up vote 6 down vote favorite

We have one user who has started flagging anything with and isn't clearly about server-stuff. To them, VirtualBox has lost the benefit of the doubt in the same way that anything with the tag seems to hold it. VirtualBox does have some enterprise server usage, but it's uptake is probably well below that of . Because of its rare usage in what we do, should we:

  1. Modify the tag-wiki to clarify on-topic situations
  2. Go through the questions we already have in that tag and either migrate them to SU, close as off-topic, or outright delete.

Or should we do something else?

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Sorry if I annoyed you :) – MDMarra Aug 15 '11 at 17:31
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While I don't think we should be in the business of deciding what makes sense or doesn't in a business environment, I agree that anything tagged with virtualbox deserves the same long, hard, sideways look that most consumer-grade hardware and software questions get. – Shane Madden Aug 16 '11 at 4:23
I wholeheartedly disagree that anything tagged "virtualbox" is not server and/or sysadmin-related. For one, VirtualBox does provide a service; it's not an application in-and-of itself. Secondly, it is far more likely to be of use to (and used by SysAds than traditional end-users. (Yes, some Power-Users are going to be playing with it.) – gWaldo Aug 23 '11 at 13:58
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3 Answers

up vote 7 down vote accepted

I'm not going to look at each of those questions and try to asses whether or not they are "server-stuff" but I will say that while I don't use VirtualBox on a server (nor is it intended to be used that way) I do use it as a valuable tool in my role as a system administrator. I think some may be forgetting that SF isn't just about server stuff.

Because VirtualBox is part of my toolkit I would see questions related to my use of it in that context to be completely on topic for SF. Before rashly trying to eliminate all VirtualBox questions consider the context, as well as the content, of the the question. They are not all posted by hobbyists.

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I disagree that it's not intended to be used that way. The first sentence on the Virtualbox.org website states that it's "for enterprise as well as home use." Virtual machines can be started headless from the command line or a batch file. In fact, all virtual machine creation, management, and execution can be controlled from the command line. It even supports live migration of running virtual machines from one physical host to another. I don't see any part of VirtualBox that gives the impression that it's for home use only. – Starfish Jan 23 at 3:00
@Starfish, you can disagree all you like but the fact is that at the time I posted that answer the VB web site very clearly stated that VB was not intended to be used on server operating systems. – John Gardeniers Jan 23 at 3:27
Regardless, it's not true now. My comment was meant to offer clarification for future editors who come across this answer when deciding how to act upon VirtualBox questions. The fact that the answer is accepted and authored by someone with a high rep means that some new contributors might unquestioningly interpret the use of VirtualBox in a server context as inappropriate and flag or downvote. I don't want to see that happen. If you really want to help, please edit your post to remove the text in parentheses, and then we can both delete our comments to this answer. – Starfish Jan 23 at 22:26
@Starfish, do you seriously expect people to go back and edit old posts just because something might have changed in the interim? You also appear to have failed to grasp that the reference is in regards to hosting on server operating systems, not servers as guests. – John Gardeniers Jan 23 at 22:40
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up vote 5 down vote

I'm the one that's been flagging them, but not all of them. Many of them are either horrible quality and I've flagged as "Very Low Quality" and others belong on SU since they don't mention servers, server OSes or any other SA related quality. I haven't been blanket-flagging everything. I've been leaving off ones that have legit SA implications - good or bad.

I think that going through the is a great idea, since I mod-flagged about 30 things in about an hour without even really trying when I was bored this weekend. While useless on SF, I'm sure a lot of them will be useful on SU.

Also, updating the tag wiki would probably be a good idea.

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Have you got some examples of those flagged questions? I agree with John - VBox is a tool for sysadmins. So answers about VBox might help in a server context, too. It`s not much of a difference if I have a Ubuntu guest because I want a Linux client or if I have a CentOS guest because I simulate the PXE boot setup for servers... – Nils Jan 22 at 22:05
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up vote 2 down vote

Ask the user to stop flagging and let the community decide in the usual way with voting. If the user wants to bring certain questions to the attention of the community then they can drop them in the vote to close room.

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Iain, are you saying that questions that should be migrated shouldn't be mod-flagged. I've mod-flagged plenty of questions that should be migrated before I went on my virtualbox spree and they were all marked valid – MDMarra Aug 15 '11 at 17:24
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@MarkM: If the mod flagging is causing sufficient annoyance then perhaps the flagger should be made aware of other channels is what I'm saying. – Iain♦ Aug 15 '11 at 17:25
I'm the flagger :) – MDMarra Aug 15 '11 at 17:26
@MarkM: drop em in vote to close then ;) – Iain♦ Aug 15 '11 at 17:27
I think this raises a larger issue, then. Should posts not be flagged if there is already an existing vote-close reason? Is there a msf or mso post that anyone can dig up about proper use of flags? – MDMarra Aug 15 '11 at 17:30
@MarkM: meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/59445/… check the change made on 2011-03-23 and meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/83861/… – Iain♦ Aug 15 '11 at 17:56
Got it. Thanks for the links. – MDMarra Aug 15 '11 at 18:07
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