Control.com Help

C

Thread Starter

CTTech

Looking for feedback from all users. Many contributors that "really know" what they are doing seem to doing be all the research for the folks that think this is the first place to go without performing troubleshooting and research.

I am not one of those "really know" folks, but I have watched this forum for a very long time. CSA, Phil Corso, and Mark V guy really helped people with problems that were complex, i.e. beyond research into experience. It seem now that just post a part number or just say my turbine tripped what happened.
 
Turbines and generators are not my field, but I see the same few questions posted over and over again by people who are clearly out of their depth, and who seem to have done little or no troubleshooting on their own. I follow Control.com via the RSS feed, and when I see a title containing the words "Mark V", I can be almost guaranteed that it will just be a re-hash of something that has been discussed in detail dozens of times before.

We do occasionally get the same problem in other topic areas, but not to the same degree that we see in power generation. There seems to be some special problem in that field relating to the structure of the industry and how it is staffed and supported.

The few people who do answer power generation questions do tend to give very detailed answers. I get the distinct impression though that many of the people who post the questions don't bother reading past the first few sentences when it becomes obvious that they're not going to get an answer that says "push this button to fix it". I could post a question on the 1st of April that said "My Mark V tripped. I tried re-calibrating the LVDT and replacing the Moog servo valve, but the turbine does not start. What is the problem?" and I doubt that anyone would see it as anything other than a typical serious question.

There's nothing that Control.com or the moderators can do themselves to directly address this. They can post headings on the web site in big bold letters that say "search the archives first before posting a question", but realistically, people aren't going to read it. They're looking for an answer to their problem *right now* and the fact that the same question has been answered 100 times before just means that they don't want to read all the archived detailed replies to find the one that addresses their particular concern. And, sometimes their problem really is something new.

Control.com tried to start a "Control Wiki" a while ago to deal with this, but it never seemed to get off the ground. It might help if the people who answer most of these questions were to talk to the Control.com moderators to see about giving them access to the wiki to let them put some of this routine material into wiki pages. That way, instead of repeating the same material over and over again, you can just point people to a wiki page (as Phil Corso likes to point people to previous posts). Also, you can point questioners to a short troubleshooting guide wiki page which would tell people to "provide this information to me before I will answer your question". The advantage a wiki page has over a regular post in the archives is that you can edit the page again later to provide more detail without re-writing the whole thing.

I don't mind "newb" type questions, as some of those have in the past lead to the most interesting discussions as we answer the question and then go off on a tangent. I also don't mind learning something about power generation. We can never predict as to which question will lead to the most interesting debate. However, I don't think that discussion here has been of the same technical level recently that we had a few years ago. I think the flood of "fix my turbine" and "do my homework assignment" questions from people who have no intention of staying around and contributing themselves is diluting the quality of debate. I think that can be rectified, but doing so will require that regular contributors also change the way they answer questions. "Control.com" provides the infrastructure and some basic filtering, but really, the community here is *us*. I think the wiki is the most promising way to address that, although perhaps someone else will have a better idea.
 
C

curt wuollet

That's an issue with an open mailing list, you get all kinds. And to be fair, some folks have a language problem that discourages providing much detail. My overall impression is that a lot of people who are doing automation probably shouldn't be, at least until they've studied a bit. But I think the problem there rests with the employers. Knowledge and experience count against you in today's job market, and so many are hiring contracters and even temps for even mission critical jobs, that it's scary. Everybody has to start someplace, but I can't help feeling that in some of these cases, the automation guy is whoever was hanging around when the problem happened. I know I've refrained from even trying to help some who are in way over their heads in a potentially dangerous situation. But then, nobody seems very interested in my expertise anyway:^).I go to test as a Radio Tech tomorrow. Career #4. We really should try to help if it won't kill somebody, but when someone asks what's causing their multi-million dollar machine to explode the past ten times they started it, I can't help but think management is trying to economize a little too much. But then, my situation may be affecting my judgment.

Regards
cww
 
S
Michael, it looks like we view a lot of the current crop of questions similarly.

If the question comes across as "do my work for me" whether it be school work or work work, Why? I do my own work, why would I do yours as well? Aside from the basic inequity of the request, why would I want to be responsible for helping to foist off a lazy and/or unqualified person on the consumers of engineered products when left to their own devices, they would be removed from the system?

If the person strikes me as, well, not the sharpest lead in the drafting pencil, those questions aren't too enticing to answer either. ("Can I solve the energy crisis with a generator in my shower?")

If the question sounds as if it's posed by an intelligent, competent engineer (or at least intelligent amateur) who happens to have strayed into an area less familiar to him, then fine. Those can be interesting discussions.

