[R] Protocol for answering basic questions

Wed Dec 1 18:46:30 CET 2004

I have been a member for only a few days but I find the tone of some
responses are inappropriate for a list dubbing itself a "help list". I also
completely understand that traffic needs to be kept at a modest level to
keep advanced users interested; therefore, I suggest that a second help list
be created to deal with "advanced R help". Belong to both lists if you wish
and filter your email for cursory glances or a detailed reading. Users must
judge themselves the level of their queries and perhaps a note saying
something like "requests to the advanced list are generally made by users
who already have a very good working knowledge of R" or some very rough
benchmark for judging your level like 2 years.

I do not know how much work this would involve or resources available for
this - it is a blind proposal. I think it might deal with many of the
problems both beginner and advanced users have with the present list.

Daniel

________________________
Daniel E. Duplisea
Fisheries and Oceans/PÃªches et OcÃ©ans Canada
Institut Maurice-Lamontagne
850 route de la mer
Mont-Joli, QC
Canada    G5H 3Z4

tel: (418) 775-0881
fax: (418) 775-0740
duplisead at dfo-mpo.gc.ca

-----Original Message-----
From: roger koenker [mailto:rkoenker at uiuc.edu] 
Sent: 1 dÃ©cembre 2004 12:26
To: James Foadi
Cc: Robert Brown FM CEFAS; R mailing list
Subject: Re: [R] Protocol for answering basic questions

Maybe it would be helpful to think of R-help as something more than the
Oracle of Delphi.  Questions, ideally, should  be framed in such a way that
they might lead to improvements in R:  extensions of the code or, more
frequently  clarifications or extensions of the documentation. Indeed the
R-help archive itself serves this function and could 
profitably
be searched prior  to firing off a question to R-help.  As traffic on 
R-help
increases there is a delicate balance that must be maintained in order to
keep knowledgeable users interested in the list.

url:	www.econ.uiuc.edu/~roger        	Roger Koenker
email	rkoenker at uiuc.edu			Department of Economics
vox: 	217-333-4558				University of Illinois
fax:   	217-244-6678				Champaign, IL 61820

On Dec 1, 2004, at 10:56 AM, James Foadi wrote:

> On Wednesday 01 Dec 2004 4:46 pm, Robert Brown FM CEFAS wrote:
>
>> Understandable but not a recipe to encourage the use of R by other
>> than
>> experts. The R community needs to decide of they really only want 
>> expert
>> statisticians users and make this clear if it is the case.  
>> Alternatively
>> if they are to encourage novices the present approach is not the way 
>> to do
>> it.
>
> I perfectly agree with Robert Brown. Althogh I have been captivated by
> "R",
> and will keep using it, I would appreciate if "R" gurus could make 
> this clear.
>
> Thanks
>
> James
> --
> Dr James Foadi
> Structural Biology Laboratory
> Department of Chemistry
> University of York
> YORK YO10 5YW
> UK
>
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