Request for new and advanced scripting sections.

Hi all, I was just wondering if anyone else would like to see a split in the scripting section into "new" and "experienced" because what I have noticed a lot of lately is that it is swarmed by people needing really simple stuff, NOT saying that is bad by any means, as it is their right to learn, but I notice the more experienced devs being drowned out and pushed to page 2 within just a few hours. I mean sure you can bump.... after 24 hours.

However, would it be better to have that sub section split in two? Sorry if a topic like this exists, I searched google for a while to try and find a topic but... no real results.

What do you think? Would this be beneficial to you, or are you already a Programming genius?

Thanks
-Myhi

 

If that is done then every question will suddenly become an "advanced" question, rendering the whole effort pointless. It's like how all of someone's email will become important once they discover the "mark as important" button in Outlook.

 

Fair point, however I have seen systems like this work before. For example, Gamemaker Community, they had a very clean Advanced section for all the people who had been around for quite a while and a new section for everyone who was new.

I think if you leave it up to people they will realize what level they are at.

 

With a bit of moderation, it could work. I think even a newbie could realize that "I need a tutorial for a jumping script" or "Why do I get this syntax error" is not an advanced question.

 

Exactly... And if it gets to the stage that new people are posting in there all the time.... Add a post count checker? Even if it is only for them being above 10 or 80 or something

 

In theory a reasonable idea, there is quite a few "help i'm new" threads. But in practice, how would it be implemented?

To someone who is new, moving an object would seem like an advanced concept.

Though it may work, calling them something like "Beginner" or "New to scripting" and "Advanced Topics". Might be worth a shot.

 

Personally, if there were an "Advanced Scripting" section I think it should be available only to registered Unity Pro license holders. This won't ween out all of the simple questions (and it would currently exclude me ) but it would certainly help.

 

Seeing as I don't have pro.... I really can't agree with this

Beginner would work... As long as they didn't think they were king koder.

 

Because only Pro users can have advanced questions, right? Right?

 

Agreed, pro shouldn't be a requirement.

Generally speaking, I am for this idea. I frequent Scripting much less than I used to for the reasons mentioned. You often have to go a few pages back to find a question/topic that can't be answered with google or just looking at the docs.

 

As pointed out by shaderop already, I also think that the idea won't work if it is free for the poster to choose where to post, as people (especially beginners) might not know the difficulty of the problem. Also they might think that if they post in the advanced section they will get better or faster answers.

 

Nah, anyone can have advanced questions. I think it would be very time consuming from a moderation standpoint to try to keep beginner questions out of the advanced section. My point was more that it might be nice for Pro users to have a place where they can collaborate and share ideas / questions. For the record, I don't have Pro so it wouldn't include me.

 

A pro-only forum doesn't help anyone and it's the JOB of moderators to moderate things. That's what they're supposed to do.

 

Eugh I hate having to list the Docs to people. The reason this idea came up is because I'm starting to frequent the Scripting section.... And I can easily see how all over the place it is.

But would it be worse than now? Atleast with two the majority of beginners wouldn't post in the wrong section, and even if they did, it would reduce the severe noise on one section, giving more advanced users a chance.

Well.... it helps the Pro users . But I'm not with the idea, I think it takes away even more staff for support for pro.

*cough* self promotion does anyone know how to do this http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/204319-Greedy-Algorithm-Question *cough*

 

Limiting it to pro users might not be bad as long as us mere mortals could see what's going on in there. (A some super secret section for pro users might exists already anyway...).

I would just generally appreciate having more advanced topics to read. And getting insights from people who uses Unity professionally is always great. There are plenty resources for beginner and intermediate Unity stuff and more advanced stuff is a bit harder to come by.

 

Yes, well most of the advanced topics in there just get drowned in "plz help, I need u to rit my game" threads. Mine included.

EDIT : Nice to see how modest people are being Not a single vote on master. Although I still have my vote. hehe

 

I think it is a fine idea if there are some guidelines setup and proper moderation.

Btw, just answered your thread!

 

Thank you so much again

P.S. Damnit alexzzzz, there goes the modesty

 

"Advanced" and "experienced" are very relative and subjective terms.

http://xkcd.com/915/

 

Then you can split all the areas into a beginner/advanced section.
Who is going to tell me that my question isn't an anvanced one compared to another one? No one. Then what are the qualifications to make a question advanced?
You would be segregate people based on skill level? Then who is going to decide that?

 

Or:

"How you writ game like Crysis in Unity"
...
"Bump"
...
"Bump"
...
"Bump plz help I'm desparate"

 

The bumping thing is in all the area. Wip has them a bunch for the op to make it jump back to the top. The same goes for the commercial section. And the "help me" is rampant for anyone not just the scripting section. But yet most can be solved by searching which really people don't do thinking to ask on a forum and get instant answers.

 

I have a proof. It claims I'm a master in C#, and I'm too modest to contradict.

 

It wont work.

1. Youre assuming someone has time to moderate this new section... considering how slow the turn around for collab is, I doubt someone has time to moderate the section.

2. Every question that goes un-answered in one section, will end up duplicated in the other section

3. Who decides what is advanced? The people who cant figure out how to do basic stuff in Unity on there own are not going to be good judges of this.


As for the pro only section, ive always supported the idea. Main reason for this is because most pro users have a made a commitment, with this commitment you usually find a person who will do their best to find a solution without resorting to forum help... although that negates the entire purpose of a pro only section.

 

I like the idea, but I also think it should be restricted to Pro Users, and people who have a certain number of posts (50? 100?).

Having an unmoderated advanced section may have worked well with gamemaker, but the program itself was segregated into D&D and actual scripting, making it very easy to distinguish whether you were a beginner or experienced. Unity has no such division.

