Letting users find the answers

It's frowned upon, as you have found out, to tell people to mark posts answered or helpful. Many people do this to troll for points, something which is forbidden by the terms of the Communities. As the Terms of Use say:

If you feel the system is not clear to users, please provide feedback to Apple; do not instruct other users unless they ask.

I understand your point, but I'd suggest you just say nothing about such matters in any thread in which you have replied. Otherwise you run the risk of the Hosts taking you to task again.

Regards.

It used to be that people would do this. I guess it was helpful to some people, but wasn't to most. A rule against this was added to the TOS, so you don't see these posts.

Robert

DOGG --

One way to do it, is to respond in the thread --

So glad you found your answer here . . .

Or,

Looks like John's post really helped!

So anyone reading the post will at least have a hint.

The only problem is that it won't have the green check mark indicating solved.

We feel your pain.

Try not to take it personally. Most of us have had a few of those emails.

I just wish there was a way to have Apple let users know that marking their question as answered might help other users to fix their problems.

Yu just did, Dogg . . .

Everyone who reads this thread, will get your point.

It's important to award points whenever appropriate. It will save others lots of time searching for correct answers.

What Dave said, D0GG.

If you feel the system is not clear to users, please provide feedback to Apple; do not instruct other users unless they ask.

So, if you feel it is not clear, use the "Report abuse " link and tell Apple. It's another way of providing feedback to Apple. (To be clear, I don't do this because it doesn't bother me a whole lot when people don't mark posts as Helpful or Correct Answer; but if it bothers you — and it obviously does — you could do this.)

I just wish there was a way to have Apple let users know that marking their question as answered might help other users to fix their problems.

Well, since the search function here seems to have gone from not-so-good to even more not-so-good-at-all, I'd say most people probably wouldn't be able to find them anyway. It still surprises me when I actually fall for one of the "more like it" column on the right and the post turns out to be from 2005 for a PPC...

And, I actually think the new way the possibilities of marking answers are displayed is "enticing" people to mark more answers; however, it has also resulted in the somewhat humorous result of people marking their own answer which says only "thanks, that worked" as the correct answer....

Personally, I only use the report feature if there really is a violation of the ToU because I feel the hosts are busy enough as it is, so I try to only add important issues to their workload.

Hi,

I know of at least one occasion when a Host marked a post in a thread of mine as the Correct Answer.

As I knew I had not marked the thread in any way I asked what was going on.

A Host admitted that there was facility to mark a Post as the "Correct Answer".
This was during the test period of the new /current Forum Software.

I also don't know if points are awarded.

They did not say when it would be used.

I can imagine some occasions when it might be used:-

1) Very long threads that does have the correct info in there.
2) Short but archived threads that also have the "Correct Answer".

Although the "Report Abuse" (Very silly, uninformative title) area could be used I doubt that the Hosts would follow up on this if it were used.

Asking the Hosts to post the Instructions to mark posts and have points awarded as a consequence is also likely to be viewed and Trolling for points.

The more it gets asked about and the more people post on it the more people will read one of the threads and a consensus on the use of Points will eventually emerge.

This is of course a long game in the scheme of things.

You either need to understand and move on or have a plan about where and when you keep the message going.

9:42 PM Thursday; June 16, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.7)
 Mac OS X (10.6.7),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Hi babowa,

And, I actually think the new way the possibilities of marking answers are displayed is "enticing" people to mark more answers; however, it has also resulted in the somewhat humorous result of people marking their own answer which says only "thanks, that worked" as the correct answer....

I had one like that in iChat the other day.
The original Poster had marked the Thread that did help them as Helpful and replied with just "k" and then marked that post as Correct.

Someone else then replied with just "k" again and then posted again asking how they got points.

I did take the time to explain that only the Original Poster can award "Helpfuls"and "Corrects" and that it was the post that was marked and in this case "k" iself was not the actual answer.

<
9:47 PM Thursday; June 16, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.7)
 Mac OS X (10.6.7),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Hi Ralph,

so what on earth is "k" ??? Is that texting for ????

"OK," I believe.

I hope you're not serious! Sheesh - even two letters is now too much? 😮

As ~Bee says, I took it to mean an abbreviation of OK.

Using just the letter k in the Apple Communities Search and then limiting it to iChat I found the thread.

As you can see it is seen quite a lot over there.

7:15 PM Friday; June 17, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.7)
 Mac OS X (10.6.7),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

As someone who has studied this and several others languages in depth I find it distasteful at best to have a(ny) language butchered to such an extent. Probably a good thing I don't visit that forum...... 😉

'K

Your choice

😉

9:49 PM Friday; June 17, 2011

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.7)
 Mac OS X (10.6.7),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously