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Ever feel like people don't use Google enough?

Yup. Ubuntu's forums are virtually unusable due to people not being familiar with a search engine. Trivial questions get asked over and over, and good questions disappear off the bottom as a result. It's great that they're "friendly", but there needs to be a balance. Sometimes RTFM is the best response.
 
This.

tech_support_cheat_sheet-600x674.png
 
lxskllr said:
Yup. Ubuntu's forums are virtually unusable due to people not being familiar with a search engine. Trivial questions get asked over and over, and good questions disappear off the bottom as a result. It's great that they're "friendly", but there needs to be a balance. Sometimes RTFM is the best response.
Click to expand...

It's simply just ridiculous how people don't use Google when it answers 99% of questions.
 
Last edited:
alangrift said:
It's simply just ridiculous how people don't use Google when it answers 99% of questions.
Click to expand...

My dad had a boss who, if he wanted to talk to you about something important, would get up and walk around the building until he found you. (Because even though email or phones were faster, they lacked the personal touch that allowed him to impart a sense of urgency, I guess.)

It wouldn't be so bad, except even in the '90s, my dad was an email addict and everybody knew he couldn't go more than ten minutes without hitting the refresh button. The fastest way to contact him was electronically. But dude would walk around the building for hours every day, looking for people.

That said, boss-man was in better shape than most.
 
lxskllr said:
Yup. Ubuntu's forums are virtually unusable due to people not being familiar with a search engine. Trivial questions get asked over and over, and good questions disappear off the bottom as a result. It's great that they're "friendly", but there needs to be a balance. Sometimes RTFM is the best response.
Click to expand...

While I do completely agree that most people need to learn how to search, and I'm sure that there are a lot of trivial questions asked at the Ubuntu forums, I do still take issue with the way many forums are run.

Many people are direct to a search function that may not function that well. I know some of them are quite limited and also don't let you make more than one search every 30 seconds, even if you make a typo. Many will automatically filter out any words deemed "too common" or "too short," even if they are a key part of an exact phrase search (if exact phrases are even possible). Not everyone is aware of Google site-specific search.

Also, a lot of people are directed to "read the stickies." In reality, a lot of forums have way too many stickies, half of which are old and outdated, and most of them are dozens (sometimes hundreds) of pages long, making it nearly impossible to find the necessary information. Unless the OP is extremely diligent in updating his post, stickies aren't always useful.

When someone asks a stupid question, it's common to berate them for asking it and then not answer. Of course this often leads to an argument, which takes longer than simply answering the question. Maybe answering it is "encouraging" more stupid questions, but I don't see it that way... usually the people asking dumb questions are first-time users, so answering or not answering makes no difference. And it's always frustrating when you search for a problem on Google only to have the first result be a thread where the question is asked and not answered.

Lastly, different forums have different philosophies on whether it's preferable to bump an existing thread or create a new thread when you have new information or new questions about an issue. And those philosophies are so ingrained into the culture that people are often chastised for doing it the wrong way ("why'd you necro that thread?" vs. "there's already a thread on this topic!").

All of that said... I am not the type of person who will immediately post a tech help thread the instant things don't work the way I want them to. I do my due diligence in searching and using whatever resources are already available.
 
Sophitia said:
You will all be as turtles on their back when Google or the internet is taken from you or regulated.
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Google is a convenience, nothing more. Internet is harder to work without, but it's doable. It needs to be taken back to the original intent of equal peers. Centralizing services is dangerous, and removes the robust fault tolerance of proper decentralized computing.
 
AstroManLuca said:
While I do completely agree that most people need to learn how to search, and I'm sure that there are a lot of trivial questions asked at the Ubuntu forums, I do still take issue with the way many forums are run.

Many people are direct to a search function that may not function that well. I know some of them are quite limited and also don't let you make more than one search every 30 seconds, even if you make a typo. Many will automatically filter out any words deemed "too common" or "too short," even if they are a key part of an exact phrase search (if exact phrases are even possible). Not everyone is aware of Google site-specific search.

Also, a lot of people are directed to "read the stickies." In reality, a lot of forums have way too many stickies, half of which are old and outdated, and most of them are dozens (sometimes hundreds) of pages long, making it nearly impossible to find the necessary information. Unless the OP is extremely diligent in updating his post, stickies aren't always useful.

