LinuxQuestions.org Turns Sixteen

I'm proud to announce that over the weekend LQ turned 16! I’d like to once again thank each and every LQ member for their participation and feedback. While there is always room for improvement, that LQ has remained a friendly and welcoming place for new Linux members despite its size is a testament to the community.

To say that feedback has been absolutely critical to our success is an understatement. With that in mind, I'd like to use this thread to collect as much feedback as possible about LQ. What are we doing well and where can we improve? Where are we failing? What can we do to ensure long time members remain engaged and willing to help? What can we do to ensure new members feel welcome? What new features or sections would you like to see? What should we be doing differently? When giving your feedback, please remember that LQ will be updated to the next generation code platform, hopefully some time this year (at this point, we've put it off way too long). To get a peek at what that platform will be like, please visit http://www.ChromeOSQuestions.org/forum.php. Feedback on that site is very much welcome as well.

As part of our 16 year anniversary, we'll be randomly selecting 16 posts from this thread and upgrading that member to "Contributing Member" status for one year. Stay tuned, and thanks again for being a member. Together, I think we can make LQ even better.

--jeremy

Hi Jeremy. Congrats to all.

// , I'm a bit new, here, but what could forums like LinuxQuestions.org can learn from sites like StackOverflow.com and GitHub.com?

Happy Birthday! Now make me a sandwich...

Well done to all at Linux Questions. It's been great to be involved here with so many people's knowledge and advice to draw on.

I personally love the forum as it is and wouldn't like to see it upgraded to a format such as the ChromeOSQuestions forum has. I know that the move will be inevitable, probably due to mobile/tablet accessibility etc., but I was almost blinded when I opened the ChromeOSQuestions site. So much white, everywhere! Horrible. I hope at least that there's a changeable theme option.

Thank YOU Jeremy for this wonderful resource.

I am always aware of an impending LQ birthday as it coincides with my own. So happy birthday to both of us.

Originally Posted by hydrurga I personally love the forum as it is and wouldn't like to see it upgraded to a format such as the ChromeOSQuestions forum has. I know that the move will be inevitable, probably due to mobile/tablet accessibility etc., but I was almost blinded when I opened the ChromeOSQuestions site. So much white, everywhere! Horrible. I hope at least that there's a changeable theme option.

As mentioned previously, the color scheme will not be changing.

--jeremy

Originally Posted by NathanBasanese // , I'm a bit new, here, but what could forums like LinuxQuestions.org can learn from sites like StackOverflow.com and GitHub.com?

We have a SO-like site as part of The Questions Network, but a Q&A site and a forum follow a very different paradigm and have different goals.

--jeremy

I first stumbled over LQ in response to a web search shortly after I started to use Linux when I was oh so much younger.

I registered as a member when I had a question to which I could not easily find an answer anywhere else. Natch, I found the answer here. Four or five years later, I worked up the nerve to answer a question, rather than just to ask one. (Then I set out to move past the "LQ Newbie" designation, but that's another story.)

LQ is the friendliest Linux site on the world wide web.

Jeremy and the others who have made it so deserve the gratitude of every Linux user, even those who have not yet discovered LQ.

LQ helps make Linux accessible.

Originally Posted by NathanBasanese I'm a bit new, here, but what could forums like LinuxQuestions.org can learn from sites like StackOverflow.com and GitHub.com?

Another question would be what can SO and Github learn from a site like linuxquestions? LQ is personal, it's populated by people with real world experience in a stunningly wide range of Linux topics. The specialisation here is tremendous.

Sure, unix.stackexchange.com is good, but it's still part of the stack exchange network, and inherits a lot of the culture from that: this means that a lot of the focus is on scoring points and earning XP, and not really caring about the people behind the problems or solutions. I don't see much collaboration aside from commenting, which tend to get lost in themselves unless they are explicitly incorporated into answers.

What SO and Github lack, in my humble opinion, is the personal, invested interest in solving Linux and Unix specific issues.

What we (LQ) could learn: I'd say the only thing LQ could learn is the really obvious "this is the accepted answer" highlighting that SO uses, and maybe the eventual culling of social and non-informational threads.

Originally Posted by jeremy We have a SO-like site as part of The Questions Network, but a Q&A site and a forum follow a very different paradigm and have different goals. --jeremy

I find the open-ended forum more useful for the most part. For beginner and intermediate level questions, it is the best. Though with a lot of edge-case situations, it still comes down to solving a problem by oneself.

for it's a jolly good forum...

Sure, unix.stackexchange.com is good, but it's still part of the stack exchange network, and inherits a lot of the culture from that: this means that a lot of the focus is on scoring points and earning XP, and not really caring about the people behind the problems or solutions.

(Grin) I've found answers to lots of Linux Questions at StackExchange and quite happily posted the links here, but I've never felt the twinge to participate there.

LQ does "community" right, and that is because of the LQ community and those who created and guide it.

Originally Posted by ponce for it's a jolly good forum...

... and so say all of us!

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