XP for CB

[jonnyfolk]

Oh well, it's Friday and there hasn't been a new discussion for a while so here goes...

We have all (I guess) at certain times been to the CB and called out a question rather than using the more formal SOPW. Well it's true that sometimes a question can go unheeded but generally folks take the time to answer the question and answer it very well

The problem is that after all the discussion and advice it feels a bit weak just to sign off saying "thanks castaway", or "cheers, Podmaster". Another side to the CB is that it can be a flippin' good read, and if a good point is made we quite often see the comment "++tye" or whoever.

What it would be nice to do would be to award XP to the CB when I benefit from it either by getting questions answered or simply by being entertained.

The way that I am thinking is that if someone voted ++ for the CB then the last x (five, ten, whatever) posters would receive an XP. It would be a bit like tossing a coin into the crowd. It's true that sometimes the XP might not hit the intended target, but for me that's not a problem

I was thinking that if a straight voting system couldn't be implemented then the relatively new and promising im2 might be used to implement something of this nature

I was wondering if the other monks found the idea interesting/useful?

[gmax]

The mechanism of voting is interesting because it is public and lasting. If you write something, I can read it one month later and show my appreciation (or disdain, sometimes) by voting it.

On the contrary, CB contents, even the most interesting pieces, fade away after one hour or so (if you use the CB last 35 page.)

That said, if you feel that somebody deserves your voting thanks, nothing prevents you from browsing that Monk's nodes and upvote the ones that you find valuable, gaining some more knowledge in the bargain.

So, after you got some useful advice from tye on a parser, for example, go to super search and try nodes with "parser" in their title, written by tye, and for sure you'll find something that you can add to your bag of tricks. If there is nothing on the subject for which you got the advice, then list his best nodes and carpet bomb them with upvotes. :)

It's part of the Monastery's culture. Live with it!

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[chromatic]

Wearing my old-timer hat, I've always thought that XP should be wielded to the benefit of the monastery as a whole. I don't have the sense that most monks ever use the chatterbox — quite a few do, but is it more than a small fraction of the total monk population? How much does any one chatterbox comment benefit the rest of the monastery?

It's not a bad idea. I just wonder what it promotes.

[kutsu]

chromatic said: I don't have the sense that most monks ever use the chatterbox

Monks who aren't here, can also miss the information given in the CB and, unlike SoPW, they can't look it up once it's gone. As VSarkiss said if you really liked the info, go ++ one of their posts.

"Pain is weakness leaving the body, I find myself in pain everyday" -me

[VSarkiss]

Chances are if you like what the person said in CB, you'll like their writeups too. Go find one or two and upvote those.

Laziness, ya know.

[moxliukas]

As far as I know Everything engine has a feature of 'blessing' (which is implemented in everything2.com) exactly for this purpose. Basically you can go and upvote (or bless) users home node. There is also a posibility for cursing

I think this would translate nicely to the whole monastery idea, but I think this has been discused a few times before.

[rir]

it feels a bit weak just to sign off saying "thanks

It is not. Don't worry about it.

XP is fun but as thanks XP is cheesy compared to a clear thank you.

[BrowserUk]

...a bit like tossing a coin in a crowd...

Isn't that illegal?

I mean, if you drop a coin from any great height, it can be dangerous can't it?

---

Examine what is said, not who speaks.
"Efficiency is intelligent laziness." -David Dunham
"When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -Richard Buckminster Fuller

[jonnyfolk]

Well, I didn't actually say that the coin was attached to a brick, so ++ for reading between the lines!

[theorbtwo]

It's perfectly possible to, rather then the interface you gave (which is somwhat clunky), look for strings of the form ...++, and ++ the user given in the brackets. (You'd have to use some subtlety so that $foo[3]++ wouldn't ++ the user named 3, even if you accidently left off the code tags, and, for that matter, so that ++foo works. Not too much of a problem, might just exclude the few monks with all-numeric names.)

Weather this is worthwhile is another question. I think a 1/5 chance of gaining an XP per mention is worthwhile.

I'll wait to see what the gods think before starting a patch, though.

---

Warning: Unless otherwise stated, code is untested. Do not use without understanding. Code is posted in the hopes it is useful, but without warranty. All copyrights are relinquished into the public domain unless otherwise stated. I am not an angel. I am capable of error, and err on a fairly regular basis. If I made a mistake, please let me know (such as by replying to this node).

[pfaut]

I don't know about other monks but as for me, knowing I've helped someone get past a problem is enough reward for me. I'd rather you didn't vote on my posts for something said in the CB.

90% of every Perl application is already written. ⇒

dragonchild

[Aristotle]

Agreed - moreover, I'm going to care a lot more about getting a "thanks!" than someone adding a point to a counter somewhere on one node in this place.

Makeshifts last the longest.

[castaway]

Hmm, its all the same to me.. But I'll throw in an argument that some people prefer to help 'live' in the CB than answer nodes (including yours truly), and it might be fairer to allow distribution of XP there too. I don't see why a [fred]++ shouldnt deduct a vote from the person that says it, and randomly award an XP to the mentioned person..

BTW, thanks for the vote of confidence, but im2 is an external script, and I doubt he'd be allowed to distribute votes for other people..

C.