Mentioned it in a sub topic of this thread but will mention it here too for added thought.
"ONBOARDING" as it is known if the process a new user should go through before getting access to the forum.
It is a topic that has come up a few times in the past and I don't think it ever got the attention it deserved.
All new forum users go through it but they can skip if they so wish and just dive right in.
Fixing and or improving that would help minimise some of the reason for this particular topic.
Better onboarding means better informed users, means a better chance of mis-categorised posts.
I thought/think the on-board process was/is too click-through, and should include common requests by mods (posting formatted code, include a drawing)... to earn ones way before achieving post-ability.
I made a similar suggestion a year or two ago and got beat up by a "person in the computer industry" who insisted that I was starting a class war of the privileged versus underprivileged... which got me a bahnhammer (well, I couldn't sign-in, so I put the keyboard down for a few months) and the topic removed.
That has been suggested in the past but turned down.
Cannot quite remember the reasons or be bothered to look them up.
Think that maybe there should be a graduated discobot.
First level basic MUST be completed and would not have to be too hard.
Second level more advanced and optional but user is bugged a few times when logging in.
Maybe they should be told that those pop ups suggestion's will go away if they complete it ?
I think that this will not bring the results you expect and will only annoy users.
Those who do not want to read anything will not read anything anyway.
That was then and slightly wrong.
There is a BADGE for users who have gone through the discobot forum tutorial.
However limits to the SQL features may make it hard to fully link badges to TL (though not impossible)
But if Pert says it cannot be done who am I to question that LOL
This "sub topic" was not made by me but is part of another one.
Somebody decided it needed to be hived off for no particular reason that I see but hey ho here we are.
Simply suggested that there is room for improvement in this area and that it has direct consequences on the other topics that have been randomly split from thier parents.
The continued dilution of suggestions/ideas is not my doing.
This was always my "preferred" forum for Arduino related topics.
Unfortunately it has taken a down turn of recent due to a couple of broken rungs on the Arduino ladder.
If I found somewhere that showed the promise this forum once had, I would certainly consider it as a viable ALT.
That could indicate that "onboarding" is part of the issue with badly placed posts that require extra work.
It would to me at least show a good reason as to why this topic should not have been split.
The figure itself is quite abysmal and much lower than many of us would have anticipated.
Catch them "as they come through the door" goes back all the way to the SMF software.
Unfortunately nobody is in a position to push those types of idea anymore.
Or if they are, they will quite possibly just get shot down generating an apathy in the community.
Wasn't always the case.
Doesn't have to be the case.
But until there are some fundamental changes I don't foresee much else.
