Is a soft reset necessary!?

In a different forum, where I am a moderator, I did a huge FAQ archive thread for things that came up over and over again. I simply made a locked sticky where nobody could post. It contained links out to the various relevant threads. It was easy to manage as you were just collating information and not really creating it. As time moves on, as the topic du jour changes, you just eliminate the old thread and add a new one into the sticky.

It works fine, and requires minimal effort.

I search those forums a lot and find all my questions are usually already answered. I must be one of the few. Unraid forums have a lot of answers.

They do indeed. Very impressive.

A number of times I have searched for something, only to find a post where squid, et al, posted the link to the question in the FAQ - but the FAQ wasn't int the top couple of search results.

All depends on the wording I guess.

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There will always be those users that either won't or can't look up the answer to a question themselves before just asking it for what turns out to be the :face_with_symbols_over_mouth::face_with_symbols_over_mouth: time.

But at least trying to help make the answers easier to find, and easier to point people to the information that already exisys, is better for everyone!

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I'd like to see what you're pointing at with these two posts if you don't mind.

Are there any non-staff users that can edit a post by another user?

I know it's possible to edit the title of a thread to indicate that an app contained in it is deprecated.

But I think only staff can actually change user posts, and I wouldn't expect them to weigh into threads on deprecated vs. active user code. Unless there was an issue of platform instability, copyright or something, and then they'd just delete whatever posts they needed to.

Hmm, not sure about this particular software. I would think moderators could though.

I certainly don't want that power! One extra scotch on a Friday night and it could be devastating to the forum! Lol

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Although it isn't the first post, here is a couple examples:

These seem to come up pretty high in search. I don't know if there are more floating around out there...

There are certain users that have the power to rename and/or re-categorize a topic. However, a high level of discretion must be used when addressing these topics.

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In my other moderator position, I always put in bold: Moderator note: this information may have changed XYZ reason

I did the note only when the original poster did not respond to my request to add a similar note.

Not every mod did this, but I think that adding that a moderator did the edit, and why, helps prevent some (but not all) issues.

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Hubitat’s implementation of discourse seems to recognize some users as moderators, but like @april.brandt said that means you can recategorize threads, add tags or even edit thread titles. But I think that’s about it?

I would settle for being able to make sticky/pinned posts. Although I would never even dream of browsing this forum under the influence of any mind altering substances :woozy_face:.

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Other forum softwares usually allow moderators to do the following, more or less:

  • Sticky posts
  • Edit all posts, except ones by positions above them (super mod, administrators)
  • Delete posts and threads
  • Divide threads
  • Move posts or threads to another category
  • Manage users (ban, warn, and even delete)
  • Group message

Probably others too. I would think the forum owner could set some or all permissions to allow this. They might not want to, but it really does help to have mods do some of the "mundane" work like this and let the owner worry about the overall picture or other duties.

Home Automation is a mind altering substance, I believe.

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Now that's a smart switch:

image

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The problem is you are expecting people to use the search function.

Not being sarcastic here, serious question.

Would it help to sticky some of these posts (like the soft reset) at the top of the forum?

Would it help to have them in a Wiki post, or in the official documentation somewhere?

Sticky posts would be better as it would be a bit more visible rather than hidden away.

They could just be links to the wiki or documentation but if it was titled in a way that people would check there first it could only improve the situation.

:+1:

Thanks for the response.

I posted this in the "share rm rules" thread.. I started this a little while ago and try to keep it updated.