Why are there duplicate posts in MATLAB Answers?

Sometimes, identicaly or very similar posts appear in MATLAB Answers from the same user. I would like know why. Is there something in the usability of submitting questions that makes you doubt it has been submitted correctly?

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

For reasons I have not yet pinned down, my access from home can be very slow, sometimes having to wait more than 5 minutes for a question to be retrieved. It is quite variable, but does go in clumps, in the sense that when it is happening the majority of accesses will be slow. This does not appear to happen from home. (We tracked an earlier occurrence of this to my having a NoScript update pending for TenFourFox, but that doesn't explain the many cases I have seen since.)

When access is that slow, it is not always clear that my submissions have been noticed, so I may end up clicking the submit multiple times. In my cases because I Answer or Comment far far more often than I ask questions, I do not get duplicate Questions, but I could imagine that others might. The problem is not, by the way, as simple as it accepting the data and acting on it quickly but then being slow to give me the updated page: if I interrupt I sometimes end up with a partial response stored. I have learned to Copy my response before interrupting.

Thus there is at least one system-level problem or incompatibility -- but I still have a heck of a time educating people to go back and edit a previous Question instead of posting a new one. Sometimes even deleting a duplicate and sending the person email only results in the person posting the same thing again. Even when I mention about the duplication of effort and about the extra cleanup involved, I get answers along the line of "Yes, but I wasn't getting an answer there."

Is there a solution? Probably not. I've seen people nudge a topic after only 4 minutes because they hadn't received an answer yet.

Long term... there may have to be a deflation of expectations. A pop-up along the line of reminding people that questions are answered by volunteers and the wait may be minutes to months... perhaps offering a list of alternatives (e.g., tech support, consulting).

[Image Analyst]

The weird thing is, if you apply a "tag" to a post in the Mathworks newsreader, the new tag will show up right away in the list, but if you add a reply, it won't (takes about 5 minutes). Quirky.

[Walter Roberson]

I don't know anything about that; I do not use the Mathworks Newsreader unless the newsreader on my own server is broken.

Answer 2

[Paulo Silva]

From my experience the system works well, it's not easy to submit duplicates.

Now why do we see duplicates, good question, I guess that people are stressed because their homework/project deadline is near.

[Arnaud Miege]

That's my opinion too. People probably think by that by reposting their question, they may get a better chance of getting it answered.

[Andreas Goser]

Thanks. I am actually happy if this is a human error :-) And I like to make sure the tools are not introducing the issues.

Answer 3

[Image Analyst]

Sometimes they've made slight edits - added something. With the newsgroup you were stuck - your only chance was to reply to your first post. Maybe with answers they don't know that they have the opportunity to edit their prior posts.

With the newsgroup, where there are many more duplicates, I know why (because posters have said why). In most cases they're using the Mathworks newsreader. When you hit submit there, it gives you back the list of topics but yours is not on there. So the user thinks it didn't work and they post again. With Google, your message appears almost instantly while with the Mathworks it takes about 5 minutes. I don't know why they can't update their newsgroup database, particularly when the post was made from the Mathworks. With Answers, the updates are instant, but not with the newsreader.

Answer 4

[Fangjun Jiang]

There are a few times that the web browser didn't refresh soon enough when I add an answer or comment. It makes me doubt whether I clicked the submit button. So I clicked again. This will cause duplicated entries. Of course, I usually check back so I will delete the duplicated entry. Sometimes I think some users may forget to check it.

Answer 5

[Fangjun Jiang]

For similar questions, I can't emphasize enough the need to improve the search capability of this site. I saw questions that I know there were similar ones before but even I can't find it with multiple tries of different key words.