Pre-post questionnaire

[Jesper Juhl]

IMHO it would be great if we could get all new posts to (at least) the help forums to include filling out a questionnaire with basic stuff (that people always need and ask for) like:
What is your OS (Linux, OS X, Windows, Android, iOS, other (please tell us)?
What version of SFML do you use?
Did you compile SFML yourself or use pre-compiled binaries?
What compiler do you use (msvc, icc, gcc, clang, other)?
Are you linking SFML statically or dynamically?
Does your problem reproduce in debug builds, release builds, or both?

There may be other questions that are relevant to add to the list. But having the above answered by default on every help post (possibly hidden behind a spoiler so you only have to see them if you care) could cut down enormously on a lot of duplicate posts that just ask for more details (usually the ones mentioned above).

[Rosme]

Not sure how something like this could be added to the forum. But that would also imply people filling the form. A lot don't bother to read the "Read before posting" thread. I'm pretty sure people wouldn't fill the form. And if you make it mandatory, people would probably just be annoyed by it.

[shadowmouse]

Would it be possible to instead (or maybe as well as) add a default text to the new topic text box (where you type the main question and stuff) that says something like "Write your question here. Please include SFML version, OS etc"

I only ask this because I agree with Rosme and a mandatory form might discourage people from posting here and get them to post to stack overflow and cplusplus.com instead.

[eXpl0it3r]

It's something I wanted to look into for a while, but well SMF, the forum software, is very annoying to use and work with.
However we won't be adding any mandatory form that people have to fill out. Sure it would be nice if everyone provided all the needed information, but lets not forget that this is also still a forum and a small community. We might as well create a ticket system if all we cared for was getting information and answering them with the highest efficiency. Plus not every question needs a full catalog of information.

I added it as issue to the website tracker, so it won't get lost.

[Jesper Juhl]

Thanks eXpl0it3r.
I know we are a small community. But it just gets really annoying after a while to have to ask all those really basic questions again and again. Like "what OS", "are you mixing debug and release", "what compiler", "what sfml version" etc...
Maybe adding questions up front is not the best solution, but we need something or else the newbies will burn out the experienced members - I know that I have taken to ignore a lot of posts instead of asking the obvious questions since I just can't be bothered to ask the same things over and over; but if they were already answered up-front then I might actually bother digging into the post.
By not asking for the basics up-front I fear we are losing the engagement of experienced developers who just can't be bothered to ask the same basic stuff over and over...

[Nexus]

Yes, I have also started to ignore questions like these, it's not ideal. A questionnaire however is definitely annoying and punishes all the reasonable forum users. Maybe something could be considered for people who have just registered, i.e. below a certain post count.

What are the technical options that we have in this forum?