Project talk:Support desk/Archive 1

Users support desk
There would be a Users support desk, a System Administrators support desk and a Developers support desk. See User_hub.
 * If there's a lesson to be learned from the English Wikipedia, is that there is such a thing as having too many desks, and not enough volume to warrant them. Having more places to look for info just causes duplicated effort or missed discussions/replies. Titoxd (?!?) 03:22, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

A suggestion about Wiki link format
But this form would also be useful and would use less text space in files (but does not seem to exist now):- That would e.g. allow ing|ed :: link to scuba diving, display scuba dived. Anthony Appleyard 08:11, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
 * If the name of an article is not the same as that name's invariant stem form, often when linking, the whole of the name (which may be long) must be repeated, e.g. scuba dived . That problem is worse in languages that have case endings, e.g. Russian. At the moment these forms are allowed:-
 * xxxx :: link to xxxx, display xxxx
 * yyyy :: link to xxxx, display yyyy
 * yyyy|zzzz :: link to xxxxyyyy, display xxxxzzzz.
 * Good idea --77.209.38.240 21:58, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but i whould suggest using a template instead, because your need is very specific and can be handled with a template, like, you need a couple of extensions to make the template work, but can be done!
 * --[[Image:Flag of Mexico.svg|20px]]Hsilamot (Insults | Contributions) 01:10, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

MediaWiki in Wikimedia
I suggest create a Project:Wikimedia support desk about support for MediaWiki in Wikimedia projects. --77.209.38.240 21:56, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Archiving resolved and "assumed-to-be" resolved questions
Is anyone going to freak out if we start actively archiving questions that have not had any activity for a while (like over a week)? I mean - we can pry safely assume that whoever asked the question is no longer monitoring this article for a response if it goes a week without feedback.

And I mean archiving questions where the original questions was responded to, but the original poster has not responded.


 * Is there any compilation/integration of answered questions into a general MediaWiki knowledgebase or whatever? I see recent discussions about creating such a system were archived but what was the result of those discussions? Otherwise, as Rick whoever mentioned, people will ask the same questions over and over since archives are rarely looked at... -Eep² 23:06, 29 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Dunno - I think if we fail to archive regularly the entire discussion becomes moot because nobody is willing to read it anymore. Archives are indeed rarely looked at, but the base article doesn't get looked at either.  As long as a few people are trolling the Support desk page regularly, we might as well just archive stale questions and let them be re-asked.  I mean, the true problem is the core documentation, isn't it?  Which is always being worked on.  What do you think?  Let the page become worthless?  Or archive to keep it clean and usable for more questions (mostly repetitive)? The entire wiki is a Knowledge Base - not this particular page, right?  I thought this was 'supposed' to be for one-off questions. --Tim Laqua 23:20, 29 July 2007 (UTC)


 * My primary argument is that this is not a forum, it's a Wiki article where people can ask questions - there is no expectation of searchability - the Project: and Project_talk: namespaces aren't default search namespaces (and haven't been assigned to be default here). Why don't we just do our best to answer questions as they arise, expand the core documentation where needed, and archive answered questions? --Tim Laqua 23:33, 29 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Because, again, without some way of updating the current documentation with questions/answers from this and other talk/normal pages, it's essentially a never-ending exercise in futility. I'd rather just say "refer to " instead of rehashing the same reply over and over and, oh yes, still over again. Granted, I'm not a long-time regular here but this is a common problem in any support discussion forum (MediaWiki-related or not). However, in my days when I was into Active Worlds a lot, people who had object/model scripting-related questions would usually be diverted to specific links on my website that answered/covered their questions. The same could be done here (only to this and other Wikimedia-related websites, of course) but only if said links are updated with questions/answers from this and other related discussion/forum/talk pages/articles/whatever--otherwise we're "doomed to repeat". -Eep² 23:58, 29 July 2007 (UTC)


 * So... we should create a Project:Asked and Answered page - then call that the "answered archive" and only archive stale, unanswered, ignored questions in this page's archive? Answered Questions go there? --Tim Laqua 00:49, 30 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't think that's necessary. Instead, I believe the relevant site sections should be updated to reflect the questions (if the sections don't already address them). Basically, better organization of the site to reduce/remove duplicate/impartial coverage of topics (and the frustration involved in finding answers to questions) needs to occur. As others have already mentioned, the manual, FAQs, project pages, etc, contain duplicate info that should be consolidated. Categorizing such articles/sections is a first step in reducing/removing this duplication, but actually editing the pages in question is going to be necessary. It doesn't help that a movement from Meta is occurring now either...and that there is a conflict between its help files and this site's help files. I think MediaWiki sites need one (1) source of help files to be referenced from (with links to them in new MediaWiki installations by default)--this includes Wikipedia which also contains a lot of duplicate help file info. -Eep² 02:39, 30 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Gotcha... So the core documentation needs to be worked on and we should take queues from commonly asked questions here to determine what needs to be addressed first in the core documentation. That still means we can agressively archive stuff here, right?  ;-) --Tim Laqua 03:59, 30 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Cues, queues, clues--whatever, so long as the information isn't buried only to resurface in questions later. :P -Eep² 04:21, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

REDIRECT FAQ Discussion to this page?
The FAQ Discussion seems to get occasional Support desk questions - How about we migrate those questions over to Support desk, archive answered and stale questions, then redirect the FAQ Discussion over to Support desk? Maybe just migrate over here and put a template pointing to Support desk for Questions at the top of the FAQ Discussion... I'm a fan of redirection - most people just click through and ignore the notices.

Further - how about migrating answered questions here over to the FAQ page if they appear to have future worth? --Tim Laqua 15:20, 30 July 2007 (UTC)


 * A central repository of support would make it easier to manage, though the volume would require more upkeep. -Eep² 19:56, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Same amount of upkeep as the existing two-page style - only less people look at the FAQ Disc. I noticed Rob over there pretty regularly.  --Tim Laqua 20:02, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Archiving
I posted another question (Project:Support_desk) and it doesn't seem to be displaying - presumably because the article has just grown that long. Is it in need of some archiving? I don't know the standard protocol for that, so it's not something I'd do myself. 68.80.149.10 00:46, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Seems like I got it to display. Not sure why it wasn't doing it before...according to the history and  s, it was saving the text. 68.80.149.10 21:23, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

How to categorise the support desk?
I`m not sure that the support desk is in the right category. It is in Category:Help, which intially seems to make sense, but that category page that it is only for pages in the help namespace (which is otherwise true, except for Project:Help}. Anyways, should this page be recategorised, or is there some kind of exception for the desk? If so, I`m not quite sure where it "fits" below the top level.--Brian 09:11, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I think its fine. I think it kind of just so happens that most pages in the Help category, the category for pages supplying help, are Help namespace pages. -- Anon  Diss  09:20, 25 November 2007 (UTC)