Questions tagged [discussion]
The question you're asking is designed to solicit opinions or best-practices on a particular topic, with the goal of reaching community consensus.
319
questions
53
votes
1answer
9k views
How can I ask better questions on Server Fault?
This is a Canonical Question / FAQ Candidate to help our new users ask better questions,
and hopefully get better answers. Similar questions:
How do I get better answers?
How can I get ...
208
votes
3answers
68k views
What are the canonical answers we've discovered over the years?
We've created, appointed, or otherwise identified certain question/answer pairs that are the canonical answer for certain problems. These are answers where the community has said all it is going to ...
44
votes
4answers
18k views
What IS a “professional capacity”?
This is part of a set of questions on how Server Fault defines "professional" system and network administration. For additional information, see:
Why "professional capacity"?
...
81
votes
9answers
2k views
Server Fault needs professional-quality questions, not just questions from professionals
In the nearly 4 years that I’ve participated on Server Fault, it’s been a community that I’ve been proud to be a part of, and I’ve been able to build my own skill set a lot and help people out at the ...
21
votes
4answers
1k views
Why “professional capacity”?
This is part of a set of questions on how Server Fault defines "professional" system and network administration. For additional information, see:
What IS a "professional capacity"?...
23
votes
9answers
2k views
Are cpanel questions really 'professional sysadmin' related?
Do any professional sysadmins really use cPanel, rather than provide cPanel? To me, cPanel is indicative of non-professional (i.e. voluntary, spare time, personal) web hosting use?
Sure, I can see ...
24
votes
1answer
498 views
When is an answer Not An Answer?
This is intended to provide information for people who throw Not An Answer (NAA) flags and who might be surprised to see the canned decline reason "flags should not be used to indicate technical ...
asked Mar 25 '13 at 22:33
user9517 supports GoFundMonica
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57
votes
8answers
3k views
Abrupt change in moderation staff?
Myself and a few others just noticed that HopelessN00b and Chris S are no longer listed as moderators. What is the story behind this?
20
votes
11answers
581 views
Perception of purpose
When using ServerFault, I approach it from the perspective of a professional resource. I use it to to provide solutions and see solutions provided to professionals. Specifically from the FAQ:
...
27
votes
13answers
2k views
The bad tag collection
Summary
Ok, we have a lot of bad tags. I found at least half a dozen without trying over the weekend. Some of these tags have hundreds of questions in them, meaning that it will take a dev so that we ...
26
votes
8answers
2k views
What should Server Fault do with questions about web hosting control panels?
We've had this discussion before, but it's apparently time to revisit it. For some background, see:
http://meta.serverfault.com/q/1075/126632
http://meta.serverfault.com/q/3425/126632
http://meta....
28
votes
8answers
1k views
Is it time to kill problematic tags like cpanel, plesk, whm and webmin?
Given the recent uptick in new users with new questions, I've been noticing an even sharper-than-normal decline in quality on the site and a correlated increase in the number of questions about how to ...
39
votes
5answers
4k views
What information should I include or obfuscate in my posts?
This is a Canonical Question about the privacy of Server Fault and the needed detail to get an answer from the community.
Is there any information other than a password that would be considered a ...
24
votes
8answers
1k views
Sick of “unprofessional” questions
I'm seeing SO MANY questions like this: How to get my server viewable from the internet?
From the FAQ:
Server Fault is for system administrators and IT professionals, people who manage or maintain ...
66
votes
8answers
4k views
Why the hostility?
The comment thread and reaction to the original poster of this question was completely out-of-line.
https://serverfault.com/questions/494996/what-are-the-bare-essentials-to-make-ubuntu-production-...
58
votes
6answers
2k views
Some parting thoughts… and apologies for the drama
First off, I know I said and take the weekend, but it turns out I don't need it, and it does seem like a dick move to let things keep going on as they have, when there's no benefit from doing so. As ...
32
votes
4answers
1k views
“Server Fault is for system administrators… in a professional capacity”
I'm interested in soliciting opinions on the meaning of the phrase from the FAQ in the question title. I've just returned from an extended hiatus from SF, and I'm finding that a lot of the things ...
