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12:53 AM
🚽
 
 
3 hours later…
3:54 AM
 
 
2 hours later…
6:15 AM
What's bad?
!!/admin
 
@QueenieGoldstein No such command 'admin'.
 
!!/help
 
@QueenieGoldstein I'm SmokeDetector, a bot that detects spam and offensive posts on the network and posts alerts to chat. A command list is available here.
 
!!/whois admin
 
@QueenieGoldstein I am aware of 8 admins. Currently in this room: ArtOfCode. Not currently in this room: tripleee, Makyen, Andy, Undo, Thomas Ward, thesecretmaster, angussidney.
 
6:17 AM
@ArtOfCode what's wrong with the "colleges in India" keyword?
 
foo in (India|<city in India>) is always invariably spam. This is a question that doesn't reference a specific product and it's asked on the correct site, but still likely was posted merely to elicit illicit responses.
 
invariably spam means? Does it consider it like "Autocorrect">
@JohnDvorak Yes, the flag is okay, but the reason bad-keyword seemed wrong
 
why?
 
why?
why on what?
 
Why did it seem wrong?
 
6:25 AM
Because i dont understand the reason for marking it as spam...Will any post mentioning India(or any other country) trigger the warning?
 
I'm not sure what the specific trigger is, but we have triggers with much lower true positive rate and they're still useful.
There have been exactly 204 posts containing "India" and caught for bad keyword in the body that turned out to be false positives, and 699 true positives.
Specific cities are (TP/FP): Hyderabad gets 136/12, Pune gets 110/12, Bangalore gets 170/15
Of the 15, only one got autoflags - and it was deleted as spam anyways.
 
6:56 AM
Network-wide spam account, so far 2 spam posts on SO at least.
@QueenieGoldstein There are some filters in place that trigger on certain regions, yes.
The site has been 'attacked' in the past (and quite recently) by spammers from colleges in India, enough to put it on the list of bad keywords.
RCMB in particular.
The flagged post has some similarities to something we removed on MSE lately (10k+ reputation on MSE required).
 
7:11 AM
Hmm I see...thanks for the data and explanation
Also, I Can't see the MSE flagged post yet
 
7:46 AM
5 messages moved to Chimney
 
 
5 hours later…
12:24 PM
13 messages moved to Chimney
 
12:46 PM
-_-
autoflagged
 
@QueenieGoldstein While that does use link shorteners, is that spam?
 
The last one used bit.ly as well
and it marked as spam
 
Yes, and it was actually marked as a false positive by other Charcoal members (I'm one of the ones who fp'd it :D). Nobody flagged it, nor was it autoflagged.
 
So bit.ly is allowed on SE?
 
Opening up the metasmoke report on it, just to the right of the title, there are some X's there. Those are indicators that this particular report had gotten some "false positive" feedback.
 
12:49 PM
It;s banned in my country
 
Metasmoke is banned in your country?
 
Ah. Well, that doesn't make it inherently spam. That just means your country doesn't like that particular link shortener ;D
Ideally... users on Stack Exchange shouldn't post their links shortened. But that doesn't make it spam, which is what Smokey tries to fight.
 
@Spevacus and the ads it shows ;)
 
Heh, I'll agree... the ads they show are pretty horrible.
 
12:52 PM
Ohh so the reason for flagging the answer and not the post maybe that it was written as

<link>
<link>

AND the other as

<link><link>
which doesnt make sense lol
 
It is strange that Smokey doesn't care about the post you scanned, but does care about the one that was reported that does have a bit.ly link.
But, it's not the worst thing. Neither are spam, so I'm not worried.
 
can it scan comments too?
 
Nope. Most (almost all?) spam comes in the form of questions and answers. That's all Smokey's designed to scan.
Also, not every post it sends to chat is autoflagged. Reports that have more than ~200ish weight are the ones that Smokey's pretty confident are spam, and those are the ones it autoflags.
Smokey aims to report as many things it think might be spam as possible. The philosophy is... Smokey wants to report anything that might be spam so it doesn't miss ANY spam, but only wants to autoflag posts that it's absolutely sure are spam.
 
hmmm I see, nice work out there
 
1:19 PM
Teresa Dietrich on September 23, 2020
A seasoned director shares her process for selecting who to hire, and offers insight on how developers can position themselves for success.
 
1:34 PM
@QueenieGoldstein answer by Jeff 10 years ago still applies.
40
A: Ban URL shortening services

Jeff AtwoodTo me, this is the same as trying to ban curse words -- it's a fundamentally broken and bad idea. http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2008/10/obscenity-filters-bad-idea-or-incredibly-intercoursing-bad-idea.html For every one we detect (even if we do an INSANELY EXPENSIVE HTTP REQUEST on every unkn...

We can't auto block them, but they're indeed discouraged over SE, as far as I can tell.
Not as far as spam flags, but editing the post to put the actual URL? Yes.
 
Rob
@QueenieGoldstein @Spe Queen runs Heat Detector to scan comments; it runs seperate from Smokey, using AI + Feedback.
 
Ooh, interesting! I had no idea!
 
Rob
There's a whole room packed with Bots posting cryptic comments that people reply to; that controls their operation, similar to Smokey's commands. You need permission, and they don't appreciate random chatting in that room, only pertinent posts.
 
@Ollie Eh, just VTC as "Does not appear to solicit discussion" (I chose the wrong reason, don't copy me) and eventually delete, I guess.
 
1:46 PM
I flagged as spam. It won't go anywhere else on the network.
 
It doesn't classify as spam. It doesn't promote a product or service.
 
@Ollie it is best to not feed the users that post that kind of bait. Just vote and move one and resist leaving a comment.
 
