum and hence no posts, no big deal.

What makes the posts mean something is the quality of your posts.

I post all the time but people will often come in with a better answer or more correct answer, i dont personally use 11.04 or 11.10 except in a VM so peoples responses after me on those subjects are often alot more informed.

Sometimes an answer you post is a catalyst to allow the OP to get on the right track maybe. As long as your answer is not outrageously incorrect and stays within the confines of the CoC and stickies on how to help and not hinder.

I would encourage you to post an answer if you feel it is correct or applicable even if not 100% sure if totally the best solution, research it yourself before posting and you too will learn more and become more insightful for the next time ;-)

There is always a right answer but often there are degrees of right and suitability, the OP's are often vague anyways and so hard to interpret so difficult to answer for anyone.

Keep answering but dont post something if you clearly have no good answer at all. ;-)

Peace

[BlinkinCat]

There is always someone with more insight and experience. Post counts do not a informed answer make either.

You have 100+ beans, i have 3000+ beans, but that does not in anyway mean my answers are more informed or insightful than yours maybe. A linux guru for 20 years might have just joined the forum and hence no posts, no big deal.

What makes the posts mean something is the quality of your posts.

I post all the time but people will often come in with a better answer or more correct answer, i dont personally use 11.04 or 11.10 except in a VM so peoples responses after me on those subjects are often alot more informed.

Sometimes an answer you post is a catalyst to allow the OP to get on the right track maybe. As long as your answer is not outrageously incorrect and stays within the confines of the CoC and stickies on how to help and not hinder.

I would encourage you to post an answer if you feel it is correct or applicable even if not 100% sure if totally the best solution, research it yourself before posting and you too will learn more and become more insightful for the next time ;-)

There is always a right answer but often there are degrees of right and suitability, the OP's are often vague anyways and so hard to interpret so difficult to answer for anyone.

Keep answering but dont post something if you clearly have no good answer at all. ;-)

Peace

Thanks for taking the time for your thoughtful reply haqking - :p

[haqking]

Thanks for taking the time for your thoughtful reply haqking - :p

You are welcome.

Dont get caught up in the psychological con that someone with a given bean count or status image outranks your input.

It can often do so easily and prevent people from posting if they see an answer from someone with x amount of beans or wont argue a point (always debate politely and not argue though....LOL

Post what you know and keep learning.

Enjoy

[matt_symes]

I will sometimes answer posts that i have no clue on how to fix.

My reason ? It's a free *bump* for the poster.

[23dornot23d]

Often too on the first posts people will not give enough information about their problem

The first thing I start with is politely asking for more information about their hardware

It just gets the conversation started and eases the user into answering a few simple questions .....
you can get a feel the user too - of what they know about their own system

LSPCI ...... in lower case ...... in a terminal

gives some basic information about some of their hardware ask them to post the results if needed
for help with their problem

lspci

asking for this ..... can save other users time in the long run ....

I personally go for ones where no one has answered in a while ..... often there is a good
reason ..... usually it is that it needs more information to get it started .....

But I too know how you feel ...... sometimes we get shot down if we ask the wrong thing
but its all a good learning process ...

I have picked up so much just by listening to what others are asking .......

Any help is better than someone ..... feeling they have been ignored too .....

Sometimes the users sort their own problems themselves once a start is made .....
interaction means a lot and google is your friend .....

search for SOLVED on the required problem
often it has been answered before ......

Keep at it ..... :)

[BlinkinCat]

I will sometimes answer posts that i have no clue on how to fix.

My reason ? It's a free *bump* for the poster.

Very interesting - Forums are very busy now with many pages for just one day - May be worthwhile scrolling back and kill two birds with one stone - Could do a little research and maybe come up with some reasonable answers - Thanks - :P

[BlinkinCat]

Keep at it ..... :)

Thanks 23dornot23d - I will - :D

[mips]

There are no doubt users out there who feel as I do - keen to help in the forums but a little (or a lot) doubtful about whether they have sufficient skill in any particular subject.

Of course we should not offer help if our knowledge of a subject is particularly limited but at the same time we may be keen to have a go to help - However it does become embarrassing when after offering help, the following poster then steps in with a far more insightful answer.

With the number of <50 posters presently being encouraged to help on the forums to increase their post count, the situation arises that an over enthusiastic poster will at times not give the perfect answer.

So we have a dilemma - I hope the more skilled of you among us will be a little forgiving in accepting that an enthusiastic poster is better by a least having a go - perhaps he/she can be gently reminded of where their information is not necessarily sound.

