Jonas This is probably more relevant in the specific code forums but I was wondering if it might be a good idea to have user ratings as with a lot of other forums as there are a fair few people who like to post really really bad advice and clearly don't know what they are talking about but still insist on answering questions. If users and their advice could be rated then those asking the questions will have a better idea of the usefulness of the answer.

Just a thought, any idea if it is possible?

I believe that the more advice that is given, the more of an informed decision can be made. If someone posts advice that is clearly bad then this will be outweighed by good advice.

The way to rate advice is very subjective. A user may have had a bad experience with a code/vendor/model/application that goes against the general consensus but this still provides valuable advice, if even only how not to approach the problem.

What has disappointed me is, firstly, the number of sarcastic comments/remarks I have read. I do not see the need for this, especially when in response to a genuine query. Secondly, the number of questions I have seen from people who have blatantly made no effort to do any background research themselves.

But, overall I have found the website and forum extremely useful and would not have been able to make certain decisions without the advice I have received. I have only been using the forum for a few weeks but have found that if I post a specific question, having done the background research already, the quality of reply is very high and has so far proved extremely useful.

A fact based rating system may be worthwhile, i.e. number of posts etc., but just because a user has posted the most replies does not mean they are correct in their opinions.

I like the voting system in place at www.eng-tips.com

I find those rankings irrelevant to mildly useful. They could be either based on how long you've been participating (which says nothing about quality) and/or what other people think about you (which says little to nothing about quality, since you don't know the quality of the votes). I think putting a voting system in place will create an extra load of fun for the administrator, but do little beyond that.

Instead I suggest we continue to give users some credit for their own abilities to judge and perform their own censoring. If Ben can tell "useful" from "useless", so can the rest of us.

The reason we don't have any author rating system is that we are still keeping the forums open and people dont have to register and enter a password to post questions. As long as we can avoid having a closed forum for only registered members I think that that is more important.

With registered users we could run a rating system. However, I must admit that I rarely use similar rating systems on other forum sites. What I might like is a rating system to put the most highly rated discussions at the top of the forum list. The disadvantage with that is that it becomes a bit difficult to know which thread you have read when you visited the forum last time. With a forum ordered in time you always know approximately where you started reading last time.

i think the rating authers is not good, however, there could be something called - 'recommended for reading', where someone thinks that this post was useful enough that others can also read it. (provides something insightful). (more people recommend it up it goes on forum). So for this you might have to create another view where people can read the most recommended posts. (authers will automatically sorted out this way eventually).

I have been planning for a long time to create a new front-page for CFD Online. It should be more like a newspaper front. One section should list the most interesting forum topics lately. The selection of topics to display could be either set by some form of public vote or it could be a few selected users who can list discussions they like. I'm not sure what is best. It would probably work well to have a staff of dedicated forum readers that help with this, but I'm hestitant if people are dedicated enough to to this work for free. A public system would be more self-going, but might require some form of registration process to avoid spamming from people who want to promote their special discussion, or the question they need help with.