Answers vs Newsgroup

Could you please explain in a nutshell - what is the difference between MATLAB Answers and MATLAB Newsgroup? E.g. which questions should be posted to answers and which - to the newsgroup?

Answer 1

[Jan]

Answers has a nicer GUI and allows to format code, links and embed pictures. You can edit your questions and answers, such that typos and clarifications can be removed / inserted directly to support a fluent reading. There is no delay between the posting and the appering of a message and therefore the communications feels more direct.

Actually you can post questions in both forums. The total sum of the knowhow of the people answering in CSSM seems to be larger than in Answers. But we are working hard to improve this. E.g. Bruno has participated in the Answers forum, but he lost the interest for reasons, I can reconsider.

The amount of spam and inpoliteness is negligible here, because the admins and editors remove improper messages. I like it not to be insulted, see e.g. http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/newsreader/view_thread/261279.

While the CSSM forum has a static charm caused by the anachronistic interface, the more fancy interface of Answers has a great potential for further improvements. E.g. I get a keyboard latency of 0.3 seconds, such that editing is tedious.

Both forums suffer from nearly the same problem: Too many users do not care about the quality of their questions. Currently questions for clarifications and suggestions of a proper code formatting dominate my work here. Unfortunately I post:

 Please add the complete error message instead of just "it does not work"

much more frequently than real solutions.

Searching for a existing solutions of a specific topic is not trivial in the Answers forum. It seems like Google is the better choice for such investigations.

See also: Answers: The future of CSSM and Answers

[Vladimir]

I agree about GUI, in particular I hate the "e-mail" style of CSSM, where every single-line reply contains all previous discussion.

So, basically, you suggest to use Answers for posting new questions?

That will also support filling it with useful information..

I think, that for improving the quality of questions in "Answers" it has sense to introduce two categories: "approved questions" and "not yet approved". And allow moderators / high-rank contributors to move question between categories if it doesn't meet guidelines.

[Jan]

I prefer Answers.

There is a list of 128 suggestions for improvements: http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/994-wish-list-for-matlab-answer-sections . Currently TMW implements about 2 suggestions per year. I assume, that the Answers forum is perfect in 64 years.

[Oleg Komarov]

Assuming no evolution in forums for 64 years...

Answer 2

[Daniel Shub]

I will chime in with my pet peeve: The CSSM is "free" while Answers is owned and controlled by TMW with editorial policies that protect TMW interests. That said, I like the concept/format of Answers much better than CSSM.

Answer 3

[Andreas Goser]

Viewpoint "person doing a web search": This user can easily see accepted (==helpful) answer in MATLAB Answers, while you would need to look through a whole email thread in the newsgroup to be sure.

Viewpoint "person asking aa new question": A growing number of MathWorks employees look int MATLAB Answers.

Viewpoint "person helping otherss". The reputation points are a nice extra on top of the "Thank You" note.

[Daniel Shub]

I agree with all of your viewpoints including your first viewpoint since you included web search. A person searching from within answers will likely find nothing useful.