When someone asks a stupid question, it's common to berate them for asking it and then not answer. Of course this often leads to an argument, which takes longer than simply answering the question. Maybe answering it is "encouraging" more stupid questions, but I don't see it that way... usually the people asking dumb questions are first-time users, so answering or not answering makes no difference. And it's always frustrating when you search for a problem on Google only to have the first result be a thread where the question is asked and not answered.

Lastly, different forums have different philosophies on whether it's preferable to bump an existing thread or create a new thread when you have new information or new questions about an issue. And those philosophies are so ingrained into the culture that people are often chastised for doing it the wrong way ("why'd you necro that thread?" vs. "there's already a thread on this topic!").

All of that said... I am not the type of person who will immediately post a tech help thread the instant things don't work the way I want them to. I do my due diligence in searching and using whatever resources are already available.
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I think these are all good points. I always found the "don't necro threads!" and "there's already a thread on this!" stuff hilarious. Its not even consistent in a site. If you listened to all the complainers you could never post anything.
 
Probably the most frustrating thing that I encounter is people who post the exact question that I have, make a few general posts with more information, then end the thread with "I figured it out" and don't post the solution.
 
xanis said:
Probably the most frustrating thing that I encounter is people who post the exact question that I have, make a few general posts with more information, then end the thread with "I figured it out" and don't post the solution.
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Those people are selfish assholes. There's been a few times I've searched obscure problems only to find "nvm, I fixed it" as the only "solution". People like that should be kicked in the balls, and their internet privilege reduced to AOL and dialup only :^S
 
lxskllr said:
Those people are selfish assholes. There's been a few times I've searched obscure problems only to find "nvm, I fixed it" as the only "solution". People like that should be kicked in the balls, and their internet privilege reduced to AOL and dialup only :^S
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This x10000. :thumbsup:
 
lxskllr said:
Those people are selfish assholes. There's been a few times I've searched obscure problems only to find "nvm, I fixed it" as the only "solution". People like that should be kicked in the balls, and their internet privilege reduced to AOL and dialup only :^S
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Yeah.. hate that shit.

TBH the type of people that do that are probably the type of people who fixed it by:

- buying a new one
- switching to mac
- not doing whatever the hell they were trying to do
- having their friend do it for them

So their solution would likely be a dissapointing one at best 😛
 
Sophitia said:
You will all be as turtles on their back when Google or the internet is taken from you or regulated.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you missed the point. Point is, too many people expect to have their hands held and spoon fed stuff instead of putting a little effort into finding an answer themselves, especially for very easily found stuff.
 
Of course they don't. Even in everyday life, people would rather call someone and have them ineptly explain something to them over the phone than look it up online. I have been able to find an answer for almost every practical question I've had through google. The only time I could even imagine having a problem is when you don't know most of the terms for the thing you're asking about.

An extreme example of the last would be trying to find out how to get a TV to work with an antenna, except you don't know what any of them are called. What would that google search look like?

"Use shiny roof thing to make pictures on black rectangle"
 
Maximilian said:
Yeah.. hate that shit.

TBH the type of people that do that are probably the type of people who fixed it by:

- buying a new one
- switching to mac
- not doing whatever the hell they were trying to do
- having their friend do it for them

So their solution would likely be a dissapointing one at best 😛
Click to expand...

Probably. I know if its a problem that I haven't seen a documented result for I usually post what I did simply to brag and perhaps create a record for myself. I seem to remember searching for a solution to a problem I had on here one time but couldn't remember the resolution for, only to find my own original post from the first time it happened.
 
PingSpike said:
Probably. I know if its a problem that I haven't seen a documented result for I usually post what I did simply to brag and perhaps create a record for myself. I seem to remember searching for a solution to a problem I had on here one time but couldn't remember the resolution for, only to find my own original post from the first time it happened.
Click to expand...

Thank god that happens to other people too. It seems like there's a lot of things these days that I'm hesitant to mess with because I don't remember exactly how I got them to work in the first place.
 
SlitheryDee said:
An extreme example of the last would be trying to find out how to get a TV to work with an antenna, except you don't know what any of them are called. What would that google search look like?

"Use shiny roof thing to make pictures on black rectangle"
Click to expand...

That would make the world hilarious if everyone suddenly forgot what everything was called :^D
 
xanis said:
Probably the most frustrating thing that I encounter is people who post the exact question that I have, make a few general posts with more information, then end the thread with "I figured it out" and don't post the solution.
Click to expand...

I have exactly the same problem!

EDIT.

NVM I found out how to stop it happening.
 
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