 

Teh Mastur O;

I just took a few tests there; don't let me model folks.
http://smarterer.com/JustinWard

 

I'm agree with this suggestion. A huge percent of questions on scripting forum can be solved with RTFM or simple Google search, which is kind of annoying.

At least, make a new forum for Pro users or a forum for users with a minimum number of posts because most newbie questions (help plz plz mai scriptz wunt work) comes from new registered users or fake accounts.

 

As an alternative, you could have an advanced user area...

Either a pro account or a post count of over 200 grants you access to post in the area.

 

Yeah, that was more what I was leaning for.

I mean you all were completely right about being able to distinguish between whether it is Advanced or a Beginner question, that is why it would be easier to distinguish as "New" and "Experienced" with a post count check. However if the moderation staff need to do like collab and check everything, like post count then that isn't worth the effort. Whereas if they can make it automatic.... Great!

This is why it is open to discussion You are completely right , but I was looking at it more as a "New to the forums" and "Long time dwellers"

 

I don't like the post threshold any more than pro limit. For one, it then becomes a type of "achievement" and some will post just to boost numbers.
But more importantly, what about pros and advanced users, who don't or haven't participated in the forums before and come here for help, only to find they need to have 200 posts to be able to participate?

It would turn them off, and reinforce the belief that Unity is for amateurs and hobbyists. If it was a privately run forum, sure. But this is an official Unity channel, and Unity has built it's image around the democratization of game development. Does it really make sense to give developers a engine they can use for free, and then limit their access to participating in the community?

Personally, I like the idea of having an advanced scripting area, but I think it should be just clearly defined rather than arbitrary gates.

The definition part shouldn't be to difficult. It could be like along the lines of SO. For example topics should be :
- on a specific, narrow topic. "like best practices for vehicle AI", not "How do I make a MMO?";
- help with a Unity-centric scope/implementation, not general coding. Like "how does Unity deal with GC related to anonymous functions?" not "what is the difference between = and ==?"
- no questions that are very clearly better answered elsewhere, like how to use/change/mod asset store packages or downloaded kits.
- maybe something like (if a question or seeking help) you need to list what you tried already and why it failed. It should be last place you ask for help when other options didn't work. no "I have no idea how to make a something do something, can someone show me how?"

Dunno, please add or improve these if you have better ideas.

 

Most of these people dont need a forum to find the answers they are looking for. I use the forum as an absolute last resort for a solution to any problem I'm having with Unity. I just come here to waste time and troll (I mean throw) my opinion around.

 

On the topic of limiting it to Pro owners, you need to think about both sides of the coin. Sure, you immediately weed out questions from anyone whos forum account isn't attached to a Pro license (note: my Pro license for work is not attached to my forum account, I bet plenty of others are the same). However, you also weed out their answers. So you'd so get rid of the first-impression newbie questions from people who haven't even read through the manual, but you'd also get rid of the potential help from plenty of others.

Given that someone's programming/problem solving/general game development skillset is highly unlikely to correlate to whether or not they have personally purchased a Unity Pro license I think you'd be doing a disservice to the section.

 

Well, the scripting section cant get much worse than it currently is.

 

That's a good point and I would certainly agree there.

 

The simple solution is make it that anyone can reply.


The problem is the new threads that get created anyway... I cant do X/Y basic stuff because I didnt RTFM, and ive never heard of google.

 

Hmm... I didn't even realize you could do that.

 

First off, yes, yes it absolutely definitely could. The community here's pretty good. The scripting sections has its cons (plenty of advice I disagree with, many newbie questions from people who ask for help before reading the manual, etc.) but it also has its pros - for starters there's plenty of good advice available, there's an existing wealth of knowledge well worth searching/reading, and there's the potential for plenty of good conversation. That's three great things that plenty of Internet hangouts don't have in one place, and in my opinion they easily outweigh the downsides (after all, if a thread/question doesn't interest me I'll happily just not participate in it).

Sure, it could be better if everyone else was also further towards the "expert with many years of professional experience" end of the scale, but then it might be a less useful place for newbies to get started in.

Secondly, what I was saying was specifically in regards to a new "advanced" section, so the state of the current section is kind of irrelevant regardless of whether you like it or not.

 

I think this is a pretty good idea, I really don't think moderation would be required. If someone is new to Unity they are much more likely to post in "Scripting Help" as opposed to "Advanced Scripting". Sure a few people might post in the wrong areas... but does it matter?

EDIT: As to the pro requirement, I think its a bad idea. I've had pro for some time now, but I was much more active helping folks in the scripting forum when I was first getting in to Unity (and didn't own a Pro license). To some extent I answered advanced scripting questions as a mechanism for learning Unity.

 

The whole concept of needing to restrict an 'advanced' scripting section is silly - same as a micro-optimisation. You're worrying about something that's not an issue and distracting from the real issue.

I'm personally in favor of an advanced concepts forum (heck, lets just call it 'advanced concepts' and let code/art/design etc all be in one forum) to encourage higher quality discussion - without impacting the necessary and important value of lower 'level' discussion. Right now we get a little bit of it in Gossip... but not enough to keep me interested in the forums.

Edit: +1 to JohnnyA, esp. names 'Scripting Help' and 'Advanced Scripting' - I like how they don't implicitly demean one of the two classes (as opposed to 'basic scripting').

 

Oh I dunno... There's already a multiplayer section and an animation section, between those and the platform specific sections I really don't see a point in creating sub categories. Maybe what's really needed is some better learning materials in the teaching section.

 

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I'm indifferent towards it. Both sides have their merits and demerits.