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Rant - Why don't people bother to search before posting questions?

Former Member
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I don't often have rants but after more than a year of seeing the same questions crop up week after week, I have to say I'm on the verge of leaving SDN.

People just couldn't be bothered to search, I'll see exactly the same question posted twice in 10 lines and week after week its exactly the same questions cropping up from users who couldn't be bothered to waste their "valuable" time searching and let others do all the work for them.

What is it with people that they couldn't be bothered to search before posting questions?

Accepted Solutions (1)

Accepted Solutions (1)

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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You could do your bit by hitting the Abuse Button on all Basic & Searchable questions. I do the same in ABAP General (roughly about 20-30 Abuse Reports a day) and they are all dealt with. Continued violation of the Rules leads to the user losing his/her account. This usually acts as a deterant.

And because of this stricter moderator, the noise-level in ABAP Forums has come down drastically.

pk

Former Member
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What abuse item do you normally list them as? General abuse?

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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Yes. I select the General Abuse item followed with a small desciption in the text box to be more specific. Something like:

Did not search or

Basic Question or

Did not learn ABAP or

Frequently asked or answered question or

Point-Hunter's bait or

Lazy question et al

If the user opened multiple threads on the same issue, then I provide links to the other duplicates.

If the user is a repeat offender, I mention that too.

If the user has been warned before by the mods, sometimes I provide those links too

Its impossible for the mods to look into every thread in the forum, conisidering they too have full-time day jobs like us. Hence they heavily rely on the Abuse Reports.

pk

Former Member
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Thanks. I'll try it and see what happens.

ThomasZloch
Active Contributor
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Few more categories from my practice::

- copy/paste from ... (quote link to source)

- spec dumping ("do my work")

- interview question

- link farm (almost extinguished now in ABAP forums)

- adding new question to somebody else's old/closed thread

Please join the team

Thomas

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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Oh.. you want more? Devour!!!

-Vague title

-Vague question

-Incomplete question

-Nonsense question

-Wrong forum

-Point-Hunting with links link (usually a single link, since farms have been vilified)

-Democracy Answers

-Answering basic questions

And last but not the least, my favourite:

-Point-gaming suspected.

pk

Edited by: kishan P on Oct 28, 2009 2:21 PM

Former Member
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I agree, Thomas.

I've even had someone copying my own work as an answer and not referencing it.

Former Member
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Hello Kishan,

I am quite curious to know as to what you mean by democracy answers. It would help me too to report those

Vikranth

ThomasZloch
Active Contributor
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Yes, I would like to know too.

I forgot:

- all capital letters

- asking for points

- offering points

- personal information (email, phone number)

Thomas

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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Here's an example for you...

pk

PS: also, in an instance we(Gautham) recently discovered:

User Account1 asks a basic question.

*Switch*

User Account2 recommends to search SCN.

*Switch*

User Account1 gives 10 points to User Account2.

Somewhere down the line, the User Accounts gets mixed up. In such a scenario:

-Oops. Something wrong here. Must be the Flux Capacitor.

pk

Edited by: kishan P on Oct 28, 2009 3:00 PM

Former Member
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LOL now i understood what are democracy answers. I missed that ABAP Data Dictionary thread.

Were you referring to this ?

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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Yes.

Even Democracy answers have come down off late...

pk

GauthamV
Active Contributor
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>

> in an instance we(Gautham) recently discovered:

>

Only mistake he made in that thread was ,forget to change his name when posting

from other user id which made our job easy.

former_member181995
Active Contributor
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>

> I am quite curious to know as to what you mean by democracy answers.

here is one more example for you => .

It would help me too to report those

Yes, You can always report abuse to yourself !

Former Member
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former_member181995
Active Contributor
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This message was moderated.

Former Member
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This message was moderated.

former_member181995
Active Contributor
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This message was moderated.

Former Member
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matt
Active Contributor
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I did a stint a while ago of simply rejecting posts with just a link (or links) in it. That really did reduce the occurrence. As did a few guestifications...

matt

Former Member
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Do you mind spending some time in the DMS forum, Matt, we need someone who is prepared to start deleting this crap.

It bugs me about how seriously problems are watered down by 400 duplicates of the same post which all say:

"Please show me how to config DMS"

"I need to setup SAP DMS to HR but can't find an option"

"How is a change master used"

"Where can I get DMS training material"

"Where do I find EasyDMS config guide"

etc

Answers (1)

Answers (1)

former_member184657
Active Contributor
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This message was moderated.