|
Current server time is: Saturday, 21-Dec-2024 16:31:38 EET Document last modified: Saturday, 13-Jun-2009 02:15:51 EEST |
Please read this section before using and/or downloading anything from this site. DisclaimerMy EE account was suspended on 23.01.2009 So my activity on experts-exchange.com has gotten to a full stop as of that date. Only time will tell who looses, but I think it will be their loss.If you do not fully read the following policy, you are risking blacklisting. which will get your name on my Hall of ShameIf you get on my blacklist, that means I will not see and thus not help you with your future problems. And if you get on other experts blacklist that will mean less chances for you to solve your future problems.So before thinking that it is not worth it to waste 10-20 minutes to read this and get familiar with how experts-exchange is working, take into account that you might invest that time into getting your porblems solved quicker and possibly better. The following is for your own good. If you read through, you will learn, among other things, how to get the full power out of experts-exchange (also referred to shortly as EE) and the people there. If you don't follow these recommendations, as I said, you will get on my blacklist. General recommendations follw now and my personal policy is last. What is Experts Exchange?First of all, you need to understand what experts-exchange is. This site is NOT your avarage forum/community and that is why it's special. Most of you probably did not bother to read through every digital paper from EE like the user agreement, the FAQ, the help etc. It's not your fault really. Most of the information there is repeated so many times in so many places that it's annoying even for us, who know about it.It is very important that you understand how problems are organized. Yes, EE is a big pool of problems. And most of them have solutions, and that's why you are here :) If you look around the site, you will notice that there are a lot of areas, by interest. Windows, Hardware, Software, etc. You go into one such area, there are sub-divisions. And so on. Just like a tree. I have a problem. What next?You want your problem to be solved ASAP (As Soon As Possible) right? Read on.Ask yourself: what are the chances that this problem I'm having also occured to somebody else? Am I really the first person having this problem? If you bought a new piece of hardware that just hit the market, or a software, or whatever, then yes, chances are that you are the first person to have this problem. But if the thing that you are having problems with is old, then you are definetly not the first and maybe not even the 100th person with this problem. So search. How do I find solutions to my problem?I suggest using google as the first searching tool. Sure, EE sites search tool is good enough, but lets assume you are not a good english speaker. Google can deal with that ;)What to search for? Other people that had your problem and could not solve it by themselves are probably as techies as you are. So just think how would you best describe your problem and extract some keywords from there. Try different keywords from different descriptions. And try at least 3 different searches and look up until at least the 3rd page of results. Google also shows you a small text from the site so you don't have to visit all of them. Don't go above th 10th page of results because they tend to be irrelevant, though I myself have found solutions beyond that (very rarely) I can't find anything. What next?Ask. Stop right there. You want your problem solved quickly, right? Don't ask just to ask, but use your head and ask smart. This implies a few things.First of all, you need to locate the correct zone to place your question in. And remember, EE allows you to place your question in 2 more zones. This is not always needed, but sometimes helps. But it is critical that you correctly identify the main zone. How? you ask? By going into the zones you think they are right and looking for past questions that are similar to your problem. EE search tool comes in very handy here ;) I'm ready to ask. Can I go now?NO. Your problems will be solved by experts, whom are people. You need to advertise your problem to the right experts, who can help you best. There are several ways to do this.Lets say for example you are having problems with a router, on a linux server. You place your question in the linux area and then in the routers area and you use a title like "Router model_here having whatever_problem_here on a linux red had 9.0". Then, in your description of the quesiton, you will give full details about the router, abuot the linux system (software and hardware) and then the problem itself. One more thing: don't give us too many details. Remember, you hate wasting time reading through all the useragreements, FAQ, helps, etc. We hate reading loooong questions too ;) I asked my question. Can I go to bed now?Again: NO. Be concice with your desription and keep in mind: if we need more information, we will ask for it. So stay engaged. Don't post a question late at night before you go to sleep. Most questions get an