Edit 2: After all, it turns out Unity agrees, they have started a community team! More details from Unity Staff later in the thread.
Edit: Let me reiterate this suggestion. I see some questions going unanswered on the forum, a dedicated full time or part time team to answer these questions could potentially help the community.
In my personal experience I see some users complaining that the forums are inactive, “dead”, etc. I think it would be really great if Unity hired a small team of Unity veterans, full time or part time who are dedicated to being very active on the forums! One of the biggest things Unity has going for it over other engines is all resources and help online, I would hate to see this advantage be minimized over time.
Such a small cost in the big picture for Unity could greatly improve the experience of using the forums.
I think this could be a great way to help keep new & old users!
Jokes aside, I see you all have a very high number of posts, so I am sorry if this was taken personally, that wasn’t the intent of course.
To answer your questions; In my circles and browsing the forums I have seen such comments relatively frequently, while normally not using those exact words but insinuating something similar, generally out of frustration for an unanswered question.
If I wasn’t clear, I do not share this opinion, I think the forums are active enough considering the user base.
With that said, it is true the forums are filled with thousands of questions that seem trivial to more active/experienced users, therefore they go unanswered.
Thus I think it would be beneficial for Unity to have a small team which gets around to answering all these questions on the forums, as trivial, silly, or lazy as they may seem to a more experienced user.
Anyway, not much else to discuss, just a suggestion which I think could only benefit the community.
But when I see discord servers with tons of members, they seem.dead too.
Like, you have little hen pecks here and there. Somebody regularly post memes. One person will offer short answers to big questions. A few boring jokes here and there. That’s it.
Some discords centered around 3d learning are more active. But it really makes no sense why the owners of these would want to maintain them. Answering same questions a thousand times because there is no search history.
I have no idea why people prefer live chat. It does not feel more human. It has less practical benefit overall.
I think maybe people is afraid to be seen in public for long time or slmething? I dunno. General sense I get from most 3d and game dev circles is severe, crushing insecurity. More people should speak up and be themselves. You supposed to be creative and all. If somebody don’t like your opinions shame on them for being so sensitive.
Real serious types probably have their own selective circles they operate in. Personally I like the public. The more that is discussed in public, the better. In smaller group maybe individual feels more respected or important. Or maybe they feel like they don’t have to put up with peons who might otherwise bug them. Still, I think public forum is best. You can simply ignore anybody you feel beneath your intellect, so I see no need for concrete filters.
Benefit of public space is one good idea shared can reach maximum number of people. Also, you get biggest pool of input from diverse audience. If you think a complete noob might not have something to teach you, I think you got wrong attitude. If you afraid to jump into fray and show people who you is, well just what kind of creative do you hope to be? A lame one if you ask me. I got no respect for the lurkers! Yeah, you! Speak up you spineless worm!
@o1o101 I am curious as others, which post indicates that forum is dead? Is this forum? Or third party?
As already mentioned, you may be confusing with Unity Answers.
Either way, if yo look into new posts and flip through past few pages, you will see, most of questions are answered / responded fairly quick. Including yours. https://forum.unity.com/find-new/115249052/posts
People can deduct valid questions. And discard called “lazy” posts. In fact, many such post are responded, with some request for more information. Unless thread is at level of ridiculousness.
Also, there are questions, which basically have not easy answer.
Or are posted in wrong forum section, so they are forgotten. No reason to bring them alive.
Responding to every single question is neither good.
Often more generic questions been already answered and can be very easy searched, by multiple means.
That also potentially lure trolls and spambots.
And finally, no matter team size, unless all Unity team, but with few members, is still impossible to answer all questions. No way to be expert in every field. Algorithms, network, shaders, rendering, meshes, animations, lights, marketing; just to touch few.
Live chat could be interesting solution, Unity has their new “https://livehelp.unity.com/” which is something similar but I don’t think it has caught on, or maybe its still in early stages of development.
Is pointless in any form of development and unproductive.
Information is simply getting lost. And chatting cost tons of valuable time either party.
Leading to questioning and answering same over and over.
Without that, we already have on forum recurring repeating question, by new users. But probably by miles less, than chatting.
On other hand, how many would you be able assist by chatting?
