Keeping Forums tidy

[Terox]

Hi,
When i visit OFPEC, like many other forums, i always have trouble finding the relevant thread.
I run the Forums for "Stoners House of Pancakes" at WWW.stone-keep.com
Having experience at running forums I would like to offer some ideas about keeping the place tidy


Poorly named title thread
1) If a postee names his thread unconstructively, like "Need Help please", then i tend to rename the title of the thread to something more meaningful.
Changing it from "Blah Blah Blah" to (Respawn Protection)
Makes it much easier to search

With the amount of posts you get here, especially the re-occuring ones, this poor Post Titling may
reduce this problem


Duplicate threads
What a pain this is
plenty of information about a particular topic, but spread all over the place (Hundreds of pages on the old OFPEC Forums)

I know it isnt possible to move a particular post from one thread to another, but it is possible to copy n paste it and even better if you do this by quoting it.

Here is an example of what I mean
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Rename thread "All about player respawn"

Topic explains itself... does anyone know the coding for respawning... and what else... umMmMmM... also, anyone know how to have a tank or chopper attack a building?

In Response

Adding Respawning
Create a new text document inside your mission directory. Write the following in this document:

Code: [Select]

respawn=2;
respawndelay=20;
The value respawndelay is in seconds. Codes for respawn are below.

Save and close the document and rename it to description.ext
Make sure your system is set to display file extensions so that its name doesn't accidentally become "description.ext.txt".

Remember to set your units as playable in the editor. If you use the setting above they will now respawn where they died after 20 seconds.

Respawn Codes

  0 (or "NONE")
  - No respawn. The camera zooms slowly out from the player's corpse.

  1 (or ["BIRD"])
  - Respawn as a seagull after respawndelay.

  2 (or "INSTANT")
  - Respawn at the place of death after respawndelay.

  3 (or "BASE")
  - Respawn at a random spot in the side's marker zone after respawndelay.
    The names of the different zones are:
        West: respawn_west
        East: respawn_east
        Resistance: respawn_guerrila
        Civilians: respawn_civilian

  4 (or "GROUP")
  - Respawn into any alive AI in the player's squad after respawndelay.
    If noone is left then the player respawns as a seagull.

  5 (or "SIDE")
  - Exactly the same as number 4 (GROUP) - at least in v1.46.

Two pitfalls must be pointed out before you start testing:

 1. Note that respawning will not work if you run the mission from the editor. You will have to Save and Export to Multiplayer, exit the Mission Editor, select Multiplayer, create a new server, select your mission, and test it.

 2. If your rename your mission when exporting it, you'll be in trouble. The editor only copies the mission.sqm file and ignores everything else It's easier to rename the mission folder in Windows before opening it in OFP and then exporting it with its new name.

Pope Zog

In Response

That's because the sticky at the top of the forum is not clear, for instance

"By the way. This only works in TRUE multiplayer mode, so it wont work if u test the mission in the mission editor."

That little snipet should be included, I did not know that you could not test respawns in the mission editor preview...

Seems to me that allot of the tutorials here need to be allot more clear for us beginners. We all had to start at one time or another, right...  :-\

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
These posts that i quoted were taken from different threads

I would also reduce the actual quoted post so that only the relevant information is displayed, not the waffle, which you have to tredge through to find the good info.


Here is a guideline to how i do it

1) Have 2 web browsers open
a) To read and copy from
b) To post too
(You may need 2 login names to do this on your forum)

2) Have a text editor open with the [ b ] [ color= ] type things already done,
ie (b)(color=blue) In Response(/b)(/color)
ie In Response[/color]
so you only have to copy n paste

3) Delete the posts from the original thread that you have copied, and in some cases the complete thread

4) If there are two offshoots within the thread, say one about how to do a respawn and one about how to create 2 respawn areas for same side, then have 2 posts in that thread, one for each, containing all the relevant discussion done in quotes.