So that's about it, although I would be interested in hearing other points of view on this subject -

Cheers - :)

Here's my view.

It's all good and well trying to help but sometimes you end up doing the opposite. It also creates a lot of useless noise in the forum and users will have a hard time figuring out what is the appropriate solution and what is not. Imagine how frustrating it is to receive 10 different 'solutions' and you now have to try all of those and in the process possibly break something else.

Phrases like these come to mind :biggrin: ;
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
The path to hell is paved with good intentions.

What's even more annoying is people just start shooting from the hip, they don't even have all the required info at hand to formulate a possible solution, the just start picking things out of the air without following any troubleshooting methodology.

I've always worked on the premise that if I don't know something I keep quite. If I have a reasonable idea I will voice it as such and suggest it be tried. Or I will research the problem and present the most likely solutions.

[nothingspecial]

If the thread that initiated this thread is the one I think it is then your first answer was the most important one.....

.....the next post was merely additional information for a particular scenario.

[BlinkinCat]

Here's my view.

It's all good and well trying to help but sometimes you end up doing the opposite. It also creates a lot of useless noise in the forum and users will have a hard time figuring out what is the appropriate solution and what is not. Imagine how frustrating it is to receive 10 different 'solutions' and you now have to try all of those and in the process possibly break something else.

Phrases like these come to mind :biggrin: ;
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
The path to hell is paved with good intentions.

Thanks mips - I will keep in mind -

[Meelad]

I always do my best to help.. I won't talk about something I have no idea about, but if I know something related to the problem I won't hesitate to share it, because I was helped SO MANY times by innocent remarks from people who thought they didn't know enough to answer my question, but still tried to help..

Less experienced users always have the edge over the experienced users in providing solutions because they are more enthusiastic to help and they tend to formulate their answers in a much easier way to understand, AND they are not lazy when it comes to explaining their solution.. (Of course I'm talking generally)..

[TREESofRIGHTEOUSNESS]

I have encountered a lot of different issues (mainly little things) and so I go search in the forums for those issues, and look to see if anyone has that particular problem. I have been using Linux for a while, and have been using Ubuntu as my sole OS for over a year, and I just now feel as though I can post relevant stuff. But I haven't been doing this for decades, and there are always thing I don't know. And I have to ask. Sometimes people give me good answers, sometimes they post something that is irrelevant... but it can point me to a different thing, as it says... "with 2 there is a better reward" so I always appreciate someone else to look at my issue and offer any kind of insight.

[kurt18947]

I am a very long way from an expert but try to preface any advice with something like 'Here's what I found' or I'm no expert but here's what I think. And yes, some expert posters sometimes assume a level of knowledge or experience that the original poster may not have. That's the thing about a distro like Ubuntu that's usable by less experienced users. A poster in a 'roll your own' distro can be presumed to have a certain level of expertise. A poster on a distro like Ubuntu or Mint not so much.

[CharlesA]

I will sometimes answer posts that i have no clue on how to fix.

My reason ? It's a free *bump* for the poster.
Yep. And it at least gives someone else something to work with.

[BlinkinCat]

Yep. And it at least gives someone else something to work with.

Yes it makes sense to me - I like the thought of scrolling back through old pages with the view of looking up problems and then posting a snippet that would be worthwhile - A good learning tool too - :)

[CharlesA]

Yes it makes sense to me - I like the thought of scrolling back through old pages with the view of looking up problems and then posting a snippet that would be worthwhile - A good learning tool too - :)
Indeed. Learning can be fun too. ;)

[23dornot23d]

Just got to be a little careful with older posts ....

Somethings go out of date ..... try to keep within the latest year 2011 ..... if possible ...

better still the latest month on some things ..... like extensions and themes for gnome-shell
the last few days alone ..... there have been some modifications .....

that now only seem to appear in the webupd8 PPA ...... wonder how that manages to get
the updates so quick yet the main repos do not ........... :confused:

[BlinkinCat]

Yes, my thoughts would be for posts three or four days old at most - :)

[grahammechanical]

I was very nervous when I first started posting. I felt that I was intruding. I know I wasn't. But that is how I felt. I wanted to give something back to the community in thanks for the gift of Ubuntu.

Many people who post questions fail to give enough information. They simply say it don't work. You can post and ask them to give specific information that will help someone more knowledgeable work out the problem and from that the answer.

