> Eric Fitzgerald writes:
> >
> > <cut>
> >
> > Also, might it be possible to move the manual comments to another
> > list? :)
>
> I have decided to stop the [DOCS COMMENT] flood. *Most* comments were
> completely useless... even though I added in BIG RED LETTERS that
> adding a comment to the manual is not a good place to ask
> questions. :(
Just had a look at the searchable online manual and I didn't see those BIG
RED LETTERS anywhere or anywhere obvious.
> I guess it proves the need for some alternate forum for newbies to ask
> questions. Apparantly joining the mailing list is too daunting for
> beginners.
I don't think having another forum/mailing list will help. Newbies will
always be newbies and having another forum just for them may just confuse
them even more as there will be even more places for them to ask questions.
An idea might be to have NEWBIES GO HERE on the mysql home page. This new
page should contain as few words as possible but be informative as possible
since people are generally lazy and don't like to read. Three things should
be enough
1. Explain a little about the MySQL user manual and that they should read
it.
2. The main mysql mailing list. They have attempted to read the manual
first as answers to most questions asked on the mailing list, can be found
in the manual. They don't need to join. Maybe mention the list archive
3. Downloading mysql
> We will soon begin to moderate the comments in the manual, to remove
> the cruft. Maybe during this moderation, we (the people moderating)
> can forward *interesting* comments (and questions if they come up) to
> the list for all to share.
How do you plan on doing that? If you continuously moderate it manually,
it will take up a lot of your time.
An idea is to make it more difficult for people to submit comments to the
manual. Ah... ... difficult isn't quite the word. More like, it requires
a little more effort to submit a comment.
Ie. To submit a comment to the online manual, users need to select a
category from a list. The default could be something like "question" and
this will not get submitted to the online manual but to the mailing list
instead. If someone is true blue about making a comment, they'll put in the
effort to change the category. Believe me, people are generally lazy and
newbies are most likely to see "question" in the category list, say "yes,
I'm asking a question, that'll do", write their question and press submit.
Cheers
Rolf
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