5) If there are two different questions raised in a post, then split the info creating a new post with the different question in it
Like this post

Topic explains itself... does anyone know the coding for respawning... and what else... umMmMmM... also, anyone know how to have a tank or chopper attack a building?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------




If you take a look at this link you will see it in action

 :gunman: http://www.stone-keep.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=231



I hope this helps

[Sefe]

Thank you for your suggestions. But for a forum of our size they simply are unpractical. I'm sure for your forums your system works fine. I just took a look at your forums. You have 1377 posts from 265 members. At the same time the OFPEC forum has 23029 posts from 2791 members. Hence, we have ten times more members and almost twenty times more posts. We have a very experienced staff and you can be sure that if there would be a practical way to avoid the problems you mentioned, we wouldn't hesitate to do so. And where there are practical ways, we go them.

I'll go into your specific suggestions:

Our moderators have the strict instruction not to modify the title or the body of a message unless it's absolutely nescessary to remove offending or illegal content. And when they modify posts, they will always mark those modifications. The reason is that we believe that it is essential for your right for free speech that everyone can be sure that the entire message is written by the one who's name you can read at the left side of the post. Thus, modifying a post requires a very good justification and should be the exception. If you think a topic title is "unconstructive", you can always send the author a personal message and ask him to change his title and to use better titles in the future.

As for your suggestion about copying/pasting posts, it's unpractical for a number of reasons:

• For a forum as big as the OFPEC this system is simply impossible to realize. We would need about five to ten times the staff we have at the moment. I am moderating this forum for a long time now and I can assure you, our moderators are busy enough moderating the forums according to our existing guidelines. They all have jobs, families and friends. It would be absolutely impossible for them to cope with the additional workload that comes with your system.
• We have the editors depot which is our database for all OFP editing related questions. Maybe you should search the ed depot first when you have a specific editing related question. That's the reason it's there. We have editors depot staff who's job is to search the forum for solved problems and add them to the add depot FAQ. And you're also invited to upload information to the ed depot. This is our system of avoiding the same question being asked again and again. It's very sophisticaed and hence we simply don't need to copy and paste answers to another thread. Uploading data to the ed depot is much more efficient than that. As long as everyone helps to improve the database, you will find more and more of your questions already answered in the ed depot.
• What justification do we have to delete posts just because the question has already been answered? Some problems are similar but not exactly the same. Especially at the field of OFP editing, problems that differ only slightly often require some completely different solutions. Hence, you should be very careful with considering a question to be already answered. And even if the question is already answered, we have to take every question seriously. When the answer can be found in the ed depot or in a different thread, someone can alwys direct the poster to that thread or the ed depot entry. But in a forum as big es the OFPEC forum, the moderators simply can't have a full overview about all asked questions and they don't have the time to search for similar threads whenever a new topic is started. It's the poster's job to check the forums and the ed depot if the question is already answered, not the job of our staff.
• When we delete a topic just because the question is already answered, the poster will either wonder where his thread has gone or our moderators would have to inform each one who posted in the thread that it has been deleted (which would be too much work). In a forum with only a fraction of the traffic of the OFPEC forums it may be rather easy to find a question that has been copied/pasted to another thread. In the OFPEC this is rather difficult.
• While we think that asking a question multiple times should be avoided, we still think that it we would disrespect the right for free speech if we would delete or lock a topic just because this question has already been asked by someone else. We can direct him to the thread that solves his problem, but we won't delete the post.

Thank you for you input but I hope to understand that we have some good reasons not to realize your suggestions.

[Tomb]

  Terox, m8 - Just a few tiny comments from a regular member here! :thumbsup:

1. the atmosphere is very "large" around here, meaning: both staffy's and members
   don't really get all that upset about a 'sprouted topic' (most times)  
   if a d00d name his thread *HEEEEELP* it just means that he needs help,
   and so you read it & post a rep. if you got the answer + the time to reply.
   No biggy, really, if ya ask me! We're all in it for free, and the depot is there for
   ppl whom don't have the time (or the temperament) for "recycled" topics  

2.  (referring to Sefe's avatar now) No one is sane around here, especially not the staff, so
    skip the professionalism and live with chaos   ;D you'll like it someday!  
     