Pick a help section. Browse the posts. See the recurring problems. See the suggestions. Test the commands out on your system and notice the information that a working system will give. Compare it to the information that the OP's broken system is giving. You will get clues as to what is wrong and from the suggestions clues as to what might work.

And do not forget. This is a forum. We are allowed to guess. On the AskUbuntu site guesses are not allowed and your answers get voted on. I hate it when my answers are voted down.

I like both ways of giving community help. Ubuntu for Humans. And I add "not only for the technocrats."

Regards.

[arashiko28]

I agree with all of you. But there's something... more a detail than something else and is the technical language. Most of linux users like myself (not IT) seem to the eyes of the common PC user like computer geeks, 90% of linux users can fix their own hardware, or assemble a custom computer, but when it comes to tech language the thing is different.

I have received many help in this specific condition and over the fear to look like an idiot, have to ask an explanation in "simple english", perhaps because english is not my first language, but then again that was not the problem, I had to read about tech language in english to understand what I was being told.

It's like when you go the doctor and you got all of the technical details of your disease except the name of the disease, or viceversa, you leave thinking you have something much worse than the rash you went for in the first place.

The main idea is to keep it simple, we don't know the expertise of the one asking for help, even if the question seems too complicated.

[BlinkinCat]

I was very nervous when I first started posting. I felt that I was intruding. I know I wasn't. But that is how I felt. I wanted to give something back to the community in thanks for the gift of Ubuntu.

Many people who post questions fail to give enough information. They simply say it don't work. You can post and ask them to give specific information that will help someone more knowledgeable work out the problem and from that the answer.

Pick a help section. Browse the posts. See the recurring problems. See the suggestions. Test the commands out on your system and notice the information that a working system will give. Compare it to the information that the OP's broken system is giving. You will get clues as to what is wrong and from the suggestions clues as to what might work.

And do not forget. This is a forum. We are allowed to guess. On the AskUbuntu site guesses are not allowed and your answers get voted on. I hate it when my answers are voted down.

I like both ways of giving community help. Ubuntu for Humans. And I add "not only for the technocrats."

Regards.

What you say makes a lot of sense grahammechanical - Thanks for that - :)

[BlinkinCat]

I agree with all of you. But there's something... more a detail than something else and is the technical language. Most of linux users like myself (not IT) seem to the eyes of the common PC user like computer geeks, 90% of linux users can fix their own hardware, or assemble a custom computer, but when it comes to tech language the thing is different.

I have received many help in this specific condition and over the fear to look like an idiot, have to ask an explanation in "simple english", perhaps because english is not my first language, but then again that was not the problem, I had to read about tech language in english to understand what I was being told.

It's like when you go the doctor and you got all of the technical details of your disease except the name of the disease, or viceversa, you leave thinking you have something much worse than the rash you went for in the first place.

The main idea is to keep it simple, we don't know the expertise of the one asking for help, even if the question seems too complicated.

You certainly write pretty good English arashiko28 - Thanks for that - :)

[23dornot23d]

Yes I particularly like this line



Test the commands out on your system and notice the information that a working system will give. Compare it to the information that the OP's broken system is giving. You will get clues as to what is wrong and from the suggestions clues as to what might work.
I often do this if I can on my test systems ..... its very good advice .....

But be careful - to not break your own main production systems ......

The only thing I do not mess with is my Networks .... and Wireless ...... once they
are set they stay set ..... as I have great difficulty with these problems ........

So advice for these is referring them to the Section or Threads where these are getting
answered ...... by the people that fully understand them .......

[BlinkinCat]

Many thanks 23dornot23d - I will take heed of your warnings - :P

[CharlesA]

I often do this if I can on my test systems ..... its very good advice .....

But be careful - to not break your own main production systems ......

+1. I've tried stuff out on VMs just to make sure they don't break stuff.

[BlinkinCat]

+1. I've tried stuff out on VMs just to make sure they don't break stuff.

Slightly off topic - how well does 11.10 install on a VM ?

[wolfen69]

Post counts do not a informed answer make either.


I'm the perfect example. I have over 8,000 posts of non-sense.
http://myveryworstjob.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/clown.jpg

[wolfen69]

Slightly off topic - how well does 11.10 install on a VM ?

As well as any other OS.

[BlinkinCat]

I'm the perfect example. I have over 8,000 posts of non-sense.
http://myveryworstjob.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/clown.jpg

My but your good lookin' wolfen69 - ;)

[CharlesA]

Slightly off topic - how well does 11.10 install on a VM ?
Probably fine, but I haven't tried it yet.

