A Four Year Review: Feedback Requested

[TerryE]

What with all of our discussions on removing SPAM, one of the things that I also thought about was the the state of the MySql database that contains our forum knowledgebase. Here are some stats:

• The first post was on Dec 11, 2002 by Draude
  
• There have been 50,752 topics raised with 197,156 posts to those topics
  
• That's an average of 35 topic and 134 posts per day in the 4 years that the forum has been active
  
• 7,803 topics (15%) have been unanswered, or to put it more postively 85% have received at least one answer (see note below).
  
• We have 39,642 registered users
  
• However 15,311 users have no posts. Given that a lot have interesting web addresses, I assume that most are SPAM users where the SPAM topic has been deleted. If these are deleted messages then the no answer ratio rises to 22%.
  
• 9,761 users have only one post. A reasonable percentage of these are unanswered.
  
• The top 25 posters have generated 25% of all posts, the top 350 posters 50% of all posts.

What this tells me is some interesting patterns:

• The forum is healthy
  
• The population seems to be split into four broad communities:
  • There is a small community (probably less than 50 active) who do most responses, and they often chat amongst themselves. These come and go (eg. goers: DannyB and Draude; comers: me)
    
  • Spammers
    
  • Those that are guests only and search for advice and guidance. I notice that when I log on there are typically 50-100 guests active and <5 logged on users.
    
  • The vaste majority of users have one or two specific queries. They create and account; ask their Q; maybe track their responses and then never come back. [I've done the same on other BBs]
• We should think about how we serve this last community better. I am a bit concerned about that 20 or % of unanswered Qs. The problem is that sometimes the innocent can ask some REALLY dumb Qs or ask a Q that must have been asked a dozen times before. I would appreciate thoughts on this.
  
• I also think we could do with trashing all accounts older than 6 moths with no posts and all accounts with no posts and a web address. This is a simple SQL query.

Another thing that strikes me is that we should have a BEFORE YOU POST sticky in every forum (or link on the posting form) which explains in simple terms how to search the forums to avoid needing to ask a Q and how to ask a sensible Q which has a good chance of being answered if you can't find the info you require.

If Draude would make available the database (in copy format) it might be worth mining it to find the top 200 or so most referenced topics and reference then in a forum FAQ which could be appended to the above sticky.

Thoughts?
_________________
Terry
WinXPSP3, OOo 2.4.1, Ubunto 8.04 for development
Also try the Official OOo Community Forum where I mainly post now.

[PromptJock]

Excellent ideas, especially the "disuser 'unused/inactive' accounts greater than 6 months old" (I personally think it should be three ).

Regarding de-SPAMming the fora: the established SPAMmers have well-defined usernames and their "missives" are generally identical in their content, as well as their subject lines. IOW, there are a number of title and message keywords that can be gleaned from the "established" SPAMs that can easily be incorporated into a filtering bot which can search and auto-delete them every day (if not intercept them outright).

As for FAQ'ing: an excellent idea! a downloadable OOo or PDF document could be created for each "major" topic/question (i.e. labels, templates, databases) for the FAQ'er to peruse on his/her own time. These could be accessed by a "Table of Contents" or "Subject" page with the appropriate pointers/links/etc.

Finally, create a "Guest" account for those simply trying to get answers. The "guests" would only have READ-ONLY privileges to the FAQ area and main message base. If, only after they've "exhausted their searching", they can't find the answer(s) they're looking for, should they consider creating an account where they can post questions.

Those are my ideas.
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I'm making perfect sense - you're just not keeping up!

[Kaaredyret]

I proposed a FAQ here several times; optimally the FAQ could be build on a WIKI (wiki.openoffice.org) where our users could improve the FAQ.
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[AndrewZ]

[Curtz]

[Hagar Delest]

[noranthon]

[TerryE]

Re:

[Kaaredyret]

[acknak]

Hey nice work Terry!

I agree with culling inactive accounts. Personally, I would choose the longer time (6 mo) and minimize administration (no confirmation or programming, just whack 'em). Add to the site policy that inactive accounts will be removed without notice, and just delete 'em occasionally. It's basically housecleaning, right? Not something to make a project out of.

As far as the FAQ, I see this as a two-sided coin. A good FAQ would be a nice resource. Somehow the official ones aren't effective, although I'm not sure why. I think we ought to have an idea where the problems are before we repeat the same mistakes.

Even a top-notch FAQ won't be used unless we agree to send people there (to their answer, not to a search), instead of answering first. I admit it's often easier to just answer an FAQ than it is to explain to someone how to look it up. However, then they never learn to look it up for themselves.

[skywriteing]

Being in the last group, I'd recommend that the top 10 questions get appended with discussion. The more "natural language " accompanies a solution the easier it will be to find.

Somebody should explain the question, flesh it out a bit and elaborate on the answer. This will make the solution much more searchable for visitors.

For example, my question is about inserting Carriage returns. I can't find any discussion on how to search and replace or insert control codes such as LF or CR. It must be in here somewhere.

- Chuck

[foxcole]

[Hagar Delest]

[hol.sten]

[Hagar Delest]