We need a category for reporting problems specifically

gnydick

@dc42 I think one thing that would help is a description for each category (at least the ones that need disambiguation). does this forum software allow that?

I like the 2 cats of firmware behavior and bug reporting.

Bugs definitely need their own place that you can review more easily.

Wyvern

Trust me, more and more categories won't solve any issues, but may actually cause more of a headache when you are trying to find or figure out what exactly you are looking for.

I use a program at work to log time, history, parts and notes, we have about 30 action categories, 45 system categories, and probably 600 component categories- most everyone has thrown in the towel and use random and incorrect job codes- making it a living nightmare to look through history and figure out what the hell is going on.

I spend about a solid hour just selecting categories and logging in notes and that's IF no one has already goofed it up.

gnydick

@wyvern so you'd prefer to have to scan all categories, looking for people who need help or are reporting a bug?

dc42 could spend much less time if he only had to keep an eye on a couple of groups regularly, while perusing the others at his leisure.

DocTrucker

Slight clarification on previous post but I think these are missing:

Website Issues (forum.duet3d.com / www.duet3d.com)
Documentation Issues

A cull/merger of little used titles will be good. Too many is a bad thing.

Wyvern

@gnydick
Problem with bugs, is you don't know its a bug until you know the root of the problem.

Most all faults are configuration or hardware issues and rarely is it actually a software glitch.

Most new users are going to assume strange machine behavior is a "bug", especially when they are using outdated firmware.

dc42

@wyvern said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

@gnydick
Problem with bugs, is you don't know its a bug until you know the root of the problem.

Most all faults are configuration or hardware issues and rarely is it actually a software glitch.

Most new users are going to assume strange machine behavior is a "bug", especially when they are using outdated firmware.

This is why I don't want a bug reporting catagory, but I am open to a "Firmware behaviour" category.

gnydick

@dc42 I don't care what you call it. But if you make it clear it's your high-pri category for people who can't get stuff to work AFTER following all of the documentation, that gives you less to patrol.

In some places I've worked, we had karma points that would go up if you did your due diligence and would go down if you didn't, like if you bugged people a lot while doing no background research to try to figure it out yourself. I don't know if that's possible here, but you could institute something like that for people who just blindly ask "how you do this?" in the high-pri category.

Wyvern

@gnydick
But priority is subject of opinion.
For instance a guy that is having hell with his printer, but all he is printing is a Spongebob du-dad for his desk- not a big deal if it takes a little while to get it running.

For someone who's job or client is relying on the machine, a simple problem could be a big deal for them.

There isn't too much traffic here, it's easy enough to scroll down and look for unanswered questions, as well as it to browse through the history to find out if their question has already been brought up and addressed.

fcwilt

@gnydick

I think any sort of priority system is going to be subject to abuse and add additional administrative duties.

We are lucky as we can be to have dc42 here so frequently. He doesn't need any headaches that a priority system would bring.

gnydick

@wyvern & @fcwilt

There are currently 20 categories. If you were dc42, would you rather watch all 20 categories, looking for something that is high priority, i.e. all posts. Or would you rather have a dedicated place, CLEARLY MARKED, not as "high priority", but as "i think my thing is broken" or "i can't get this to work after following all of the docs."

Unless you believe that all posts will miraculously appear in that new area, rather than in the 20 other categories, I think it's pretty clear that giving priority to a category like the ones mentioned and reviewing it more diligently than the others for things that dc42 deems high priority, which I'm assuming is firmware issues, would be much less work.

The math adds up no matter how you look at it. Even with a 99% false positive rate for the questions in that new category, they would still not amount to the volume of the entire forum.

fcwilt

@gnydick

I would that dc42 simply process on a first come/first serve basis.

I think you are being too kind of you think the system won't be abused.

Phaedrux

@gnydick said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

If you were dc42, would you rather watch all 20 categories, looking for something that is high priority, i.e. all posts.

