Slow Response?

I recently attended an ASP.NET 2.0 AJAX training. Someone there actually commented that SgDotNet was very slow in responding to questions posted.

Are people here really that slow in responding? Nevertheless, I hope this serves as a gentle reminder... for that someone would probably shy away from participating in our local dot net community.

Hope that members here can be active and passionate enough to contribute more... I really wish that Microsoft recognises the activity level of the dot net community here and bring in the PDC event to Singapore some day.

I read (and replied to) this post 3 hours, 22 minutes after the initial posting. Is this slow or fast?

Just a bit of personal feedback here. I feel that too. I mean, i refreshed my browser a few times throughout the day, and seeing the same list of "unread post". I'm not sure if this is "normal".

Perhaps, here's what contributes to the slowness?

1. We're working in Singapore, and when we're not busy removing knives from our back, we're busy firefighting the fire started by our ex-colleagues who have resigned without leaving any trail of existence. For some others, it could be their pointy haired bosses.

2. The time when we're not in situation [1] is when we're already outdated (and hence, no demand or not being a threat to evolution), and need to pick up on new technologies. Usually, before I started posting a new problem, i'd searched online for it first, and by luck, i can find the same problem solved by some 13 years old developer in elbonia.

3. When we're not in situation [1], and we're already a cutting edge geek, probably we're already seeking the most advanced form of technologies in solitaire, thinking there are more appropriate gurus out there (read ~ MVPs and sorts) to answer the public questions correctly.

 Time to conduct a pool?

 

(PS: Perhaps that's why MVPs, evangelist, and sorts can't be any average joe)

With regards to that comment, I think it boils down to what people try to perceive this usergroup is. As William Tay (Softwaremaker) puts it - we should not be an online support helpdesk, offering free services to developers in need of technical assistance. Yes, we happen to have those forums, but we never aim to be on par with other online support communities like DevAdvice.com or forums.asp.net or forums.microsoft.com/msdn where a globally-connected community with more, way more, number of brains can offer far superior response and solution. No matter how you look at it, since we are essentially an English-oriented country; we cannot "compete" with these global communities. There is no point to in the first place.

If one is here purely to seek technical answers to their problems at work, recognised global communities like the above are your best bet. No arguments.

What would be lovely to witness is more fruitful activities that take advantage of being geographically close to each other, which is what most user groups are about - meeting, chatting, sharing experiences with friends in person. One does not have to stop there; if there are common technical issues people have always wanted to look into, but couldn't shoulder the burden alone, why not join forces and do technical experiments together? (we have done this in the past)

Having said that, I confidently can tell you the case for most people is they are bogged down by work, IT or not. They seriously cannot justify spending time on other technical matters that is not about solving their problems. I am sure the term "fire fighting" is so common amongst us that it almost becomes the norm condition of working life. With all the extra energy and time spent in attempt to reaching resolutions, how much is left for extra cirricular activities like a user group? I know this, because of my first hand experience. My friends know it, because of their own first hand experience.

People come and go as they move through phases and cycles in their life. There is no law nor rule here to dictate what is most important, deserving top priority in their lives. Quite often there are external pressures (e.g. family, management, etc) that can lead one to make decisions against one's desires, but this community here won't be one, shouldn't be one. Those who are around, are around. Those who are not around, let us hope they are doing well in their work and lives.

I agreed with Icelava completely on the fact that many people are wrongly perceiving our SGDN as sort of an online helpdesk and expecting to help solve their personal / work problem. And I don't think that is healthy for our community.

I, personally, go online at least 3 to 5 times a day to see if in anyway I can contribute to this community.  But seeing certain type of posts asking for code samples to help solve specific problem simply put me off.  Sometimes, you can see obviously that the one who posted the question had not even done his/her homework.  In my opinion, objectives of our SGDN community is to benefit fellow .NET developers by encouraging learning, creating awareness, sharing experiences, and exchanging opinions by having interesting and valuable discussions about certain technologies / implementation / issues / updates.  It is not that we are not active but we (at least for me) just don't wish to have dependent / lazy developers in our SGDN community who simply sitting down (probably shaking legs) to get ready-made solutions to their work problems.  No hard feelings...

Ha ha… I am glad that the response is fast and furious! At least this should give others some idea of what this online community is all about.

