<insert prefix here> Request for prefix suggestions..

[Tigersharke]

We have but a few at the moment. 'SOLVED' being the most heavily needed I guess..

What would you like to see? Please provide a scenario that would call for its use.

 

[Basil Hendroff]

SUGGESTION (or FEATURE REQUEST or another synonym), would make it easier in the forum to direct interest to future Suggestion Tickets. Once implemented, in an ideal world, the prefix would be then be changed to SOLVED.

BUG is something in the OS that's clearly broken and can't be SOLVED. It should also be associated with an open ticket.

The issue with additional prefixes such as SUGGESTION or BUG, is that once addressed, the state should be changed to SOLVED. That requires a discipline on the part of the OP. That's the real challenge here I believe. I wouldn't be surprised if this is one of the reasons why transient state prefixes haven't been implemented in the past.

To be really useful though, if additional prefixes are being considered, I wonder whether the Advanced Search box should have a 'Search prefix' option.

 

[Tigersharke]

That is possible but I'd also suspect that unfamiliarity or somehow not recognizing the usefulness/power of prefix as something to implement more completely. As for OP and such, there have been admins/mods here that ask from time to time if some problem was fixed and so an admin/mod could also flip the prefix to solved. Some other forums do not seem to use a forum-based system of prefixes, or possibly they do not exist or any such mod was not added/installed. Take a peek at the forums.freebsd.org to see their [bracket] approach. If this is a way to keep lynx-friendly or similar, that can easily be solved with alt that would be bracket method.

As bugs ought to be reported, possibly that prefix might be more of a 'postulated bug' but with slightly different wording or simply a '?' added. I think I saw somewher among my wandering to reach Xenforo documentation, that some software triage such as bug, confirmed, etc, was implemented. I don't know if I would re-discover the post or how ever it was related on the web, but I could do a search somehow and look into the concept deeper.

Another thing we do not take advantage of, are prompts and forms (I think thats a thing).. and fields. Whether or not required, fields can themselves be a good prompt which might allieviate having to ask "and what is your hardware, specificaly.." for example.

I think there is some way to focus a search on the prefixes but off the top of my head I am uncertain how/where, but likely needs prefix availability in particular nodes involved.

Thank you for your ideas.

 

[argumentum]

...most users, "hit and run", and don't adhere to an etiquette. But nevertheless seeing [solved] in a title, makes looking for a solution much easier.
Now, the implementation can be done with a menu of options ( that I could not find to this moment ) or by been able to edit the thread title. Having an option, allows a user to behave more accordingly, but there are those that may misuse the feature. So like anything else: give it a try and if misused remove the ability. ( my 2 cents. )

 

[Basil Hendroff]

@Tigersharke As I alluded to, I think that you could be creating a rod for your back here with prefixes. However, a couple of things you said got me thinking. Rather than the focus being about new prefixes, I wonder if instead, the focus should be around currency.

Some other forums do not seem to use a forum-based system of prefixes, or possibly they do not exist or any such mod was not added/installed.

I quite regularly see threads on this forum that have been necroed that really shouldn't have been.

On the Plex forum, if a thread hasn't been touched in three months since the last post, it's locked. Now, I feel this window is too short; it could be something longer, say six months or one year. This could be a way of preventing old threads on FreeNAS from being resurrected. What I like about this idea is that it lends itself to automation.

EDIT: On the Caddyserver forum, threads are locked one month after the last post.

Another thing we do not take advantage of, are prompts and forms (I think thats a thing).. and fields. Whether or not required, fields can themselves be a good prompt which might allieviate having to ask "and what is your hardware, specificaly.." for example.

This idea would also help with currency. For example, let's say with new threads, you aren't allowed to start a thread unless you specify which version of TrueNAS you're considering. (This is also relevant for proposed hardware builds, which tend to be built around the current version of TrueNAS at the time.) In its simplest form, this could be a field with a drop-down list eg. 11, 12, etc. If this field were then selectable in a search, it would help to narrow down searches to threads on version-specific features of TrueNAS.

What I like about the combination of these ideas, is that the first, locking of threads, will treat historical threads. The second, the versioning of threads, provides a value add for new threads. Both ideas focus on currency and should help to reduce the administrative effort for admins/mods of managing threads, while providing a value-added benefit for forum members by allowing more targeted searches in recent history.

 

[Tigersharke]

Or

@Tigersharke As I alluded to, I think that you could be creating a rod for your back here with prefixes. However, a couple of things you said got me thinking. Rather than the focus being about new prefixes, I wonder if instead, the focus should be around currency.



I quite regularly see threads on this forum that have been necroed that really shouldn't have been.

On the Plex forum, if a thread hasn't been touched in three months since the last post, it's locked. Now, I feel this window is too short; it could be something longer, say six months or one year. This could be a way of preventing old threads on FreeNAS from being resurrected. What I like about this idea is that it lends itself to automation.



This idea would also help with currency. For example, let's say with new threads, you aren't allowed to start a thread unless you specify which version of TrueNAS you're considering. (This is also relevant for proposed hardware builds, which tend to be built around the current version of TrueNAS at the time.) In its simplest form, this could be a field with a drop-down list eg. 11, 12, etc. If this field were then selectable in a search, it would help to narrow down searches to threads on version-specific features of TrueNAS.

What I like about the combination of these ideas, is that the first, locking of threads, will treat historical threads. The second, the versioning of threads, provides a value add for new threads. Both ideas focus on currency and should help to reduce the administrative effort for admins/mods of managing threads, while providing a value-added benefit for forum members by allowing more targeted searches in recent history.

I appreciate the ideas. I hope other admin/mods weigh in, as I would be apt to test many things sooner than later, and get them used.

UPDATE (over a month later)
Note: After looking at this post I believe my thought (whatever it was) was somehow interrupted or I fat fingered a key, I dunno, but the initial "Or" in this post has no detail and seems very incomplete.