My solution has always been simply not to answer. In the short run it minimizes the wastage of your time, and in the long run, if the kinds of questions we don't want to see don't draw responses, the people will eventually go away.

But if you feel that approach isn't working, and if whomever are viewed as the authorities for a given topic are up for the additional workload, then maybe the solution would be for them to become auxiliary moderators. The original thread never even appears on the board without the go ahead from one of them. That should discourage inappropriate questions. It might get to the point where you had these expert panels for other categories as well. Sorry Phil, CSA, I had to suggest it.
 
Its not just restricted to the GE Turbine Control topics. There's been a marked increase in the number of either very dumb questions that could be resolved with some research or questions that show a serious lack of background knowledge across all areas of the forum.

That's not necessarily a problem since the whole point of this group is to help educate, but as said before its frustrating to see the same questions repeated or very very old topics being re-opened without significant new information.

With all respect to control.com however, the Forum software is beginning to look quite dated. and for my 2C this is a significant contributor to the problem.

There are a number of very good open source forums out there like SMF (Simple Machines Forum) that offer very good functionality including searching, user profiles, blogging, wiki integration etc that could greatly help the functionality of this site. (Of course there are lots of other very good forum systems available, so dont think I'm plugging SMF over others.)

Rob
www[.]lymac.co.nz
 
I usually try not to answer if the person has not taken the time to clearly describe their problem. I cut them some slack if their native language is clearly not english, but not if they are lazy.

Something I won't answer:

"extruder #5 broke, do I need relayz?"

KEJR
 
You bring up some issues that we struggle with all the time. Our moderators fend off an unbelievable number of posts that are clearly "do my homework for me" posts (mainly, I have to say, from India, although I'm not sure why we're so popular for that specific purpose there).

We also get a fair number of "how do I control my new cement plant" questions, which are returned for more specificity. Yes, it makes you wonder how some people got their jobs.

When questions come along that, in the moderator's memory, have been previously addressed, the poster gets a private email pointing them to the thread. But, honestly, memory is imperfect and sometimes the phrasing of a question can make is seem new.

In all of these cases, other forum participants are certainly welcome to play a role. Our moderators watch your responses and adjust their criteria when they learn from you that certain questions are too broad, or are likely homework questions, or have been addressed previously. And, we appreciate threads like this, because it helps us judge whether our standards need to be tighter for moderation.

All said, it's a tough balance to maintain. We do have many posters for whom English is not their first language, and we have many posters who are new to the field, as we all were at one time. The service being performed by this forum, and specifically by you -- the people who post here -- is real and important, and it would be a shame to diminish it by excluding some of the more basic questions from the discussion.

Please continue to help us maintain this balance, and we'll continue to try to find new ways to accommodate the breadth of users the forum attracts.

Thanks to all,
Ken Crater
Control.com founder
 
>With all respect to control.com
>however, the Forum software is beginning
>to look quite dated. and for my 2C this
>is a significant contributor to the
>problem.

This is an area I'd love to get more input on (after all, I live to code :). For instance...

- We're about to install a new user-ranking feature on the site which will essentially acknowledge forum participants who are viewed by other users as being the most helpful.

- A while back we instituted User Pics that allow forum members to put up thumbnail photos / avatars, as well as User Pages, which show basic information about a member and all their posts. What other information should be included on these pages?

- Our ControlWiki project was met with, um, somewhat underwhelming response, but I think what it may need is more editorial input. Recently I had to suspend open editing of the wiki because it was being spammed mercilessly, but I'm looking into some anti-spam measures to install there.

Anyway, feedback is good, especially specific feedback. I can't promise we'll do everything, but we will listen to everything.

Thanks,
Ken Crater
Control.com founder
 
C

curt wuollet

Hi Ken

I have tried a wiki with technicians and engineers before, so that we could capture their cleverness and avoid reinventing the wheel. Even though it had all the resources a click away (schematics, manuals, etc.), there was simply no way to get them to participate. Great idea, slammed by human nature. What is amazing is that the forum format draws out even the shyest wallflowers:^). That's food for thought.

Regards
cww
 
CTTech,

What do you recommend to solve the problems you have raised?

Do you believe that people will read your post and start using the 'Search' function first?

Did you use the control.com 'Search' function when you first posted here?

Are you certain that all similar questions are the same and require the same answer and can be answered by referring to past threads in all cases?

Please, what would you suggest, CTTech? Do we need to have an experience/skill test before allowing people to post questions here? Are you willing to start supporting the Moderators to try to reduce the number of similar questions and email instructions on how to search control.com for answers, or, to refer them to specific threads?

