Timeline for How do we feel about requests for learning materials?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
11 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 18, 2019 at 11:06 | comment | added | Time4Tea | @Kusalananda I don't see why that would happen any more than for those other sites. There are sub-par references all over the internet for every topic. Besides, sub-par references would get voted down (as they should - SE mechanism doing its thing). Also, even a 'bad' reference can be very helpful, if there is literally nothing else. I've seen enough 'bad' Linux man pages ;-) | |
| Jan 18, 2019 at 7:52 | comment | added | Kusalananda Mod | Requests for learning material for U&L would, I believe, degenerate into replies of the type "I've used this random website", "I've used these random blog posts". The topic of Unix is such that there are literally thousands of sub-par sites with all sorts of weird and wonderful code (bad, fragile, unsafe). This, I believe, is different from Physics, Maths, and Music. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 21:17 | comment | added | terdon Mod | Agreed, that the questions can become obsolete is not a main issue for me either. The main problem is the rest of the points raised in this Q&A. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 21:10 | comment | added | Time4Tea | @terdon I'd say the fact that answers are editable by the community is actually more of a reason why these questions should be allowed. Because any broken links can easily be fixed by the community, so the concern about stale links is less of an issue. Btw, I'm not suggesting that questions should be allowed where someone has been lazy (i.e. not done their research) and there are obvious resources available that they haven't bothered to look for. But, in cases (like mine, I believe), where the poster has searched hard for a resource and found nothing, imo they should be allowed. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 21:05 | comment | added | Time4Tea | @terdon many of the questions that have been asked and answered on the other sites I linked to show that such questions can be tackled effectively in the SE format. So, I have to disagree with you there. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 21:04 | comment | added | terdon Mod | fair enough. Let's say they're off topic by default unless the local community has decided otherwise. But that's why I said "pretty much" :) | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 21:02 | comment | added | Time4Tea | @terdon to address your points in turn: Mathematics and Music both also allow questions requesting external resources. So, these questions are not off-topic network-wide. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 20:43 | comment | added | terdon Mod | Finally, one of the most important features of the SE system is that everything is editable. Which means that answers that are out of date can be fixed and brought up to date. This is much easier to do with Answers, that provide a technical solution than it is with answers with broken links where you need to find an equivalent link. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 20:41 | comment | added | terdon Mod | And yes, not being able to find resources is absolutely a problem (and one we all face). However, it isn't a Question (with a capital Q, in the sense of SE). The answers will not be Answers, but only answers linking to various places where the actual Answer (if you need technical docs, you need them to answer some question) can be found. We want to be the place you come to to get Answers, not pointers to where Answers can be found. So instead of encouraging posts that ask for directions to where an answer can be found, we want posts that ask for answers that we can give here. | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 20:40 | comment | added | terdon Mod | Physics is certainly an exception. List questions are off topic pretty much network-wide (1, 2). | |
| Jan 17, 2019 at 20:25 | history | answered | Time4Tea | CC BY-SA 4.0 |