Add a second voting feature that regards grammar
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I think it would help the site significantly if the tech-heads that publish (which I'm grateful for) could have feed-back on grammar/spelling. It is hard to read articles that contain errors in grammar. Maybe add a second vote control that is dedicated to grammar/spelling? I do not wish to ridicule articles, but believe the poor writing of many articles brings down the pedigree of codeproject.com. It's ironic that many of articles containing wonderful technical information with original content suffer terribly from this problem. At present, I do not want to vote down an article that I like that also has bad grammar, and I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author, nor do I want to have to take that much time to do so.
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I think it would help the site significantly if the tech-heads that publish (which I'm grateful for) could have feed-back on grammar/spelling. It is hard to read articles that contain errors in grammar. Maybe add a second vote control that is dedicated to grammar/spelling? I do not wish to ridicule articles, but believe the poor writing of many articles brings down the pedigree of codeproject.com. It's ironic that many of articles containing wonderful technical information with original content suffer terribly from this problem. At present, I do not want to vote down an article that I like that also has bad grammar, and I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author, nor do I want to have to take that much time to do so.
puromtec1 wrote:
I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author
Unfortunately these two methods are really the only way the author will get notified that his article needs work. People don't post articles then reread and go "whoa! I sure have a lot of bad grammar and spelling there!". They post and think it's either good enough, or don't know any better since English isn't their first language. A second voting bar will simply tell everyone who reads the article what they already know: it needs work.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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puromtec1 wrote:
I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author
Unfortunately these two methods are really the only way the author will get notified that his article needs work. People don't post articles then reread and go "whoa! I sure have a lot of bad grammar and spelling there!". They post and think it's either good enough, or don't know any better since English isn't their first language. A second voting bar will simply tell everyone who reads the article what they already know: it needs work.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
Chris Maunder wrote:
A second voting bar will simply tell everyone who reads the article what they already know: it needs work.
True. An alternative approach would be to offer an "editor" slot for articles, just like in a newspaper or book. It would provide an incentive for fellows who like words (see the 'Lounge') to help improve articles.
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Chris Maunder wrote:
A second voting bar will simply tell everyone who reads the article what they already know: it needs work.
True. An alternative approach would be to offer an "editor" slot for articles, just like in a newspaper or book. It would provide an incentive for fellows who like words (see the 'Lounge') to help improve articles.
puromtec1 wrote:
An alternative approach would be to offer an "editor" slot for articles, just like in a newspaper or book
Not sure what you mean. Can you give an example? We're always looking to make this easier for authors and their (sometimes hard done) readers!
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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puromtec1 wrote:
I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author
Unfortunately these two methods are really the only way the author will get notified that his article needs work. People don't post articles then reread and go "whoa! I sure have a lot of bad grammar and spelling there!". They post and think it's either good enough, or don't know any better since English isn't their first language. A second voting bar will simply tell everyone who reads the article what they already know: it needs work.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
I'm not sure I agree. As an article reader "Good technical content, but rotten writing" vs "Rotten technical content" is a useful distinction. Obviously having both good is ideal, but for something obscure enough that there's only a few articles available having an indication of why it was slammed would help in figuring which ones were worth looking at.
The European Way of War: Blow your own continent up. The American Way of War: Go over and help them.
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puromtec1 wrote:
An alternative approach would be to offer an "editor" slot for articles, just like in a newspaper or book
Not sure what you mean. Can you give an example? We're always looking to make this easier for authors and their (sometimes hard done) readers!
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
Change: Articles get new attribute: Editor (displays below author's name) Sample Workflow: 1. Author write article X 2. Reader reads article and wishes to correct articles grammar formatting 3. Reader sends requests to Author to become Editor of X 4. Author accepts 5. Reader edits article X 6. Author approves 7. Reader's name shows as the Editor of article X below the Author's name on the article. 8. My head stops hurting when reading said article **joke**
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Change: Articles get new attribute: Editor (displays below author's name) Sample Workflow: 1. Author write article X 2. Reader reads article and wishes to correct articles grammar formatting 3. Reader sends requests to Author to become Editor of X 4. Author accepts 5. Reader edits article X 6. Author approves 7. Reader's name shows as the Editor of article X below the Author's name on the article. 8. My head stops hurting when reading said article **joke**
I assume that you are talking about a form of copy editing. That's a helluva lot of responsibility for people in a volunteer site - especially as it could end up trampling on the original authors ego. When an author releases an article, it's not a great feeling for others to come along and effectively say "something about this sucks dude", especially if English isn't their first language.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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I assume that you are talking about a form of copy editing. That's a helluva lot of responsibility for people in a volunteer site - especially as it could end up trampling on the original authors ego. When an author releases an article, it's not a great feeling for others to come along and effectively say "something about this sucks dude", especially if English isn't their first language.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
That's a helluva lot of responsibility
Could be. But, people do it completely anonymously on wikipedia.
Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
could end up trampling on the original authors ego
When it is all said and done, readers will not know the line between the author's and editor's work. The author will look better, afterwards. Once corrected, as time goes by, the author will not get random and endless messages to correct spelling and grammar--which you refer to below....
Pete O'Hanlon wrote:
it's not a great feeling for others to come along and effectively say "something about this sucks dude"
What stops this from happening now, as Chris stated earlier? Also, a dryly worded request for editing via a button on codeproject is much less traumatizing than a personal message.
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I assume that you are talking about a form of copy editing. That's a helluva lot of responsibility for people in a volunteer site - especially as it could end up trampling on the original authors ego. When an author releases an article, it's not a great feeling for others to come along and effectively say "something about this sucks dude", especially if English isn't their first language.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
What if we had a (persisted) option on the article editor that said "Accept offers from members to edit and correct this article". Authors with articles over a certain rating would have this unset by default, but for new members it could be helpful.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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What if we had a (persisted) option on the article editor that said "Accept offers from members to edit and correct this article". Authors with articles over a certain rating would have this unset by default, but for new members it could be helpful.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
what if we had the possibility to submit a would-be article to a proofreader (either CP staff, or volunteers) so they can cast a vote on language/grammar, and/or suggest improvements, however responsibility remains with the author? BTW: I sometimes wish I had similar on actual content, that is: hey mr/ms specialist, please give your very first impression on this... :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
The quality and detail of your question reflects on the effectiveness of the help you are likely to get. Show formatted code inside PRE tags, and give clear symptoms when describing a problem.
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what if we had the possibility to submit a would-be article to a proofreader (either CP staff, or volunteers) so they can cast a vote on language/grammar, and/or suggest improvements, however responsibility remains with the author? BTW: I sometimes wish I had similar on actual content, that is: hey mr/ms specialist, please give your very first impression on this... :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
The quality and detail of your question reflects on the effectiveness of the help you are likely to get. Show formatted code inside PRE tags, and give clear symptoms when describing a problem.
We kinda-sorta already have this through the article moderation system. The only issue is that it's open to a lot of people.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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We kinda-sorta already have this through the article moderation system. The only issue is that it's open to a lot of people.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
yes, however it is anonymous, uncommitted, and does not focus on language. I would appreciate a language-oriented proof reading service (that is a big step better than dumping the text in MS Word to get it somewhat checked). And on occasion I would like to address a content-oriented specialist (probably a famous CPian known to be expert in the matter at hand). :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
The quality and detail of your question reflects on the effectiveness of the help you are likely to get. Show formatted code inside PRE tags, and give clear symptoms when describing a problem.
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We kinda-sorta already have this through the article moderation system. The only issue is that it's open to a lot of people.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
do gold articles go there too? :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
The quality and detail of your question reflects on the effectiveness of the help you are likely to get. Show formatted code inside PRE tags, and give clear symptoms when describing a problem.
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do gold articles go there too? :)
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
The quality and detail of your question reflects on the effectiveness of the help you are likely to get. Show formatted code inside PRE tags, and give clear symptoms when describing a problem.
Articles by Gold level members? No - they don't have to go through moderation. But I see your point: there is no option for accomplished authors.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
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What if we had a (persisted) option on the article editor that said "Accept offers from members to edit and correct this article". Authors with articles over a certain rating would have this unset by default, but for new members it could be helpful.
cheers, Chris Maunder The Code Project Co-founder Microsoft C++ MVP
Chris Maunder wrote:
edit and correct this article
If worded too loosley, one might call this "mission creep" at this point. From a systems perspectve, IMO, corrections to 'content' happen in response to messages in the forum at the bottom of an article. Clearly stating this as a "Plan for Improving Grammar and Formatting" of articles helps prevent eroding the individualistic quality you have cultivated at this site.
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I think it would help the site significantly if the tech-heads that publish (which I'm grateful for) could have feed-back on grammar/spelling. It is hard to read articles that contain errors in grammar. Maybe add a second vote control that is dedicated to grammar/spelling? I do not wish to ridicule articles, but believe the poor writing of many articles brings down the pedigree of codeproject.com. It's ironic that many of articles containing wonderful technical information with original content suffer terribly from this problem. At present, I do not want to vote down an article that I like that also has bad grammar, and I do not want to comment at the bottom or send a private message to the author, nor do I want to have to take that much time to do so.
CP has staff-editors who eventually edit and clean up the grammar/language. But I don't think they actually re-write it (in typical copy-edit style), so if the original article was not written in a natural style, the edited article would still feel a tad stiff to read (even if it's now grammatically correct).
Regards, Nish
Nish’s thoughts on MFC, C++/CLI and .NET (my blog)
My latest book : C++/CLI in Action / Amazon.com link