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Hiya ppl..

When I look at threads in forums like "Programmer Certification (SCJP)", "EJB Certification (SCBCD)" etc., I find that there are lots of repeated questions everyday. For example, I see atleast one new post every two days, about SLP. About SCJP 1.5 beta, Math funtions, Garbage collection etc.
I was wondering if we could have something like a sticky section on top of every forum. We could place the "most commonly asked questions" posts in that section, so that people can go through them before they post a new topic. (As it is, it would work if people would do a simple search, which they seldom do)

Or we could come up with a general solution, to have a placeholder for the most commonly asked questions section, where we can give references/links to exhaustive/famous/infamous threads that have already been discussed and finished off with.

What do you all think?
 
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I think that is what the JavaRanch FAQ is for: http://faq.javaranch.com/search?CategoryFaq

Eric
 
Subhash Bhushan C
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Yep, that just about matches my description. But again, there are the inherent problems. There is no search. And with all due respects to you and the rest of the JavaRanch team, the material covered does not completely answer the "Oh, I saw this post just yesterday!!" problem And the CategoryFAQ does not seem to be organized, so any newbie who steps in there (Assuming that he knows that such a page exists), will be disheartened to see all those myriad terms (myriad atleast to him).

Please do not misunderstand me, that I complain a lot. I grew to appreciate Javaranch the moment I saw these posts on the web.

http://www.javaranch.com/newsletter/200404/JoltAward.html
http://www.sdmagazine.com/jolts/

Just trying to make it better.

Maybe we could just soup it up and make the FAQ a little better.
[ February 11, 2005: Message edited by: Agni Vartula ]
 
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Originally posted by Agni Vartula:
There is no search.



There is a search box at the bottom right, and it is indexed by Google (included "site:faq.javaranch.com" in your search terms).

Actually the page you were looking at *was* a just-in-time search result!

Would it help if we moved the search box to the top right?

And with all due respects to you and the rest of the JavaRanch team, the material covered does not completely answer the "Oh, I saw this post just yesterday!!" problem



It is a work in progress - and we could use any help we can get! The FAQ is a wiki, that is, everyone is able to edit pages, hyperlink them or even create new ones. So, if you find that anything is missing or could be improved, just do it!


And the CategoryFAQ does not seem to be organized, so any newbie who steps in there (Assuming that he knows that such a page exists), will be disheartened to see all those myriad terms (myriad atleast to him).



Yes, unfortunately the search result isn't even alphabetically ordered. This is fixed in the newest version of Friki, but my last attempt to install failed. We are working on it.

We once had a more organized overview page for the FAQ, perhaps we should reintroduce it? http://faq.javaranch.com/view?old/FrequentlyAskedQuestions.2004-04-23-08.51.01
 
Subhash Bhushan C
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It is a work in progress - and we could use any help we can get! The FAQ is a wiki, that is, everyone is able to edit pages, hyperlink them or even create new ones. So, if you find that anything is missing or could be improved, just do it!



Didnt know this fact. I dont work much around BBSs, so to tell the truth, I dont completely understand what you are talking about But will find out and do whatever I can.

Thank you so much for the reply.
[ February 12, 2005: Message edited by: Agni Vartula ]
 
Ilja Preuss
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Agni, start your research here: http://faq.javaranch.com/view?FranksWiki
 
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Ilja, I agree that having a "table of contents" page is very useful in addition to the auto-generated index. Indices are great when you are looking up a specific term. ToCs are better when you're exploring or just browsing, especially for the new folks.
 
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