1, 2, 3 at the time? You know, that one question leads to another and another …
Then realizing, you spend with someone on the project few hours.
And what about others chat users?
Tomorrow you will have person with same question anyway.
Ok, check forum, that would be the answer.
At best, I would create chatbot assistant, which redirects to relevant forum section / thread.
I think would be best resolution.
I think real issue isn’t the platform but rather change in collective psyche. Insecure and selfish is what social media environment shapes. Public forum is all about the opposite. (Even a disconnected internet forum).
I know there is senior leaders in industry afraid to let their real name ever come out on public forum. And all they do is provide answers to technical questions. Indicative of toxic environment looks like to me. Nobody should be afraid to have a personality, granted you aren’t a straight up Nazi. It’s 2019 and humans build our own environments now. A real shame that people anywhere are too afraid of social pressure to put their name on their own words.
Game developers need to strive to find kinship and community, embolden others to be themselves, embrace difference of opinions, and destroy insecurity wherever they find it. End result is gonna be happier workplace and way more substantial games.
I have a rather high number of posts for the time i’m here, most of them are for like you said, trivial things like missing references ( besides this one, i swear. lol ), floating point errors, code tags and alike.
I actually stopped answering this questions unless the problem is actually unique.
It can be probably be solved by a quick search though the forums (and stackoverflow).
Unity should just make some kind of FAQ.
But if you’re down with paying me for my time in the forums - I’m game. just saying. (;
I just answered this. Are you expecting me to compile a list for you? I am not here to argue whether you think these opinions exist or not, if you want to believe they do not, then nothing needs to be said.
This is a contradiction, and you just explained to yourself exactly why something like live chat could be a solution for such questions in some cases.
If it was pointless Unity would not be investing in such systems.
The particulars of how a live chat system would function efficiently, is not my concern, nor do I care to discuss because I am uninformed on the subject.
Support for any product or service can be similar to this, a beginner user may not be as familiar as you with forums, terminology and search techniques to find such answers.
While not the greatest comparison, when a 75 year old women calls her internet provider, she probably has some very trivial questions, and just because they are silly to you, doesn’t mean she would not like for them to be answered. Unity is providing services after all.
Lastly I am not advocating for a live chat, nor do I think Unity is obligated to answer every single question but I think it could potentially be helpful if executed correctly.
It is always great having people answer these questions, I am sure the people on the receiving end appreciate it greatly.
Of course it gets repetitive, I understand why you would stop answering such questions, which is why I think it could be interesting to see Unity take a part in this some how.
You literally didn’t. You made vague gestures towards unanswered beginner questions, but most of the beginner questions that go unanswered have been answered by the people you claim don’t exist, repeatedly, in other threads.
Generally, it is not because “the forums are dead” but “nobody wants to answer a question that has been solved dozens of times before and can be easily googled.” At some point you have to understand that the labour cost isn’t worth it.
This problem has persisted to the point where, several years ago, a thread was started outlining how to ask a good question, because many of the things asked are in threads titled things like “BUG!!!” with a body of “my cube won’t rotate.”
There is a point where some responsibility falls on the person asking the question.
With all respect, but you can not just pull two random statements out of context and make it one. You can not state is “contradiction”, if you don’t understand process behind community system mechanics and whats involves. My two quotation pointed earlier, are discussing separate community systems.
Answers is pretty much not maintained and a mess.
Discord is self contained very cheap option, with relatively little moderation required. But try finding information there and following discussion chain …
Forum runs also, mainly propelled by community and active eye of moderation. Here is main value of content.
Plus blogs, and content on 3rd party forums and websites.
We as developers, or related professions, are not some random 75 yld. We are expected to be at least minimum technically oriented, which is able to autonomously search for information. This is greatest thing you can teach anyone. I call it, give fishing rod, rather a fish. Specially, most of information are already there.
If individual has unique question, on chat one to one, person is not contributing to the community. Information is locked. That is not good approach.
Not really. But yes please, examples can be informative, because for me, is just your own impression, rather general public view. Which is fine. However, if you can point at case as you state in following quotation, because I, or others may not be aware. That would be more into contribution, rather than ranting, which normally lead to thread closure.