[Jay Car]

This subject has been on my mind for a very long time. How to be helpful on the forums is an ongoing dilemma for me. I also fear being an intrusion, or misunderstanding someone's problem, or giving someone information that might be wrong.

If I find a question I think I can answer, by the time I've written the answer out, spell-checked, previewed, then edited and reworded for clarity, at least three answers have already been posted. I don't mind, and actually think it's wonderful to see other people's answers...it helps me to see if my own answer would have been correct. But I don't post my own answers if someone else has already said it better (and faster).

I feel like I'm much too slow. It's discouraging sometimes.

[haqking]

Slightly off topic - how well does 11.10 install on a VM ?

It works fine.

There seems to be a few posts on guest additions but it works fine for me the same way as it always did in any other VM.

Make sure you have latest Vbox version, extension pack etc.

It works really well

[BlinkinCat]

Hi Jay Car -

Have a look at posts #15, #16 and #17 for what options I may take up to improve my knowledge and get some posts in (on older threads) at the same time -

Cheers - :)

[BlinkinCat]

It works fine.

There seems to be a few posts on guest additions but it works fine for me the same way as it always did in any other VM.

Make sure you have latest Vbox version, extension pack etc.

It works really well

Yes I have the latest VM with XP on it - thanks - :)

[Dangertux]

There are no doubt users out there who feel as I do - keen to help in the forums but a little (or a lot) doubtful about whether they have sufficient skill in any particular subject.

Of course we should not offer help if our knowledge of a subject is particularly limited but at the same time we may be keen to have a go to help - However it does become embarrassing when after offering help, the following poster then steps in with a far more insightful answer.

With the number of <50 posters presently being encouraged to help on the forums to increase their post count, the situation arises that an over enthusiastic poster will at times not give the perfect answer.

So we have a dilemma - I hope the more skilled of you among us will be a little forgiving in accepting that an enthusiastic poster is better by a least having a go - perhaps he/she can be gently reminded of where their information is not necessarily sound.

So that's about it, although I would be interested in hearing other points of view on this subject -

Cheers - :)


I don't find it embarassing. If someone knows more than me and can help someone better great. There have also been times when the situation was reversed and I know more than someone else.

What I will usually do if answering a question that I'm not particularly experienced with is google a little bit, give some basic suggestions and give the user something of a starting point. It's better than nothing, particularly if nobody else has helped them. At the very least it might get them researching/thinking in the right direction , so that would be helpful to them.

This is free, nobody is getting paid, and while its always best to give the most detailed and informed answer you can, any help is better than no help. If for no other reason then to help alleviate some of the poster's frustration in thinking they are completely alone in their problems.

Just my thoughts.

[BlinkinCat]

I don't find it embarassing. If someone knows more than me and can help someone better great. There have also been times when the situation was reversed and I know more than someone else.

What I will usually do if answering a question that I'm not particularly experienced with is google a little bit, give some basic suggestions and give the user something of a starting point. It's better than nothing, particularly if nobody else has helped them. At the very least it might get them researching/thinking in the right direction , so that would be helpful to them.

This is free, nobody is getting paid, and while its always best to give the most detailed and informed answer you can, any help is better than no help. If for no other reason then to help alleviate some of the poster's frustration in thinking they are completely alone in their problems.

Just my thoughts.

Thanks very much for those thoughts Dangertux - :)

[forrestcupp]

One thing I've learned in the years that I've been on these forums is that you can be an expert on any subject in the world, not just Linux, and there will always be someone right here on these forums that knows twice as much as you do, ready immediately to put you to shame. And I mean any subject that you can think of.

You just have to suck it up, learn from when you get corrected, and learn which subjects you'd better just keep your mouth shut on. That doesn't mean you stop posting, though.

[BlinkinCat]

Thanks forrestcupp for your wise (as always) words - :)

[webfiend]

One thing I've learned in the years that I've been on these forums is that you can be an expert on any subject in the world, not just Linux, and there will always be someone right here on these forums that knows twice as much as you do, ready immediately to put you to shame. And I mean any subject that you can think of.

You just have to suck it up, learn from when you get corrected, and learn which subjects you'd better just keep your mouth shut on. That doesn't mean you stop posting, though.

Fear of posting a foolish question or an incomplete answer keeps me lurking on most forums. I'm trying a new thing: asking the best questions that I can, giving the best answers that I can, and also looking at the forum sections where I don't have to worry about it, like this one. I figure somebody is bound to correct me when I'm wrong, or I can do it myself when I learn more.