Perhaps it is the way people here perceive. I mean, like MaungMaung wrote, they do not even do their homework before posting questions. Then again, if they do their homework in the first place, like all good techies do, they probably will not even post the question, and maybe even be the one to answer questions. So I suspect that these people may not even bother to look at other forums or search the Internet for answers.

I remember those days during Microsoft events, where Beng Cheong and later Chewy would promote SgDotNet, telling people that here is the place where the local dot net people hang around. Naturally, being Singaporeans, they would think that we have a SLA in place here.

Anyway, we are all busy people and can only do so much. I just posted this topic so that you guys have an idea. I do admit that it is disappointing to hear such comments, especially when we do not really get anything from it. In any case, I am glad to have the chance to participate and contribute my two cents.

bronkman:

Then again, if they do their homework in the first place, like all good techies do, they probably will not even post the question, and maybe even be the one to answer questions. So I suspect that these people may not even bother to look at other forums or search the Internet for answers.

I doubt so. No one is born omniscient, and one must find ways to learn. Asking, and curious inquiring, has been the key to learning and obtaining knowledge. I have not met a person who has learnt alot without asking anything.

Again, I believe there is a big mis-perception these forums are purely for direct solving of problems-of-the-moment. Step back, widen the eyes, and look at the bigger picture; note what our vision is about - helping motivated developers find better ways to utilise .NET/CLI. The forums are here to facilitate discussion. Discussions about methodologies, design patterns, architectural approaches to different application types, performance tuning, security frameworks, the lot of them. About what we are doing right now, and how we can take on a new approach, new idea, weighing the pros and cons for each method, and make informed design decisions in the development of our applications.

The stuff we are using, the technologies that surround us, it is time to take a deeper look into our profession. And what exactly we do to qualify as "professionals".

Not i got this error when trying to doing X work to show Y results, i need to get this done tomorrow, what is the correct code sample to get this to work, kkthxbye.

icelava:

...Yes, we happen to have those forums, but we never aim to be on par with other online support communities like DevAdvice.com or forums.asp.net or forums.microsoft.com/msdn where a globally-connected community with more, way more, number of brains can offer far superior response and solution. No matter how you look at it, since we are essentially an English-oriented country; we cannot "compete" with these global communities. There is no point to in the first place.

If one is here purely to seek technical answers to their problems at work, recognised global communities like the above are your best bet. No arguments.

We are all looking at one view here. Posters are learning as well as the postees. If posters post somewhere on a global-scale, he/she knows that what he/she posts are subject to global-scale eyes and are, therefore, more likely to post better researched and correct answers. Even if what they posted is wrong, the power of the global community will correct that (Compare that to a wiki hosted here and a wiki hosted globally).

It, therefore, goes both ways. I agree with MaungMaung as well on spoonfeeding people. What makes things worst is that the spoonfeeding here happens in an uni-directional way. I always believe in the pay-it-forward mentality. It may not be bi-directional but the effort must be able to be multiplied exponentially for a commnity to be vibrant, active and alive.

Sadly, being in this community in the times of Beng Cheong and Chewy, I have seen many (and more and more) spoon-feedees who enages in uni-directional communication. Spoon-feeders are usually not encouraged by this sort of behaviour. It is sad but it is real.

So what constitues spoon-feeding ? It is a fine line. I still help out in many communities whenever I can. forums.microsoft.com, msdn, webcasts, and even our neighbours at MIND. I recently helped out at a thread there BUT stop short when I feel that the other party has crossed the line: http://mind.com.my/forums/thread/2187.aspx

Even if the postee has initially solved his/her problem, he/she is not bothered to update the community of what HAS BEEN done to correct that mistake so that other people and wandering eyeballs can learn and yet they want others to feed them. That would give you an idea of what I mean.

Makes sense ?

On a related note, how can we make Sgdotnet a vibrant developer community again (both online and offline)?

I think all of us should get together for dinner, and have a good brainstorm.

IMHO, personal touch and that friendship is what makes a community a community. The frankness to chat and discuss about anything under the sun. Take a look at Hardwarezone, and you'll get what I mean. 

what you say sounds very familiar. i probably seen this happen many times. well whether the response here is fast or slow, this will really have to depend on all the readers and commitee here. of coz the larger the number of users, the better.