30
votes
2answers
2k views
Where can I ask questions about web hosting control panels?
My question was closed as off-topic because it is "about a web hosting control panel". But I still need help. Where can I ask my question?
23
votes
3answers
704 views
How to deal with bad questions? VOTE!
tl;dr:
Please vote more; both up and down.
Why you should all (ok, almost all) vote more:
Admittedly, when it comes to voting, I'm a bit like the porcupine in the Dilbert cartoon at the end of this ...
11
votes
5answers
458 views
What bad tags in need of burnination do we still have hanging around?
Similar to the old "bad tag collection" thread, I'm looking for suggestions/submissions of tags we still have hanging around on Server Fault, that we would be better off not having in existence ...
92
votes
8answers
2k views
Is ServerFault doomed? Not if we all vote more!
To sum up a lot of the threads and comments on Meta.SF: We're doooomed!
That seems to be the consensus. Look at some of the answers and comments in Why the major FAQ/help change? and Can we do ...
30
votes
8answers
811 views
Can we do anything to change the dynamic of the site?
This came up in relation to the upcoming mod election, e.g. Dennis' question here, and tombull89's and Iain's comments here, but I think the discussion of this shouldn't be limited to "what do the the ...
asked May 16 '13 at 17:35
32
votes
11answers
934 views
Site design update is now live
Hello Server Fault community,
I want to give you a heads up that I'll be making some minor design updates to SF site design to reflect recent changes on Stack Overflow and Super User. Visually it ...
35
votes
3answers
394 views
Change style of Links
There's already a question for this, I tried to "bump" it with a comment, but it didn't show up on the Active Page.
Can we setup a different style for links on the Server Fault page to make the link ...
24
votes
2answers
473 views
External site copying without attribution
Came across a site today which appears to be blatantly scraping SF content - and even has a similar name. The SF result was actually ranked below that of the external site.
A search of mSO and mSF ...
12
votes
2answers
294 views
How can I get people to fully read my question?
I'm having trouble with getting people who review my questions to read the entire question before answering!
I've noticed that my most difficult questions on ServerFault usually end up with answers ...
12
votes
5answers
464 views
In what circumstances should VirtualBox questions be on topic?
Oracle VM VirtualBox is a virtualization solution which is (now) supposedly targeted at "enterprise as well as home users" according to its web site.
In the past, we've been mostly hostile to ...
7
votes
7answers
160 views
Networking - always an SF topic?
This fits along the lines of SF and SU having entirely different scopes, and decidedly NOT covering different complexity levels.
If SU is about individual systems, and the troubleshooting of that ...
8
votes
2answers
950 views
When is a request for product recommendations not a request for product recommendations?
I have a vested interest in this issue, since I recently asked about https://serverfault.com/questions/576648/solutions-for-integrated-management-of-l2tp-ipsec-vpn-clients-and-802-1x-wired and it was ...
15
votes
2answers
256 views
Who chooses the questions for review audit? I failed a highly debatable one
This just happened to me:
I tried to close it as off topic, as I personally don't believe this falls under system administration. For others it may be a grey area, but I think it belongs on either ...
13
votes
6answers
410 views
FAQ Rewrite edit round 1
Since the FAQ as-written was not accepted, we get to have an edit round.
The below is a grammar/spelling/punctuation checked version of the FAQ.
The edit process:
Proposed edits will be submitted ...
10
votes
2answers
354 views
Can the Vmware tag be deleted ?
The plain vmware tag adds no value as we never get any questions about the company. When it is used it is usually used in error and in place of a product specific tag which would be more useful. This ...
asked Mar 10 '11 at 11:01
user9517 supports GoFundMonica
108k4 gold badges48 silver badges123 bronze badges
7
votes
3answers
349 views
Virtualbox is losing the benefit of the doubt
We have one user who has started flagging anything with virtualbox 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 ...
4
votes
3answers
209 views
Are problems that turned out to be typos “Not a Real Question”?
I happened to see the three questions below in short succession, and they all struck me as being "non-questions" because the problems described were either due to a typo or a misinterpretation of what ...