answer in the first 30 minutes after posting. So be online.You must stay engaged. Keep in mind that sometimes, the experts don't have time to write you a full demo. We do this for free, on our free time. Sometimes, we just don't have enough free time. So be prepared to work hard on the problem just by what we suggest. In the end, we are helping you solve your problem ;) I got my answer. Bye.Where are you going? We're not done yet. You must close the question and you must do it properly, otherwise we might not help you next time you are having a problem.The EE FAQ comes in handy to read at this time as it explains the basics of closing questions and grading. Keep in mind that they are generic HINTS. Basically, you are grading the experts that helped you. It is a way of saying how well did they help you. You mentioned blacklisting. Sounds scary.It does. And it is. However, it is (now) a last resort towards people (askers) that do not want to learn how to properly behave on EE. This includes: accepting incorrect answers, giving incorrect grades, not closing their questions, etc.I shall cover the 3 problems mentioned earlier:
My personal policy regarding my EE activityI consider that every question deserves an A grade. That doesn't mean that every answer deserves one too. But you must alow me to earn my A grade. Otherwise, you guessed, I will blacklist you.I accept when I am out of ideas and so deserve a B grade. I'm not that .. "lulu" I think that even if you did almost all the work in solving the problem, if it weren't for my suggestions and questions and ideas, you wouldn't have solved it by yourself, so I still expect an A grade. The above line does not apply in cases when I give bad suggestions :) If we cannot help you solve your problem, have it deleted. Don't give us a C grade. We don't know everything so every once in a while there will be problems we cannot help you with. If you still think we deserve a B grade, do everybody a favor and explain why. If you just grade with a B/C and leave, I will just blacklist you and leave. Sure, I will ask for clarifications, but if they don't come or are not acceptable, I will ask moderators to change the grade and most likely blacklist you. All it takes me is one click of a button. I do not look at the points. However, 500 points questions get my attention with bigger priority than 50 point questions. But they all get my attention no matter the amount of points. I tend to ignore questions that don't have a meaningfull title. Like "Help me pls." If I'm really bored, I might look at it. I get an email with the title in the subject so I see the title first, and then, if it's interesting, I loopen the email and then see the points. So, title is evry important. Do note that I don't rmember the last time I was bored. It happens a lot of times that I solve a problem with something I know nothing about. And that is because 1) I can google and 2) I understand what I find on google. So if I ask apparently stupid questions, don't think that I am not able to eventually solve the problem because in most cases I will solve it. If you need help, ASK. Maybe I get the wrong idea about you and I think you can deal with the little information I give you. If it is not the case, ask for more help, for more clarifications. Don't just close the question with a B grade or asking for a delete and refund. We don't like that. DO NOT expect us to give you fully functional demos. Most of us are married, with kids. We do this on our spare time. Sometimes that means 5 minutes. We can help you, but we will rarely do the work for you. Also, just because some experts do give you full demos, that doesn't make it a rule. Sometimes I find the time for a demo, mostly I don't. I can give you small pieces of code if you need them, but if you think that deserves a B grade ... I think you belong on my blacklist :) Nothing personal. Once on my blacklist, you will remain forever on it. That is sometimes expanded to other forums as well. I am blacklisting a person, not a user ;) And I have automated sripts that help me with that so don't think that I will just forget. My computer doens't. If you are blacklisted, your username will be made public on my blacklisted users page, also called the Hall of Shame. So think twice before thinking that you can live with yourself on my blacklist. Other experts are likely to add you on their blacklist by default, just to avoid getting into the situation I did. So if you get blacklisted by one expert, other might do it too. And not everybody keeps their list public. To my knowledge, at the time of this writing, there is only one expert on the entire experts-exchange.com site that is using blacklisting: me. And there are a few others interested in the idea. And since the solutions for dealing with it are made public by me, tehre is a big chance that some of them are already using it. And finally, this is not a complete list. I will edit and modify this in the future. After I make my own EE Helper Application, you will be automatically notified about any changes occured since you last read this. But that will not happen for another few months, maybe next year. |