You will get faster and better support if you use a descriptive subject line!

[Owdy]

One humble request. Please try to be creative with topic subjects. Subjects like 'HELP!!!!!!!!!!', and 'Is this possible?', 'Sorry, N000000000b quoestion' etc, aren't telling anything about that topic.

Example, you have trouble installing smilies.

Subject #1: 'HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELPPPP!!!!!- URGENTTTTT!!!'
Subject #2: 'I cant install new smilies'

Which one is more informative?

So please, be creative. Think what describes your problem best and make that your topic subject. Doing that, you help us to do our job easier, to give best support we can. It makes searching for help in future easier as well. 

Owdy

[Trekkie101]

You mean:

H3LP 1v3 b33n pwn3d 

[/color

Doesnt help

Maybe you should make a support template sort of thing that people could use, optional ofcourse but it would help speedup things.

Like:
URL:
Problem:
PHPinfo:
Have you searched: yes/no
Version of SMF:
Mods Installed:

And people can put it into that format, we done that once at another site, it works a lot better if followed, but then small problems can waste time making phpinfos etc.

[rhizome]

Over at phpbb.com folks are supposed to do that; but many don't until prompted, which may be better anyway as it isn't always necessary

The main suggestion of having an informative subject header for the new topic is the best - never can figure out why folks don't do it and instead wanna be melodramatic

*errm...newbie me goes off checks his previous posts  *

[Dannii]

this is a good idea of course, but It's annoying to me and I think it's spammy, when all Owdy posts is a link to this topic. Link of course, but prehaps with some suggestions as well.

[Owdy]

I post only link, because i tired to write same thing over and over again. I dont think its spammy. All suggestions i wanna make is in this topic. Other way is to copy paste same text again, but i think this is better.

[rhizome]

this is a good idea of course, but It's annoying to me and I think it's spammy, when all Owdy posts is a link to this topic. Link of course, but prehaps with some suggestions as well.

I don't think support staff should be burdened by giving suggestions to subject descriptors people should be using

And in terms of posting the link, makes sense to me. If elaborated further then the link ends up being redundant

Surely, as Owdy's original post suggests, if you have a support question, spend a bit of time thinking about how it could be indicated. Granted you may not get it right, but it's always better than sticking in a load of !!!!!! etc.

Posting the link doesn't necessarily mean that the request won't get answered in the thread. Though it indicates to the original poster that next time be more thoughtful.

[Dannii]

sorry, I meant suggests to solve the problem. In a few topics I've seen the link in one post, and then one or two later help given. but, meh, do as you like.

[Owdy]

See http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=40295.0

[Grudge]

Although it's fine to post the link to this topic I do think we should be posting some help as well.

[Owdy]

True also.

* Owdy does some cleaning in first post

[ladyinfinity]

I agree--

A person asks for help, gets referred to this topic (like we should have found it among thousands of posts) then dumps you because you were too stupid to be super specific. I never got any help and it was a simple, easy question.
I'm not going to even use the SMF board now.

[xenovanis]

Well, I'm sorry to hear that you feel dumped, the truth is that you are asking about a none default feature not everyone migth know the answer to. The people you want your answer from and expect them to answer you immediately, giving that you bumped the topic after four hours, are all volunteers with another live apart from this forum. So, they might have missed your topic because they were busy with their lives or maybe there were more urgent matters, like crashed forums or something.

[Owdy]

ladyinfinity, no one asks you to be 'superspecific' and say you are stupid like you sayd. We ask this because it helps us to do our job. Like you sayd, there are thousands posts and we have to go trought them all when giving support. Maybe, just maybe you would have got right persons attention if you have done what we ask in this topic. Personally, when i come here, first i go trough unread support requests  with 0 replyes. I read topic subjects to see if there something i can help. If subject doesnt say anything, usually it doesnt get my attention. I'm sorry. There is many topics and limited time.

Remember, smf is free, support you get is free and like xenovanis sayd, we all have lives also.

[redone]

I think most forums need this kind of suggestion especially for new posters. Truth is most questions can often be answered by pressing the search button.

Search is your friend. 

[judymcl]

I have to agree with this. I still visit a few MSN groups and other forums, and I see this all the time. And bless the managers, they put up with all the "eeekkkks" and "HELP ME!!" in all caps. I have also seen overly descriptive subject lines.....where the poster put the whole question into the subject line which of course made it 10 miles long.

I agree with having some sort of template but as a newbie, I have run across some that are very hard to understand for a newbie, such as ones with more technical info such as info regarding servers etc wanted on it. I find your answers to be straight forward and to the point and very understandable from a newbie's standpoint, and I can see how much you must have to repeat yourselves.

If you perhaps had a support template such as the following, (it's just an example, but if you like it you can have it) hopefully it would help.

Version of SMF:
Theme used:
Modules installed:
Are you hosted or on own server:
Describe your problem in detail:
What you were doing when the problem occurred:

Other info if you know it

PHP version:
SQL version:
Any other information that you can add: (such as the server info if you have your own)

[Sys_ZERO]

So something like this:

HEEEELLLLLP!!!! I'VE BEEEEEEN HAAACKKKKEEED!!!

Just kidding

Sys_ZERO

[Oldiesmann]

If anyone actually does that, I will delete their post without even answering it...

[Fizzy]

I have to agree with the guys that more infomation given to the support team the better the chances of being able to help.

It's impossible to be able to gauge the level of PHP knowledge of Webmastery of a SMF user, so a familiar problem can often be solved by simply pointing a member to a previous topic that covers and answers their questions.
If it doesn't then the member is perfectly entitled and welcome to post again asking for further help but I think they should at least try to resolve problems themselves - that's how we learn.

I make a point of scanning for "0 replies" posts on the off-chance I might be able to help with my very limited knowledge and to try and make sure no-one gets overlooked but at the end of the day when posting help it's important for the member to inderstand what went wrong and more importantly how it was fixed - that's an area that I think SMF is very strong.

[hilary]

In defense of those who post thread titles like, "Help!" or "Board isn't working!", please understand that some of us have absolutely no background in this kind of thing. Something goes wrong, and we have no idea what it is. While we might be able to sort of explain it in a long-winded post, we're not savvy enough to summarize it easily in a succinct thread title.
So when you see, "Help!", think "newb," and then take pity; we're flailing around here and we're looking for a knight in shining armor.

[Fizzy]

That's not a problem at all Hilary

* Fizzy remembering the fact that we all started off knowing diddly once

Rest assured, if a new user posts a "Help!!" title it will never get ignored, but all we are saying is "the more informative the better".