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The new ask page is now live on the network! discusses an 'ask' page which is configurable for each site in the SE universe.

Specific bits that can be modified and the procedure of getting it live are here:

What's per-site customizable, and what's the procedure to get it live?

As you can see, any existing custom guidance on "How to ask," "How to tag," or any custom error or warning messages your site may already have in place will still be there, and will still be customizable with the same restraints (basic HTML, using paragraphs, lists, links) as before:

  • The "welcome modal" for new askers, everything between the title and "Before you post..." (this is only custom on 4 sites at the moment).
  • The full contents of the "Draft your question" sidebar.
  • The text in the tag popover, between "Tags help the right people..." and the bullet points.
  • The placeholder text in the title field (text only)
  • The warning text shown in the "Review your question" sidebar, regex-based.
  • Tag-related error messages, regex-based.

These can only be edited by staff, so the process to get them live is:

  • Create a Meta post on the appropriate Meta site, and discuss it with your community.
  • Once a consensus is reached, a mod should escalate it to the CM team. Generally speaking, the "contact us" form is the best way to go, though a ping in chat can sometimes work too (the most that could happen is we ask you to use the form).
  • Unless there are any outstanding issues, the CMs should be able to get to it Soon™.

I did not find any discussion here of the 'ask' page, so may we start a discussion?

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  • You need to include the specific buts here that can be customized for sanity sake, because that way we have references to specific bits here too (for those who don't want to read the entire Meta post)
    – Thomas Ward Mod
    Commented Mar 3, 2020 at 21:56
  • NOTE: This contains some modifications from the original post for brevity sake and simplicity sake.
    – Thomas Ward Mod
    Commented Mar 3, 2020 at 21:59

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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Suggestion 001:

Which version of Linux have you installed (Ubuntu server, Ubuntu desktop, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, Xubuntu, Ubuntu MATE, et al.), and which release number? Please click [edit] and add that vital information to your question so all the facts we need are in the question. Please do not use Add Comment.

Why?

The enumeration of Ubuntu flavours is there to encourage folks who are not running any supported Ubuntu to provide the name of whatever distro they are running, so we may (gently) redirect them to where their question should be posted.

The question regarding version number is so we can redirect (again, gently) folks who have unsupported Ubuntu distros to the appropriate site.

I've been using this for about a month and it sure has turned up a lot of Mint, Kali, ElementaryOS, and other distros.

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Regarding "The full contents of the "Draft your question" sidebar."

It would make sense for this to contain links to help/on-topic, the tour, how to ask and perhaps even some helpful meta posts like this style guide, it may even be a good idea to have a list of supported releases on the page too.

Before you ask, to make sure you get the best help we can give you, please take the time to review help/on-topic, how to ask and take the tour

Please include the following information in your question: Your distribution, your Ubuntu version (ie 16.04) and any error messages as text (please avoid screenshots of errors, where possible).

Supported Distributions:

  • Ubuntu
  • Ubuntu Budgie
  • Ubuntu MATE
  • Kubuntu
  • Ubuntu Kylin
  • Lubuntu
  • Ubuntu Studio
  • Xubuntu

For questions about other distributions, please ask at Unix and Linux.

To me this seems like a good way to get all the information users should really know before asking out there.

This is a bit rough but I think it goes in the right direction of showing people how to ask a good question.

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  • Graf 1: Lovely idea. The rest of it? Folks with Kali, Mint, et al, will respond with whatever they think will get us to answer their question, and I've seen that many times where folks will think "oh, it's all the same', when, no, it isn't. Ask them cold what they have, and the rate of correct responses is higher than trying to divert them.
    – K7AAY
    Commented May 15, 2020 at 17:32

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