34
votes
7answers
1k views
Questions to ask the SE staff regarding the future of ServerFault
There is user concern regarding the direction ServerFault has been heading over the past year; in particular what some, myself included, see as a significant rise in inappropriate and bad questions ...
33
votes
5answers
780 views
Should folks have to click through an interstitial page to ask questions on Server Fault?
A few weeks back, Jay and I had a nice conversation with voretaq7 and Chopper3 where we discussed and debated the various items raised by the community here in http://meta.serverfault.com/questions/...
29
votes
13answers
1k views
How can we recruit and retain more talent?
Tangentially related to another meta post, the last discussion about this was a while back, so it may be time to revisit this topic.
The #1 answer in the chat was money, so that and fried chicken ...
17
votes
1answer
407 views
Rewriting “minimal understanding”
This current close reason is confusing and potentially misleading.
Questions must demonstrate a minimal understanding of the problem being solved. Try including attempted solutions, why they didn't ...
10
votes
2answers
311 views
Vote: Do we want code highlighting?
Currently, code highlighting is turned off (see balpha's comment here). It is possible to turn it on, if we want so.
I think this would be nice to have, maybe on a per-tag basis, but turning it on is ...
5
votes
1answer
2k views
How can I remove my ban on asking questions?
How can I remove my ban on asking questions? My asked questions are closed. Please help me. I asked questions when I was newbie at servers. Please help me, how can I remove my ban on asking questions?
26
votes
2answers
967 views
What to do with XAMPP/MAMP/WAMP questions
It's generally known that it's a horrible idea to use these one-click LAMP stack installers for anything but local development. That said, with surprising regularity, we seem to get questions from ...
13
votes
2answers
227 views
Cleanup duplicate tags: different by hyphenation and pluralization
Inspired by bad-tag-cleanup project by our awesome mod, here I suggest the idea to cleanup duplicate tags:
Different by one or hyphen, for example port-forwarding vs portforwarding and mod-security ...
39
votes
7answers
919 views
Getting a bit too snarky
Can people stop being quite so snarky when answering questions please? There has been a noticeable increase in answers that begin with snarky/preachy statements followed by an answer, as well as ...
asked Aug 13 '11 at 15:35
user9517 supports GoFundMonica
108k4 gold badges48 silver badges123 bronze badges
34
votes
6answers
2k views
Why SF is failing - the dismal future of ServerFault
This is a Canonical Question about the scope of Server Fault and the attitude of the community.
This is in response to Questions to ask the SE staff regarding the future of ServerFault
Why am I ...
13
votes
2answers
520 views
How to find and clean up bad questions
We've got lots of existing meta posts about how many bad questions there are and how much of a problem they are (or aren't) - that's not what this question is about.
I wanted to collect in one post ...
12
votes
3answers
4k views
When to post on Serverfault vs Stackoverflow?
I've just started using Stackoverflow, and it's been very useful. I asked a question once on here that was much more technical (decoding a wordpress hack), but I'm confused in general about why to use ...
21
votes
2answers
1k views
Do you have a checklist that can help me ask a better question?
This is a Canonical Question / FAQ Candidate to help our new users ask better questions,
and hopefully get better answers. Similar questions:
How can I ask better questions on Server Fault?
...
asked Jan 9 '14 at 10:05
user9517 supports GoFundMonica
108k4 gold badges48 silver badges123 bronze badges
17
votes
4answers
432 views
Edit powers activate! Removing Hi/Thanks
The format of StackExchange sites in general discourages the sort of letter-format questions common elsewhere. You know what I'm talking about:
Hi,
I have ${problem}. It has ${details}. Any ...
15
votes
4answers
372 views
What's wrong with ServerFault community?
I'm a decentely active stackexchange contributor.
I do not have massive reputation, but I consistently try to ask good questions, provide good answers, and moderate to provide my modest contibution ...
14
votes
8answers
255 views
How to attract more professionals?
This topic has been discussed before but I do not believe it to be exhaustive. During the first chat beta, Jeff Atwood and I were discussing potential areas where SF could be marketed to ...
