[R] Rating R Helpers

Sat Dec 1 17:59:33 CET 2007

I don't think r-help is really intended for packages although for some
very popular packages questions appear on it anyways sometimes.

On Dec 1, 2007 11:28 AM, Mark Kimpel <mwkimpel at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'll throw one more idea into the mix. I agree with Bill that a rating
> system for respondents is probably not that practical and of not the highest
> importance. It also seems like a recipe for creating inter-personal problems
> that the list doesn't need.
>
> I do like Bill's idea of a review system for packages, which could be
> incorporated into my idea that follows...
>
> What I would find useful would be some sort of tagging system for messages.
> I can't count the times I've remembered seeing a message that addresses a
> question I have down the road but, when Googled, I can't find it. It would
> be so nice, for example, to reliably be able to find all messages related to
> a certain package or package function posted within the last X days. This
> could be implemented as simply as asking posters to provide keywords at the
> end of a message, but it would be great if they could somehow be pulled out
> of a message and stored in a DB. For instance keywords could be surrounded
> by a sequence of special characters, which a parser could then extract and
> store in a DB along with the message.
>
> Of course, this would be work to set up, but how many of our "experts" who
> so kindly give of their time, get exasperated when similar questions keep
> popping up on the list? Also, if we had a web-accessable DB, the responses,
> not the responders, could be rated as to how well a reply takes care of an
> issue. Thus, over time, a sort of auto-wiki could be born. I can think of
> more uses for this as well. For example a developer could quickly check to
> see what usability problems or suggestions have cropped up of on individual
> package.
>
> Mark
>
> On Dec 1, 2007 2:21 AM, <Bill.Venables at csiro.au> wrote:
>
>
> > This seems a little impractical to me.  People respond so much at random
> > and most only tackle questions with which they feel comfortable.  As
> > it's not a competition in any sense, it's going to be hard to rank
> > people in any effective way.  But suppose you succeed in doing so, then
> > what?
> >
> > To me a much more urgent initiative is some kind of user online review
> > system for packages, even something as simple as that used by Amazon.com
> > has for customer review of books.
> >
> > I think the need for this is rather urgent, in fact.  Most packages are
> > very good, but I regret to say some are pretty inefficient and others
> > downright dangerous.  You don't want to discourage people from
> > submitting their work to CRAN, but at the same time you do want some
> > mechanism that allows users to relate their experience with it, good or
> > bad.
> >
> >
> > Bill Venables
> > CSIRO Laboratories
> > PO Box 120, Cleveland, 4163
> > AUSTRALIA
> > Office Phone (email preferred): +61 7 3826 7251
> > Fax (if absolutely necessary):  +61 7 3826 7304
> > Mobile:                         +61 4 8819 4402
> > Home Phone:                     +61 7 3286 7700
> > mailto:Bill.Venables at csiro.au
> > http://www.cmis.csiro.au/bill.venables/
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: r-help-bounces at r-project.org [mailto:r-help-bounces at r-project.org]
> > On Behalf Of Doran, Harold
> > Sent: Saturday, 1 December 2007 6:13 AM
> > To: R Help
> > Subject: [R] Rating R Helpers
> >
> > Since R is open source and help may come from varied levels of
> > experience on R-Help, I wonder if it might be helpful to construct a
> > method that can be used to "rate" those who provide help on this list.
> >
> > This is something that is done on other comp lists, like
> > http://www.experts-exchange.com/.
> >
> > I think some of the reasons for this are pretty transparent, but I
> > suppose one reason is that one could decide to implement the advise of
> > those with "superior" or "expert" levels. In other words, you can trust
> > the advice of someone who is more experienced more than someone who is
> > not. Currently, there is no way to discern who on this list is really an
> > R expert and who is not. Of course, there is R core, but most people
> > don't actually know who these people are (at least I surmise that to be
> > true).
> >
> > If this is potentially useful, maybe one way to begin the development of
> > such ratings is to allow the original poster to "rate" the level of help
> > from those who responded. Maybe something like a very simple
> > questionnaire on a likert-like scale that the original poster would
> > respond to upon receiving help which would lead to the accumulation of
> > points for the responders. Higher points would result in higher levels
> > of expertise (e.g., novice, ..., wizaRd).
> >
> > Just a random thought. What do others think?
> >
> > Harold
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > R-help at r-project.org mailing list
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> > PLEASE do read the posting guide
> > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > R-help at r-project.org mailing list
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> > PLEASE do read the posting guide
> > http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> > and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
> >
>
>
>
> --
> --
> Mark W. Kimpel MD
> Neuroinformatics
> Department of Psychiatry
> Indiana University School of Medicine
>
>
>        [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-help at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
> PLEASE do read the posting guide http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
> and provide commented, minimal, self-contained, reproducible code.
>