Apple recommended

Somebody from behind the scenes on the hosts side browses posts that have not been marked as solved and reviews answers to see if they contribute what is likely to be the solution. Many users do not mark posts even when they solve a problem and this helps other users find solutions that may not stand out otherwise. Not that I know anything about it other than by observation. I don't know you can call them an expert, no more than any of us are experts. I would say in 95% of the cases they seem to indicate correctly though I have seen a few cases where it was not necessarily what I would have chosen, and in 1% of the cases what was very likely not the real solution if you really read the details of every single post in the topic.

Some of them that I've received have been along the line of me posting a link that contains the solution, even if the OP never comes back to say 'yeah, solved it'.

And, as stated, since it's called Apple Recommends, someone employed by Apple reads over and basically says 'yeah, this is ok'.

This is the "announcement" that was pinned to the top of ASC pages for a while > Introducing Apple Recommends, Manage Subscriptions, and This Helped Me

There it is. I was looking for it and couldn't find it.

Thanks 🙂

Goggle (I had to!) > [ "apple recommends" site:discussions.apple.com ] quotes, no brackets = top result!

The Community Specialists (the same forum staff members that you may see replying to other posters' questions) are the ones who mark posts as Apple Recommends.

I, too, think it would be nice for a distinction between Solved and Recommended in the content view, and I think this has been brought up before. Maybe they could use a green Apple logo or something for Apple Recommended, and then the bubble with the check mark can be for Solved.

And just a note. The hosts are not volunteers, they are Apple employees. This site is a user to user forum, but it it hosted by Apple.

Cheers,

GB

To add a little more confusion clarity to this discussion, there can be up to 3 recommends in any one given post and they can come into play on a discussion that is quite old. I received an Apple recommends on this one just about 30 minutes ago.

Re: Can receive emails but can't send any

So it would be useful if only the OP could mark the question solved.

I think that would result in more solutions not being marked correctly than recommended posts not being solutions. It used to be that way but as a frequent poster I can say it was getting very frustrating to post maybe 50 times per day with what was probably at least 66% of those being de-facto solutions and getting 20 points at the end of the day. Maybe it isn't as bad in some of the "pro" fora or fora where savvy users ask questions, but in certain fora where people ask questions such as how do they turn on their iPhone you don't see many users getting to the tech level of expertise required to mark a post. 🙂

Yes, you see boilerplate responses but that does not necessarily mean they are not solutions. You also see many cases where the OP has apparently abandoned a topic and not responded if the problem was solved. What is likely to be the solution is there but you never hear from the OP again. I know on the occasions when I am looking for a solution I tend to first read topics marked as solved so having abandoned ones with solutions marked as such is helpful. Again, many, many users do not mark posts. Unfortunately "helpful" does not have an icon when browsing a forum line and many users will only mark a solution as "helpful" so again those go missing when specifically looking for solved topics.

Then there's the solutions an OP doesn't like. Many people do not like "No, can't do that," as the answer to their question even if it happens to be correct. Kind of along these lines are solutions that the OP might not like but somebody else may. I tend to provide "teach a person to fish" answers and others may provide a "click here" link answer. Both have the solution and if marking solutions is the point of Apple Recommends then the OP's personal preference for response style is unfair to others.

distinctions like these?

Limnos wrote:

Yes, you see boilerplate responses but that does not necessarily mean they are not solutions.

I can tell you that as i have learnt sometimes through the back and forth - where some of the knowledge gaps are - I tend to incorporate them into my answers upfront so as to give the OP the better chance of solving his/her issue without having to come back and post another question that may get buried in the other content i have replied to

As I mentioned to CCC - I have OneNote running on the backend where some of the boilerplate answers that Limnos refers to are written out 🙂

Limnos wrote:

Yes, you see boilerplate responses but that does not necessarily mean they are not solutions.

Not necessarily, but sometimes. Depends on the boilerplate. 😉

I think that the view within threads is fine as is, because it already clearly says "recommended," but in a forum, the content or activity views, the green checkmark is used to indicate both recommended posts and solve posts, which is confusing. I think something like in your second screenshot would be helpful there.

Agree - mostly - if it was "clearly different" as I illustrated, it would be mo' betta IMHO.

A plain grey Apple logo? With an "R" in the middle? Icons are a tough design row to hoe, particularly when they get "small"

A green balloon with a white Apple logo in the center?

Apple doesn't do as much graphic design work as they used to. San Francisco was their first font in 20 years!

I'm not holding my breath