What would you do, CTTech?

In working side-by-side with people, I have noticed that many, if not most, people will only perform one or two searches before giving up. They won't try different words or terms or combinations, only the ones most obvious to them. They won't look at relevant search returns to find different terms to search with. One or two attempts with the words/terms they think are the words/terms everyone else uses and that's all their willing to do before giving up and asking someone for help or information.

The well-hidden 'Search' function here at control.com has gotten less user-friendly than it was. And, it could "float" on the right side of the page making it visible at all times, instead of only being visible when at or near the top of a page. People might be more inclined to try to use it (until they get frustrated at the context they have to use).

My only "complaint" about the Moderation here at control.com is that it seems that people are allowed to post their questions in any seemingly related 'Discussion Topic' and so it makes it very hard for people to go to the 'Power Generation' topic and find all related threads there, when some were posted in Software or Process Control or PLCs or Communications or Business. I know it must be difficult for the moderators to know precisely which Discussion Topic each question should be posted in, and to have enough Topics and sub-Topics to cover every contingency would be unmanageable. But, it seems anyone can post any question in any Discussion Topic they wish--again making a search by Discussion Topic difficult.

But, I don't know how one would "solve" this issue. Do I get frustrated at seemingly similar questions being asked repeatedly? Sure! I used to work with a colleague who frequently said there's no such thing as a dumb question, just a dumb answer. And, he also said that he didn't believe he understood a concept or a process if he couldn't explain it to someone else so they could understand it.

So, sometimes it's just a matter of explaining things a little differently in order for someone to understand something. One might be saying the same thing, just differently, to make it clear to someone else.

Do some people abuse the 'privilege' of being able to post questions here by not searching for relevant posts first? Yes. But how would you police that, CTTech?

A lot of the people posting turbine- and turbine controls-related questions to control.com do not speak English as their primary language. So, searching and reading previous posts is not always so easy.

Also, many of these people have had little or no training and have little or no access to manuals, drawings, or documentation--much of which, for GE equipment, is also in English, if available. (I've actually been to sites where manuals and drawings are kept under lock and key, and not made available to operators or technicians. Not even photocopies of pertinent and important information, like P&IDs, are available to operators and technicians.)

Many power plant managers and plant owners aren't required to train, license or certify their operators and technicians. And, when they do invest in training, the employees will take their training certificates and peddle them elsewhere to obtain a slightly higher wage. So, many employers just don't and won't invest in training.

Why, when the control systems have become so reliable and take only a click or two to start or stop a 100+ MW turbine-generator? Seriously, operating a turbine-generator is very easy, because virtually everything is automatic. Troubleshooting is another story, but operating is quite easy these days, and the control systems virtually protect the units without much, if any, operator intervention.

But, I'm still curious, CTTech. What would you do to solve this problem you have raised?

I've often been asked about, and considered, a pay-per-incident site. But--and trust me when I say this: The quality of the questions and information provided is even WORSE than here on control.com! When people pay for help or information, they expect omniscience and mind-reading. And, mostly they already have preconceived notions of what the problem is or was, and are just looking for validation--and they're not happy if they don't get it. And they don't want to provide any data that might not support their hypothesis. And, they believe that paying someone else to troubleshoot their problem relieves them of all responsibility to provide any meaningful data at any time during the process.

But, I'm very interested in your ideas, CTTech. Please tell us how you would handle this issue.

For me, the control wiki seemed like a good idea but I'd actually forgotten about it. I still think "avatars" are the way to go here, requiring posters to put some information about them, their experience, their site and configuration, so that others can refer to that for information and even possible questions in the future.

Of course, the ability to post drawings or files would be helpful, but we all know that's not secure. So, we just live with it.

Personally, I post because I learn a lot. I'm not a very good writer (and an even worse proof-reader of my own writing!), so I have to work at the posts. Because I don't want to make a '20 Questions' effort with a lot of back-and-forth I try to make my answers broader, encompassing more possibilities, which takes more words. Would I like it if there was good information in every post? Sure! I will say that people who post more than one question seem to include more information in their subsequent questions.

But, how to solve this problem? Please tell us your ideas, CTTech.
 
S
Yeah, I agree. Lack of English proficiency is no barrier as long as it's not so bad that I actually can't tell what the person's asking.

I don't mind trying to help hardworking intelligent people whatever language they may speak. In fact, just trying to post a question on a board in a language that isn't your own indicates some ambition in and of itself.
 
