[Tilt, TyTN II, MDA Vario III Windows Mobile ROM De] jon_k:
I monitor and contribute to the Linux kernel development list. I compile and try out new patches to the mainstream kernel. I can guarantee you that if a bunch of newbies to Linux came on the mailing list and started asking questions like "HOW DO I USE THE GCC COMPILER?" that the Linux

developers would quickly make the mailing list private

amongst themselves disallowing input from people such as myself and others.

Developers need their users, but they cannot work in an environment where they are having to hold hand for the clueless. If all they get is questions, they cannot develop. They also cannot communicate with users who have legitimate issues such as bug reports.

I've only been here a short time, and only have a few posts. However, it has become apparent that the lack of organization is the one thing that could kill this site. Developers are having problems getting things out to people because there's too many questions by new users flooding the pages.

This site was not made for Joe Sixpack. I know the site administrators want this site to grow and become larger, but failure to manage the growth could result in the key contributers leaving. In the end all you would have is people asking for help. This forum is growing and it's going to need to have a way to deal with the grow. They are going to need to segregate the development stuff from the baseless questions being asked.

The end result of all developers is to get their product out to the clueless joe sixpack, but discussions on how to install a program are not meant to be discussed in the place that new releases/bug reports are to be handled. The admins here need to try to find a way to give a tier to the type of discussions going on. That way the newbies can get their information, and the developers can communicate with other developers and work on fixing bugs.

Posts like:

"the hinge broke on my tilt! how do i fix it!?"

"how do i get all the ATT cabs that were in my original rom?"

"how do i block all SMS's?"

Should not be welcomed nor answered here. These are questions that belong on the ATT Wireless forums, or any other general-discussion cell phone forum. It has nothing to do with hacking or development, and it only stands to clutter the boards we have here. Those examples above were real threads that were created. It's getting ridiculous.

The solution Read this if nothing else of my post.

I don't think people should be *****ing unless they have a plan to fix the problem. If you're complaining without a plan of action, you're just asinine.

I believe that if the board got more moderators per-subforum, and had very strict and clear posting guidelines, they could handle the junk. Anything off topic would strictly be moved, locked, or deleted, preferably with a post by the moderator saying 'This is better asked on ATT WIRELESS FORUMS, not on a development board'

This would drive the totally clueless away to the other forums to ask petty questions at. They are welcome here, but only if it is questions about the products developed here, or questions about the internals of the OS, etc. Everything has to be about development or hacking in some remote fashion.

We can still have accessory boards and such, but on the development sub forums there is NO small talk and NO off topic posts. That would keep the development sections clean of general questions.

It's ultimately up to the site admins, but that's the only solution I can see. Perhaps the site admins can start up another forum for general discussion/questions about the phones, so that the newbies can be directed there.