General > General Technical Chat
Designated "Expert" Forum Users?
Siwastaja:
--- Quote from: MK14 on February 16, 2022, 02:24:28 am ---But beginners don't need help from just extreme experts. Many people can help them. Typically their questions are actually rather simple
--- End quote ---
No no no! This sounds very agreeable and logical, but actually you are wrong!
Fundamental beginner questions require pretty high level of expertise to answer. Teaching is difficult.
This is also why I have been hired, year after year, as an outside helper, on a university class where we build and measure buck converters. There are no experienced enough, free, available resources inside! Even though everyone is a total beginner, constructing their first DC/DC converter ever and driving the gate with an FG, they will, in this simple exercise, face all interesting details like gate charge plateau, low-frequency sinusoidal oscillation in DCM when the SW goes hi-Z, slowly drifting spikes on their scope screens coupled from their neighbors, etc., etc. The teacher can't say "I don't know what this is".
I can totally see in the beginner section the problem caused by total crap answers by well-meaning people, who were just beginners themselves but think they are now on a bit higher beginner level and can start helping others. Or even true professionals who think helping beginners is so trivial they don't need to spend any effort on it.
One professor I kinda respect did say it well, the difference between average professor and a world-class expert is, the expert actually knows the 101 basics of their field. Well enough to be able to teach it!
Besides, beginner questions can be extremely difficult because they haven't learned the abstractions yet. They may ask "what is voltage on a physical level" or "how a transistor works". Things like that, most "practical engineers" struggle with.
tggzzz:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on February 16, 2022, 06:39:04 am ---
--- Quote from: rstofer on February 15, 2022, 09:46:38 pm ---FWIW, I don't like either of the Stack (Overflow or Exchange) sites I have run across. The 'leaders' are rude and condescending, something that doesn't happen around here very often. One thing I see over and over on the Stack... sites: "This question has been answered!" Of course it was 5 years ago and doesn't show up in a search because, well, search terms don't quite match. I don't waste my time on either site.
The nice thing about eevBlog is that the threads tend to wander around a bit before coalescing.
--- End quote ---
These sites are fundamentally different. Stack Overflow/Exchange are question-answer services run by peers. EEVBlog forum is a discussion forum. It's a nice, even desirable side effect if the OP gets a straight answer to their exact question, but it's not the primary point.
For the same reason, it's OK to post about something even if something very similar was discussed 2 years ago. We get totally different viewpoints as time goes by.
--- End quote ---
All those points should be written large, and not forgotten!
Stack exchange is OK-ish to get an answer to "which button do I press to cause the floggle to trepusculate?" type questions, where little understanding is required.
This site is popular because people can have a to-and-fro discussion about subtle topics where there are different equally valid opinions. That helps people to work out the right question to ask - which is much more difficult than simply answering it.
MK14:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on February 16, 2022, 06:50:31 am ---
--- Quote from: MK14 on February 16, 2022, 02:24:28 am ---But beginners don't need help from just extreme experts. Many people can help them. Typically their questions are actually rather simple
--- End quote ---
No no no! This sounds very agreeable and logical, but actually you are wrong!
Fundamental beginner questions require pretty high level of expertise to answer. Teaching is difficult.
This is also why I have been hired, year after year, as an outside helper, on a university class where we build and measure buck converters.
--- End quote ---
I agree, what I wrote there was, at least partially wrong. I had noticed an issue, when I read it back, but (incorrectly) thought it covered the wrong aspect, but it didn't adequately do that.
I wanted to rewrite it, to be something like:
"Most of the time (90%), an expert in the applicable field, is NOT needed to answer the question".
But there are still two major issues outstanding, even with the corrected version.
Firstly, a beginner, can't tell when it is the 10% of the time, when a real expert is needed. Causing practical difficulties.
Secondly, if the beginner has done a really, really good job of researching the answer themselves. E.g. They triple checked the wiring for mistakes. They tried swapping some things. They did some initial googling for an answer. Etc.
They can potentially increase the need for a true expert, to perhaps 80% or 90% of the time.
The percentages I have stated, are extremely rough estimates, and I have no problem, with them being, even wildly wrong.
In summary, I agree with you. A number of issues a beginner has, may indeed need a real expert. It wouldn't be obvious at all to the beginner, when it is a simple/quick question for anyone, including people with partial electronics knowledge/experience, and when it really needs an advanced specialist in the appropriate field(s).
If/when someone reaches a very high expert/experience level in a particular field. They sometimes comment on how extremely frightening it is, with how many things are just NOT known, at the current time. E.g. Although there are solutions to many illnesses, with medicine X, being well known to usually fully treat illness Y. It is only when one learns extensively about illness Y, that it turns out, very little is actually known as to what really causes illness Y, why it causes the symptoms it does and how to properly fix illness Y, or even how/why medicine X actually works.
Fortunately, much of electronics is understood. Yet if you go into extreme detail with the Physics, of what is really going on. It can move into areas of Physics, that don't really know why or how, the (e.g. Quantum) stuff actually works.
ogden:
How about showing number of unique users who "thanked", in particular topic.
emece67:
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