3. (being serious now) I have never ever experienced a forum as big as this which
   actually works and in general have an EXTREME high level of peace and
    kindness (and patience) among the members. Really amazing, I'd say.

  :cheers:

4. The official BIS forums seem to run this 'hard' line of strict policies, and it is my
    personal opinion that exactly this fact keeps me away from the place....
    Somehow, a game-forum is also a place of plain good ol' fun, nothing else!
    You can take professionalism too high up and risk to kill the place  

Never the less, I understand your points and (in despite of my statements) feel
attracted to the user friendly machinery that you seem to be running.
Still, I prefer 'chaos', as it leads me from topic to topic, which means that I
have learned more about editing etc. when I leave ofpec at night, than if
I just got online, located a certain threadName and left again.

The Ed. depot offers me this option   while the boards give me the unknown surprises.


------------------------------

P.S.  THIS THREAD is a perfect example of what I mean;

A guy has a Q, and a he gets his reply, and the rep. is given by a d00d
who (I know that for sure) has been answering this Q multiple times,
yet it doesn't bother him, it's ok   Now, THAT's caring, sharing and helping, m8    :thumbsup:
And somehow, precisely this is what gives this place a special atmosphere!


   

[Terox]

It was just a suggestion,
If you have guidelines to follow, then that is what must be done

i find it frustrating sometimes looking for a snippet of information which i know is in there somewhere, but even a search doesnt find it because a lot of the thread titles are so vague.

Yes you are quite correct, it takes ages to do it the way I do it and in the end about half the posts are deleted.

As per right of speach fair comment.

I always approached OFPEC as a (The) major source of scripting info, and just thought that with it being so, could be made better for searching purposes.
Approx 4 months ago before u redid the forums i spent about 4 hours looking for a snippet of information about turning boat engines off and just gave up in the end, it was (Due to the phenomenal amount of posts you have) a mammoth task ;D
I never did find a workable solution.


Anyway, I am very impressed with the effort you put in to replying to my post, and would like to thank you all on behalf of all the OFP community for the continuing effort you all put in

[Tomb]

Ya can't switch off the boats "soundEngine", m8  :-\ it's impossible.
However, you COULD (if it's just for a cutscene) use the "FadeSound" command
and put some music/weather sfx instead.... OR   make a tiny addon, sort of a
"dummy-ship-object" just for use in silenced moments... then a cutscene could
give you time to swap the dummy with the real thing or alike...

(grab this attached addon, it will show ya the trick - very simple stuff really)  

put the .pbo file into your OFP / "Addons" folder and run the game.

PS. it's a regular "PBR" boat. it will pop up in the editor under :

  UNITS / EMPTY / Sea ( ;D ) / Dummy Boat (PBR)  

[Sefe]

Approx 4 months ago before u redid the forums i spent about 4 hours looking for a snippet of information about turning boat engines off and just gave up in the end, it was (Due to the phenomenal amount of posts you have) a mammoth task ;D
I never did find a workable solution.

It's commendable that you searched the forum before you asked a question. If everyone did that we would avoid many duplicate threads. But you don't need to search for hours. When the search isn't successful your question might not been asked before. In those cases, just start a new thread. And if you're lucky you'll have the answer in no time.

[Terox]

God have i started a thread here.
Dont worry about the boat question, i gave up on it a long time ago.

My problem was that i wanted a boat to stay put on land until pushed in by a vehicle. Unfortunately the engine runs, and this causes slight movement, which was misaligning the boat on the launch ramp (It was twisting)
Engineoff, locking wp into position etc all of these didnt work, nor did any ideas to the replies to my post about it.


So dont worry about it.