Will you look at this?

I added a test message to the "question poll", and it turned up in the water cooler poll...
So, maybe this has to do with it having a "?" at the end of the title...
Maybe all discussions with a "?" at the end of the title are mirrorlinked to Q&A?
That would solve the problem of people posting questions in Discussions, at least!

by charliespencer Jan 25, 2011

I recall hearing Jason mention applying some AI to the Subject line in Discussion and Question submissions. Subjects that ended in question marks would be routed to Questions.

that they're in two places at once... at least if the OP was made to the water cooler... this has to be checked out.Now I selected a post as "the answer" in the spawned Q&A poll, I want to see how it affects the original, if at all.

EDIT: And the answer is, no effect.Funny how the same thread can be displayed in two different ways at once.I think that means the code can handle very disparate views... maybe we can ask Jason to have an alternative "Seek and Destroy" -view made... one that focuses at having as many posts visible on-screen at a time as at all possible, with steeper indentation to make it easier to see where the discussions are going.It would make it much easier to handle big threads...

EDIT mkII : It just now hit me, this thread is probably also in the Q&A section, then...

The question mark *should* ask you if you mean for the post to go to the Questions forum. Similarly, a question that doesn't have a question mark should ask you if you mean to start a discussion. As I recall... from reading my notes and not because I actually remember... if you have a question mark at the end of your discussion title, the AI should only [b]ask[/b] you if you meant to ask a question, not automatically redirect your post to the questions forum. The same should hold true for a question without a question mark.

Sounds like a couple of things I want to test for too- just to see what happens. I sense some odd water cooler posts as people try to figure out how everything works.

I went to check if this thread is in the Q&A - and I didn't see it there...
I even made a search which came up empty.
Then I selected the link pointing to this thread at the water cooler; meaning to go here and report the non-spawning of this thread.
And where do I end up?
In a spawned Q&A clone of this thread!!!
Now we have to check if this is a bug that works with any discussion... Sorry, Jason, it's what we gremlins do ;)

The link to this thread as a question: https://www.techrepublic.com/forum/questions/103-340702?tag=mantle_skin;content Turns out, neither of these shows in the questions list: So, if you open one of the two visible OT topics next to the Space-toilet pic above the Q&A list of questions, you'll get to that OT discussion, but it's parsed as a question! Totally a bug.

But it's very robust! When you see these discussions as question, you'll see the post I selected as "the answer" right after the "Question". But if you look at it in the water cooler section, they're in the original order.

This means there is hope for the hunter-killer view, this code could be very adaptable.

When you cry out for clarification, you cry only to other loonies huddled together in the water closet. We get to say what we want.

The thread in QA wasn't showing me all the content from this thread that I know exists.

Perhaps the intended AI isn't working as it should?

Possibly a glitch that was resolved?

But I didn't write "Request For Clarification" as a subject.The code did, when I viewed my Discussion as a Question (DaaQ) and used the "ask for clarification" button to add a reply.In the DaaQ there is no title for the above "Request for Clarification", but when the DaaQ is view as a Discussion again, the Request for Clarification is added as a title.

Obviously the code is requesting it... it feels the anomaly - and reacts, asking "What the hell is going on with me? Please, God, someone, answer me!"

In the DaaQ, no one can hear you scream!

with the level of replies...A real Question doesn't allow requests for clarifications to requests for clarifications; so the replies to replies get cut off, when the thing is erroneously viewed as a Q.

EDIT: And I verified that it's nothing to do with an AI or with the "?"... and the threads don't really show up in Q&A (I think), I just accidentally tricked the code into displaying them as Questions by using the direct shortcut from Q&A to the featured water cooler discussions.

by boxfiddler Hot topic Jan 25, 2011

that all sorts of things that appeared to not work correctly, started working correctly as soon as I disabled NoScript. I do [b]protest[/b] the need to fully disable NoScript for things to work properly.

[i]typo[/i]

Thank you. Just now enabled, show this page, and not temporarily (I'll trust TR). Had to enable "temporarily" for Gravitar yesterday. Never thought to do it here. I noticed that, when I enabled here, the Subject/Comment box for my reply opened instantly under your post. Didn't do that before.

to add www.techrepublic.com to the whitelist of NoScript?
No more .com.com

by boxfiddler Hot topic Jan 25, 2011

*slaps forehead* Duh! :^0

edit
No help. And now posts collapse again after replying, and the dreaded blank white page returns when I try to edit. I'll do more exploring, but at the moment it looks like an all or nothing proposition. :(

by nicknielsen Jan 25, 2011

Works fine here. Still having issues in the feedback thread.

by seanferd Jan 25, 2011

Allow:
techrepublic.com
com.com
zdnet.com
also required now,
bnet.com
cbsinteractive.com (I got away without this one briefly, but later, voting-type gizmos stopped working.)

Then, you have to train Adblock again. I mean, if you are into this sort of thing, interfering in the pursuit of commerce and all.

Why can't can't nobody take control of it? Leave me to my meanderings? I mean, I don't aim harm to anyone. Why do I have to do all this? Somebody please take charge.

This is the URL for the Official Feedback thread in discussions...https://www.techrepublic.com/forum/discussions/102-340633?tag=mantle_skin;content

Now, this, if God will, is the URL for the Official Feedback thread as a Question:https://www.techrepublic.com/forum/questions/102-340633
Could be explosive... But no, it doesn't work ... at least not from the discussion version...And not from the Q&A version either.So it has to do with the linker at the top of Q&A or with the Water Cooler being different from Discussions.

Is it possible that they put a Water Cooler in Questions? Seems possible- there were off topic things in the old QA space.

Can't even think of a way to test it, either.
Especially as there are no "featured discussions" in the Q&A front page... only "featured questions" and then the "featured WC discussions" which caused this whole reality-meltdown-en-miniature.

I started to abbreviate Water Cooler as WC and realized that meant Water Closet so I didn't.

We're all playing in the bathroom. Yes, I know that I am slow to catch on. *sigh*

Somehow, I don't think that my conclusion is what the PTB intended when they decided to officially call Off Topic the Water Cooler. After all, we actually did that back when Off Topic was still called Miscellaneous.

Reminds me of a place I worked for awhile. Their first two initials were AN. A board decision decided that they needed to differentiate their US operations from their Canadian operations. They announced company wide via email that US operations would be known as A.N.U.S as opposed to A.N.Can.

A follow-up email received minutes later changed that to A.N.N.A. (North America) Several minutes later, it changed again. What's funny is that I don't recall off hand what they finally decided on.

Where we get to smoke, drink, and cuss.