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I run a large discord. I am in several large discords. I do not know anyone proposing replacing a traditional FAQ with discord. If anything, I would argue disc

I run a large discord. I am in several large discords. I do not know anyone proposing replacing a traditional FAQ with discord. If anything, I would argue discord tends to improve website-based documentation because people ask the same question over and over again, leading to a need for a quick way to link the answer. Who do you think is replacing FAQ's with Discord?

iforgotpassword 2y ago
I don't want to throw dirt at the project in question, but I signed up specifically to ask a question regarding a configuration problem, and the reply was "search for <specific term> in the channel." like they apparently already had enough people ask the question that they immediately knew how to find the relevant discussion containing a solution. Versus in the old days, asking on irc and getting a link to a forum thread, or even better, finding the thread on Google. I don't know how much of an outlier this is, as said, I didn't ever use it again and that was at least two years ago. But at least here on hn I've read similar stories.
- aaravchen 2y ago
  That is the exact reason Discord isn't sufficient. I've had to support enough projects as a maintainer to know that you will always get hammered with the stupidest questions and the same questions all the time. The less you have to repeat yourself the better, and Discord, or any chat application, ensures you have to repeat yourself as much as possible. There's virtually no way to retroactively follow the stream-of-consciousness that is a chat-style discussion with no single topic instead of the post-style single-topic threaded discussion. I have seen exactly 1 project ever have a solution to this, and ironically it was actually on Discord. Of all the many many chat applications out there, Discord seems to have the most flexible admin control of retroactive chat organisation, and 1 huge development community I'm in has actually proactively created threads when a reoccurring topic comes up again and then moved them to a common FAQ channel.
politelemon 2y ago
I've seen it on numerous game, book, and software related discords. Your experience is alien to mine.
AlienRobot 2y ago
The forum threads ARE the FAQs. When enough people make the same thread to ask the same question, that is a frequently-asked question.
aaravchen 2y ago
I'm guessing you don't interact with the development community very much then? Almost every open source project I encounter at least has a Discord server, it's the new easier and more accessible version of "find me on IRC", but most that are less than 10 years old that I've encountered also don't have a forum and direct you to the Discord for even the most basic info. In fact I've had multiple popular GitHub repos that directed me in an Issue I was offering to file a PR for to go check Discord for an explanation of how the project was even used.

iforgotpassword 2y ago

I don't want to throw dirt at the project in question, but I signed up specifically to ask a question regarding a configuration problem, and the reply was "search for <specific term> in the channel." like they apparently already had enough people ask the question that they immediately knew how to find the relevant discussion containing a solution. Versus in the old days, asking on irc and getting a link to a forum thread, or even better, finding the thread on Google. I don't know how much of an outlier this is, as said, I didn't ever use it again and that was at least two years ago. But at least here on hn I've read similar stories.

aaravchen 2y ago
That is the exact reason Discord isn't sufficient. I've had to support enough projects as a maintainer to know that you will always get hammered with the stupidest questions and the same questions all the time. The less you have to repeat yourself the better, and Discord, or any chat application, ensures you have to repeat yourself as much as possible. There's virtually no way to retroactively follow the stream-of-consciousness that is a chat-style discussion with no single topic instead of the post-style single-topic threaded discussion. I have seen exactly 1 project ever have a solution to this, and ironically it was actually on Discord. Of all the many many chat applications out there, Discord seems to have the most flexible admin control of retroactive chat organisation, and 1 huge development community I'm in has actually proactively created threads when a reoccurring topic comes up again and then moved them to a common FAQ channel.

politelemon 2y ago

I've seen it on numerous game, book, and software related discords. Your experience is alien to mine.

AlienRobot 2y ago

The forum threads ARE the FAQs. When enough people make the same thread to ask the same question, that is a frequently-asked question.

aaravchen 2y ago

I'm guessing you don't interact with the development community very much then? Almost every open source project I encounter at least has a Discord server, it's the new easier and more accessible version of "find me on IRC", but most that are less than 10 years old that I've encountered also don't have a forum and direct you to the Discord for even the most basic info. In fact I've had multiple popular GitHub repos that directed me in an Issue I was offering to file a PR for to go check Discord for an explanation of how the project was even used.