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[nwboater]

I just finished reading the "Pre-Sales" thread. In it Glynor spent a great deal of time posting what I believe is a lot of very useful information. And I mean a lot!

After awhile this thread will scroll off the thread list page one. If someone does a search for 'Itunes' the information wont show up (I don't believe) because that is not in the thread title. So soon it will basically be lost. I think that is a great shame!

Is there something that can be done to save some of the very useful information in threads like this? Does the poster have to take the time to learn how to post to the WIKI and the time to organize it for the WIKI? Could there be some tagging system for threads so it would show up in searches? Or something???

Rod

[glynor]

The search does search the full-text of the posts, not just the titles.  However, I agree that one of the problems with forum based support systems is that helpful things do often get "buried".  While the search will find them, it will also find a huge pile of other useless junk.

[newsposter]

The thing with a wiki or any other compilation or concentration of reference material is that someone has to be responsible for maintenance.

[nwboater]

The search does search the full-text of the posts, not just the titles.  However, I agree that one of the problems with forum based support systems is that helpful things do often get "buried".  While the search will find them, it will also find a huge pile of other useless junk.

Before I made my original post I did a search for 'itunes'. I thought it only returned those with itunes in the header. Just did another search and it returned a whole bunch with itunes in both the header and body. Guess I'm getting senile! But on the first page of returns it did not give the 'Pre-sales' thread that had what I believe is a lot of useful information from Glynor.

I know there is no easy way to deal with this. With the constantly evolving nature of the program it would be prohibitively expensive for JRiver to keep everything documented. I just thought I would throw the problem out to the masses here in the hopes that perhaps some novel approach may appear. I've always been a bit of a dreamer!

Rod

[Alex B]

Did you use the full search: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?action=search ?  It provides several search options.

Regarding the topic, you can use my "Notable Threads" thread for posting valuable links: http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=59513. If you decide to post there, please explain the linked thread or reply shortly.

[iPanini]

I've seen this happen on other forums as well. It is indeed a pitty that usefull information gets lost or at least difficult to find. Also for new users it is often cumbersome to first find what they search before getting scolded at..

There may be tools to help with this:
Simple Machines forum supports a tagging plugin: http://custom.simplemachines.org/mods/index.php?mod=579

This would allow for posts to be tagged using keywords, and thus to be searched more easily.
Administrators could determine 'tags'. I believe e.g. Ubuntu forums uses tags as well.

This is what the description says:

Code: [Select]

A complete tagging system for SMF.
Features:
Tag Cloud
Tagging of Topics
Thread owner can add and remove tags to the topic.
Tag Admins can tag topics and remove tags.
Clicking a tag returns a list of tagged topics that have that tag.
Recent tagged topics on tag cloud page.
Just my 2cents.

Erwin

[marko]

I like this thread tagging idea.

Naturally, just as in our MC libraries, it's only ever going to be as reliable as the tag status, potentially creating a fair amount of work for for a small team of users.

I use tags for my MC bookmarks in firefox, which works pretty well, so long as I remember to actually bookmark the thread in the first place!!!

-marko.

[Lasse_Lus]

I use tags for my MC bookmarks in firefox, which works pretty well, so long as I remember to actually bookmark the thread in the first place!!!

you can also drag "the page" into MC and use MC Tag functionality, also scrapbook is pretty neat, then MC will index the webpage as well (in the textfield) 

[iPanini]

Well, perhaps to be a bit more specific:
- when I think about tagging, I would be thinking about 2 types of tags, one type would be completely user specific, but if I'm not mistaken, the server will 'suggest' tags that 're already in the tag database. So if you would enter w, the server would suggest anything in the database starting with w and so forth following autocompletion principles.
- second type could be admin chosen tags. These could be e.g. wiki-suggestion, hardware, remote control, rs232, idv3, etc. etc.

As far as 'other' tagging goes:
- I've been a long time user of Scrapbook too, used extensive tagging there too, but it lacks portability and shareability in my opinion, great add-on however. I still use it, but only in very specific cases.
-another option, and perhaps not a silly one either, would be the usage of Zotero.
Now I think at the moment of writing only Firefox is supported, but they're working on Google Chrome and Safari and.. compatibility. I realize Zotero is a bibliographical utility, but, as stated on their website, you can use it for capturing any data. (quite similar to scrapbook in fact)
In Zotero we could set up a collective group, and store our 'forum' snippets there...
This would mean that each user willing to benefit from this initiative, would a) need to use Firefox, b) would need to install the Zotero add-on.

If there's enough common interest and support, I'm willing to set up the MC group. Just a suggestion though.

Erwin

[joh]

you can also drag "the page" into MC and use MC Tag functionality, also scrapbook is pretty neat, then MC will index the webpage as well (in the textfield) 

Lasse - How is this 'dragging' accomplished?

Gott Nytt År
Olle

[Lasse_Lus]

Lasse - How is this 'dragging' accomplished?

Gott Nytt År
Olle

Olle, you drag the favicon or link onto MC and release, you will find the bookmarks under "Data" with filenames like http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php

gott nytt 

[MrHaugen]

I like the idea of tagging forum posts. A smaller group of dedicated forum users should be enough to tag all the posts there is. The beta team comes in mind. If the tags are reasonable and sorted in a good fashion, this could be a very helpful tool for new and old users.

[nwboater]

I like the idea of tagging forum posts. A smaller group of dedicated forum users should be enough to tag all the posts there is. The beta team comes in mind. If the tags are reasonable and sorted in a good fashion, this could be a very helpful tool for new and old users.

I like tagging as it makes the information available to anyone who wants it.

Should individual posts be tagged? Or just the threads?

Thanks everyone for the brainstorming here. Hopefully more to come!

Rod

[MrHaugen]

Threads. Individual posts would be way to time consuming and messy.

[nwboater]

Threads. Individual posts would be way to time consuming and messy.

I totally agree!

Rod