A Guide to Message Boards
icekin — Tue, 2006/03/07 - 13:51
This is a very basic guide to using message boards.
Contents
1) Accessing Message Boards
Most newsgroups on USENET can be accessed through any standard email client such as Mozilla Thunderbird, Outlook Express or Ximian Evolution. Google also provides a web based interface to access the newsgroups through Google Groups, through which posting to the groups is possible. One can also search the entire USENET for posts containing a certain keyword though the Google Groups interface.
Newsgroups and message boards that are outside USENET are often run on free forum software solutions like phpBB or Invision Bulletin Board System. To access these, one has to unfortunately use a web based interface every time to log in and read the messages or search the forums. The advantage is that forum software is quite advanced and offer extensive options in their searches. They also allow posting through email, if the forum moderator has activated the option.
2) Message Board Terminology
Category
A category is a placeholder for a group of message boards, all which are related to that subject. You cannot post under a category itself, you have to send the post to one of the individual message boards under that category.
Board
This is the actually place where the messages are held, according to various topics.
Topic
A single message board can hold any number of topics. Users usually have the power to create new topics, but not new categories or message boards. That power is usually reserved for moderators of the forum. A topic must have a title associated with it. The topic often describes the issue or problem at hand. When posting a new question, a person can either post it as a reply under some other existing topic or create a new topic.
Before deciding whether to post under an existing topic, check the date of the last post. If it is too long ago, say more than 2 weeks, it is better to create a new topic to post your question.
When creating a topic, use a meaningful title to describe question. A poor topic title is one like 'Help, this software is broken!'
A better title would be one like 'Software gives runtime error when executing'. Topics with good titles immediately attract any person who might know the answer. A general title like the former means that a person would have to open that topic to actually read the question. While someone may eventually get around to answering the query, it will take longer.
Post
The post is the actual body of the post. Here, type the entire question with details. Always be descriptive, giving as much information as possible.
Reply
All the posts following the first post that began with the topic are considered replies.
Thread
A topic together with all the posts and replies that come under it is called a thread.
3) Message Board Usage
Always remember that there are other real people in a forum, just like you. For this reason, be considerate towards them. Always remember to use the search feature to find out if anyone has posted a similar question earlier. The moderators of a forum get really annoyed if different users keep posting the same question many times over when it has already been answered. Some forums even have a special FAQ thread where ready answers to the most commonly used questions are available. Read those threads.
Always post under the appropriate category. Many forums have various discussions going on from politics to sports, even if the site is associated mainly with some other topic. Most threads have a clear short summary below the thread name stating what the subject of discussion is. If really unsure which category or board it belongs to, just post it under the general or miscellaneous category.
Another thing to remember is that while people on forums are more than willing to help, they will not do your work for you. This means posts like
"I need help with my homework, can someone give me the source code to this program etc." will be ignored or even condemned.
However, if the same question had been posted as :
"I have the following homework question. This is what I tried doing so far. Here is a section of my source code. The program still fails to run as expected. What could possibly be wrong?"
Such a question would be welcomed because it shows that the person tried, but still failed. Also, don't be worried if you get abused or criticized on a forum. Take it as part of your learning experience.
4) Criticism on Boards
I have generally noticed that abuse is more prevalent on forums regarding computer programming. Some of the people in those forums have been into serious programming and project development for more than a decade and consider themselves true hackers. For unexplainable reasons, hacker culture generally considers the use of profanity to be a cool phenomenon. Terms like RTFM and STFW are considered very common replies to questions, especially if the person asking never did any work to find the answer on their own. So, don't take offence. In fact, even well known computer consultants like Eric S Raymond have taken the stand that such lingo acceptable on hacker forums. See the Hacker FAQ and How to become a Hacker documents for more information. Such hackers may be found on any forum, but are more common on computer and electronics related forums. Also read this document on How to Ask Questions the Smart Way.
Most forums have a feature that lets you be informed by email the moment someone replies to your post so that you don't have to keep checking the forum now and then. Some offer an option to receive all the posts by email instead of having to visit the forum. It is possible to post to the forum by sending an email to the forum address. There may not always be an immediate reply to your post. Some replies may simply point you to a reference site to look for more data. But, in general, after a day or two, you would have obtained an answer or something to work with.
5) Problems with Message Boards
The information given by the users of a forum is to be taken as a piece of advice on the subject. A researcher planning to use that information in his work cannot directly quote someone from a forum as a reference. He must instead search the web for a web page that contains the same type of information. Whenever possible, always cross check the data provided by a forum user because it might be inaccurate. The best way is to ask reply to the post asking that user how he came to learn of that information. This might lead to the original source.
6) Evaluating a Board
The best way to is to determine if a forum is good is to examine the following factors:
Site evaluation
If the forum is associated with a particular website, then determine how good that website is first. If it is a popular site and the articles seem to be of high quality, then you are likely to find some real information in the forums too. Usually the authors of the site are also members of the forum, so you can be sure that the information is coming from a somewhat credible source.
Age
The older the forum, the more number of posts relevant to the subject and it is likely that someone before you would have asked a similar question before.
Number of Posts
In some forums, it is possible to see how many total posts have been made to date. This will also include a lot of posts that may be off topic.
Number of Users
If a large user base is present, then someone is likely to answer your question soon. A large user base does not mean a very active user base, but usually it means at least some of the users are regulars and will help you out.