We don't have to imagine what it would be like to be DC42 and answer for him. The man has answered for himself.

@dc42 said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

This is why I don't want a bug reporting catagory, but I am open to a "Firmware behaviour" category.

gnydick

@phaedrux exactly. He could see having a firmware category.

gnydick

@fcwilt I'm out with talking to you. I acknowledged that it would be abused IF it were given to people as, "please put your high priority stuff here". But that's not what I said...

I said, make some category, that IS the high priority, like "firmware related issues", or "I've followed all the docs, but I still can't get it to work", which are implicitly high priority.

Again, I'm not saying make it like the toggle on email that lets you set priority. To dc42, firmware issues are high priority. If I post something in "firmware issues", like the other day, my machine magically created a 3rd tool, he would want to see that before answering a general question like "how do I attach a mosfet to trigger led lights?".

If you still want to respond with the same thing "it'll be abused", please don't respond because you're not digesting what I'm saying.

deckingman

@gnydick What you are proposing won't work and here is why.

The Duet team know what would help them. I've met them all and can confirm that they are all fully grown up adults, more than capable of making their own decisions.

To this end, they have tried to get users of these forums to do things which would make it easier to solve their issues. A fairly recent example is this sticky https://forum.duet3d.com/topic/5909/guide-for-posting-requests-for-help

Hardly anyone takes any notice of this - YOU INCLUDED - I've just had a quick gander at threads that you have started which confirms this.

So if hardly anyone follows the guidelines that the Duet team have asked for (you included), why do you expect that other users will follow the recommendations that you are proposing?

fcwilt

@gnydick said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

I acknowledged that it would be abused IF it were given to people as, "please put your high priority stuff here"

I said, make some category, that IS the high priority, like "firmware related issues".

Again, I'm not saying make it like the toggle on email that lets you set priority.

I understand what you are saying.

BUT simply making some special category that IS high priority is the same as saying "put your high priority stuff here" or being able to mark the post as "high priority".

Folks will know that that special category gets processed first and they will put their posts there. Then dc42, after determining the posts are NOT high priority, will have to either delete them or move them to the correct category.

I fail to see why you object to first come/first serve - it is fair and equitable.

Anyway that's enough on this topic.

Have a great day.

Edgars Batna

@deckingman said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

@gnydick What you are proposing won't work and here is why.

The Duet team know what would help them. I've met them all and can confirm that they are all fully grown up adults, more than capable of making their own decisions.

To this end, they have tried to get users of these forums to do things which would make it easier to solve their issues. A fairly recent example is this sticky https://forum.duet3d.com/topic/5909/guide-for-posting-requests-for-help

All things described in that topic should be mandatory. There shouldn't be any free-form threads when dealing with problems.

deckingman

@edgars-batna said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

All things described in that topic should be mandatory. There shouldn't be any free-form threads when dealing with problems.

Exactly so. But how do you enforce it?

It's just human nature that some people don't read or follow written instructions. Maybe what is needed is that people have to fill in some sort of form whenever a new thread is started? That might work but there will always be people who jump in on an existing thread and say "I have a similar problem" but those people may not be using the same hardware or firmware or whatever. So then it becomes necessary for users to fill in a form whenever they make a post, which just isn't going to work.

Edgars Batna

@deckingman Yes, a form. Something like a JIRA bugtracker, Bugzilla, Redmine, etc. There are various tools around that are used for software projects that would apply here quite well. Github is not ideal as it's too free-for-all and applies to software only, the forums being a total one-shot-kill deathmatch in comparison.

Maybe the forum software can be extended to support mandatory fields... but why reinvent all the wheels.

fcwilt

@edgars-batna said in We need a category for reporting problems specifically:

Yes, a form. Something like a JIRA bugtracker, Bugzilla, Redmine, etc.

dc42 has already ruled out a "bug reporting" category.

Structured bug reporting is fine for programmers and beta testers and the like, but for end users it is not going to be pretty.