>When questions come along that, in the
>moderator's memory, have been previously
>addressed, the poster gets a private
>email pointing them to the thread. But,
>honestly, memory is imperfect and
>sometimes the phrasing of a question can
>make is seem new.

How about posting these responses to the forum, so that people can see their question might already have been asked and answered, as many others' questions have already been asked and answered?
 
Hi CSA,

First of all let me say you are one of my heroes on this site. You take great pains to answer questions.

> My only "complaint" about the Moderation here at control.com is that
> it seems that people are allowed to post their questions in any seemingly related
> 'Discussion Topic' and so it makes it very hard for people to go to the 'Power
> Generation' topic and find all related threads there, when some were posted in
> Software or Process Control or PLCs or Communications or Business. I know it
> must be difficult for the moderators to know precisely which Discussion Topic
> each question should be posted in, and to have enough Topics and sub-Topics to
> cover every contingency would be unmanageable. But, it seems anyone can
> post any question in any Discussion Topic they wish--again making a search
> by Discussion Topic difficult.

I actually change the topics people post under all the time, but I know I miss things. Now that I know that it is a problem, I will give a little more time to that aspect of moderating.

Thanks for the feedback,
Peg
 
S
Oh, I forgot to ask -- does the guy need relayz or not? ;-)

There's another type of VERY annoying post. There was a guy here, whom I don't believe I seen a post from in some time, and all of his posts were some variation of "My company pays me minimum wage and never listens to me even though I could troubleshoot the space shuttle! Wahhh!", except that the spelling and punctuation would be all wrong.

Why post unless you have a question? Why spend time here when if your premise is correct you should be perusing the want ads or starting up your own company?
 
CSA,

The first aspect of troubleshooting is to recognize a problem exists.

Next you should pool your resources to help solve the problem.

This post; the first question I have ever posted, I hope does just that.

The brainstorming thus far has, at least in my opinion, recognized that a problem exists.

And CSA has already made suggestions for possible changes to help correct the problem.

My personal problem was trudging through a bunch of worthless stuff to find the opportunity to learn or help if possible.

Farewell,
CTTech
 
Ms. Ferraro,

I'm blushing.

I wish I could walk in your shoes just one day to see how much work it takes to moderate this site. I honestly don't have any idea about what it takes, but I'm sure it can be as trying and difficult as it can be satisfying. (Like most jobs, I imagine--it's just I don't really have a clue about how this moderation thing works!).

Please note I'm not complaining; it's just a comment I've heard from colleagues when I tell them about the site. They just want to go to one place and scroll through for interesting topics.

Anyway, thanks for all you do! Especially for all the extra help you provide! ;-)
 
Ken Crater said:
>- We're about to install a new user-ranking feature on the site

I think this could be good.

>- A while back we instituted User Pics that allow forum members to put up
>thumbnail photos / avatars,

Only a few people seem to make use of that. I don't know whether that is due to lack of interest or whether people don't know how. I suspect it's a bit of both. There are lots of free avatars available, but users have to find them and then upload them here. I just had a look on the web to see if there are some collections of stock avatars that you could integrate directly into the site (to make selection easier), but didn't have much luck. Perhaps there is some easy solution available however that I'm not aware of.

For me, I ended up drawing my own because I didn't think any of the typical free avatars available projected the sort of image that I wanted to have associated with me in a forum like this.

>as well as User Pages, which show basic information
>about a member and all their posts. What other information should be
>included on these pages?

Some suggestions would be:
- Country.
- Types of control systems they are interested in.
- A few people may wish to have a link to their company web site.

All that should be optional though.

I would add to the above that I think you should update the theme (colours, style, etc.). The blue gradients give a 10 year old "feel" to the site. I'm not a graphic designer and I can't tell you what would look good, but the current fashion seems to be for:

- dark (even black) banner headers,
- light or dark grey tabbed menu bars,
- fixed width columns with distinct separation between the posts and the ads (no overlap or column wrapping),
- light grey backgrounds around the content columns,
- reply buttons are either images or use CSS background styling to stand out,
- sans serif fonts,
- forum reply posts can have their own (optional) titles,
- RSS feeds use a logo directly in the page (not by going through a menu).

I could mention iPhone and Android apps for Control.com, but I'm not sure where to start there. However, a special web page format for mobile browsers (which have smaller screens) would cover that angle to at least some degree.
 
In reply to CSA: I want to be clear about a few things. One is that I don't want to filter out power generation topics from what I see. I want to read your explanations about how power plants work. The reason why I read Control.com is to learn new things. The problem is that that the nuggets of new knowledge get buried in the repetition.

What I was thinking of is really two problems:

1) A lot of simple routine questions could be answered by just pointing the questioner to the relevant wiki page that contained the information on that topic.

2) A lot of people post vague questions, and getting any real background out of them is like pulling teeth. Again, you could point them to a wiki page which has a series of steps they need to do in order to provide you with the information you need to help them.

Phil Corso likes to point people to old posts. The problem with just leaving the information in posts though is that at some point the quantity of similar but slightly different answers becomes a barrier to finding what people are looking for. I think what is needed is to distill some of that down into more comprehensive answers that people can be directed to as a first step.

I have an open source software project with its own web site and forums. The web site has about as much information in it as a typical PLC manual. People ask me questions all the time about things that are explained in the web site. I find that most questions can be answered by telling them "here are some links to the specific web pages with an explanation for your question, together with diagrams and examples, have a look at that and I will be happy to discuss further details with you". I can also include some additional detail if I think the information needs to be put in the context of their particular problem. That seems to work quite well, and the users seem to be happy, and I can give better answers because I can focus on what is unique about what they are doing in their project or what it is they are having problems with without getting bogged down in background detail. The documentation doesn't always answer their questions, but it does help them to ask better ones.

>The well-hidden 'Search' function here
>at control.com has gotten less
>user-friendly than it was.

I don't think that a better search function is going to help. A lot of these people are getting here by using Google search to begin with. If Google didn't point them to the relevant post to begin with, a search function inside Control.com is unlikely to do better. What they need is someone to tell them "here is what you are looking for", or "here is some background you need to understand before you can adequately describe your problem". Google ranks Control.com very highly in search rankings. Once enough links start pointing to a relevant wiki page, people are going to be taken straight there to begin with.

>My only "complaint" about the
>Moderation here at control.com is that
>it seems that people are allowed to post
>their questions in any seemingly related
>'Discussion Topic' and so it makes it
>very hard for people to go to the 'Power
>Generation' topic and find all related
>threads there,

There's a *lot* of stuff in power generation, so better classification doesn't narrow the topic down that much. Also I don't know about your perspective on this but I don't want to actually filter out anything. I follow the site on an RSS reader and click on topics that look interesting. I would *like* to read more posts on power generation, but after the 50th explanation of how an IGV works, I stopped clicking on anything with "IGV" in the title. That's not because I don't want to know anything about IGVs, but because I knew I would have to read through a lot of repetition without knowing if there would be anything new there.

I want to be clear on something here. I didn't start this thread, and I don't have a problem with how things are being run, and I don't have a problem with the way you are answering questions. As I said, I follow this through RSS and I just don't click on things that don't interest me. I'm just taking the opportunity to make some suggestions for improvement.

>Of course, the ability to post drawings
>or files would be helpful, but we all
>know that's not secure. So, we just live
>with it.

Images are a problem for open forums because spammers will target the forum. Spammers use images to try to get around automatic text based filtering, including things like pornography (involving various genders, ages, and species), pills for altering your anatomy, and other similar topics. They also send viruses embedded in images (if you look at the image in MS IE, you get pwned). Even if the moderator were to screen all of these in advance, I'm not sure that they're the sort of thing she would want to spend her day looking at. I follow some other (non-controls forums) and most of them have had to implement registration policies because of this. Spammers even do things like register "sleeper" accounts which they activate later (sometimes years later) to get around automatic time based approvals. Registration would be a problem for Control.com, where many people come here for the first time because they want help with a problem, and having to wait to have their registration approved would be a barrier to them.

On the other hand, if a controls wiki was editable by known and "trusted" users only, then this wouldn't be a problem and I don't see why we couldn't have images there.
 
Posted by Ken Crater on 19 April, 2011 - 10:08 am
>This is an area I'd love to get more input on (after all, I live to code :). For instance...

1) Confucious say, "picture worth a thousand words". I can't count the number of times I've wanted to post some graphic image that would complement the explanation. The ability to include an image would be helpful.

2) An edit function. No matter how carefully I read my own replies, once it's posted I see spelling and typo errors and omissions. Of course how that can be implemented on a moderated forum isn't clear to me.

> Our moderators fend off an unbelievable number of posts that are clearly "do my homework for me" posts.

Thank you. It maintains a certain gravitas when the obvious homework questions are cut.
 
I just had a thought here - the problems with images in forum posts would come from accepting them from unknown parties. If someone has a "known good" posting history though, then there shouldn't be a serious problem in that regard. That could be made automatic by only giving those users an upload button on the "post" page.

The question then would be if there is a problem with creating two classes of users (established posters versus newcomers)?
 
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