Rob
@Ollie Why not flag: Very low quality - This question has severe formatting or content problems. This question is unlikely to be salvageable through editing, and might need to be removed. ?
 
Hmm.
Yeah, okay.'
Done.
 
@Ollie classic trolling.
No need for red flag.
 
Rob
1:50 PM
Choose what is best, and vote/flag/close as you see fit.
 
I usually do
I don't usually make use of the "Very low quality" flag...
 
It's a pretty awful flag, all things considered.
 
Anyway it's gone now.
 
On questions, anyway.
 
Rob
Spam was not a good choice, R/A barely qualifies; IMNSHO VLQ is appropriate, but it's your account.
 
1:54 PM
I wouldn't use R/A for a post like that.
I've only ever used it once.
 
There is no post. Only Zuuul
 
Post: Gone. Flags: Probably helpful. Geek: Munching on nonsensical posts. Left: Zuuul
 
sdc tea Spevacus
 
@Ollie brews a cup of earl grey tea for @Spevacus
 
Is there any way to scroll the starred messages? Rob's message:
Sep 19 at 22:05, by Rob
Awwwww
is dipping below the blue banner thing.
No wait, it's gone.
 
2:02 PM
@Ollie Yep. Go here.
 
Rob
The rudeness is the time wasting, it's also an abuse of the system; but the VLQ flag describes the situation better (especially better than spam) and it throws it into the review queue: meta.stackexchange.com/review/low-quality-posts - had it not been hit prior to arriving there. --- Don't start: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barking_up_the_wrong_tree
 
@Spevacus Thanks.
My favorite:
16 hours ago, by Ollie
1 Rubiksmoose moved to Trashcan.
 
@Ollie Found by going here.
 
Rob
They would flap their antlers and escape.
 
Flapping antlers?
 
2:05 PM
Good thing there's an "l"
 
What?
 
Explaining will throw it all to the bin. :D
 
Like this?
1 ShadowWizard moved to Trashcan
 
Pretty sure @Rob undestrands.
(typo funny, leaving it)
 
strandz
 
2:08 PM
Undestrands?
 
lol success :D
Under the strands, yes.
 
Undeprants.
 
rofl
@Ollie but for real, yeah ;)
See also: monkeys
 
No.
 
Sure no, they're not here.
 
2:09 PM
I'm just going to quit while I'm ahead.
No monkeys.
 
Rob
@Ollie Antler:
 
Rob
 
Pity it takes so long to upload an image.
 
Isn't it @Rubiksmoose? ^^
 
2:10 PM
To Imgur.
 
You could just use the existing avatar
 
In the last 30 days, we've closed 269 questions as "Not about the software that powers the Stack Exchange network." This makes up 66.42% of all questions closed over those 30 days. On average, that's almost 9 blatantly off-topic questions that get closed each day. That's... a bit wild to me.
 
Rob
There is a Meta complaint about that.
 
Really?
Where?
 
Rob
JAS
 
2:11 PM
@Spevacus where you got the stats from?
 
@ShadowWizardWearingMask meta.stackexchange.com/tools/…
10k tools are pretty neat
 
But yeah, this appears to be true for long long time.
 
I'm not there...
...yet.
 
soon tm
 
@Spevacus will fear that day ;)
 
2:12 PM
Oh lord. Ollie deleting questions. That's scary.
 
14
Q: Imgur image processing takes too long

Franck DernoncourtImage uploads are slow. It takes at least 6-8 seconds to upload one image (demo: https://youtu.be/laNmsiLhcFY). This is not due to upload speed, but because Imgur processing is slow (in the YouTube demo, the network speed can be viewed at the top of the screen). It would be a more user-friendly e...

But it's not SE fault, it's all on imgur side.
Only way to have faster upload is to replace image hosting.
 
@Spevacus Don't worry, it'll only be yours.
And I thought it was voting to delete?
 
It is.
 
@ShadowWizardWearingMask I'd say yes lol
 
Oh @ShadowWizardWearingMask, it's actually more like 4k in three months.
 
2:14 PM
@Ollie good!
 
3834 in 93 days.
sdc donkling ShadowWizard
 
@Ollie No such command 'donkling'.
 
"Donkling" - baby donkey.
How do you black-star chat messages?
Like this one:
8 mins ago, by Spevacus
Oh lord. Ollie deleting questions. That's scary.
is gold (who did that?)
But this one:
18 mins ago, by Ollie
16 hours ago, by Ollie
1 Rubiksmoose moved to Trashcan.
is black.
 
It'll turn gold if it's a message you have starred. It's black if you haven't starred it yet, but others have.
It'll be just a star's outline if it's a pinned message.
 
mm
 
2:31 PM
@Spevacus sounds about right. Actually I think there might be more? 🤣
 
Might be!
 
I have closed 103 posts this month. I think a good chunk of em are for ot-ness
 
How about deletion stats? You've been deleting a fair few of the ones that're closed. Only a bit-more-than-a-handful are taken care of by >20kers
 
I'll be going now
Ta!
 
Rob
yesterday, by Ollie
no wait, I'm back again with another question:
:)
 
2:38 PM
🚽
4
 
Rob
ก็็็็็็็็็็็็็ʕ•͡ᴥ•ʔ ก
 
@Spevacus 156
But some may be answers or deleted for other reasons
 
Is there a search you can do for this? Something like... is:question closed:true deleted:ByTheDoggo
 
@Spevacus deleted:1
@Rob you missed the toilets
 
Yeah I was just wondering if there was some diamond-tooling for searching for questions deleted/del-voted by a particular user, that also happen to be closed for a given reason.
 
2:50 PM
@Spevacus think mod can use search for this, yes.
 
Rob
But hit the user; we don't want the wrong kind of mess.
 
@Rob user might be sitting, not standing.
 
Rob
^^^ No PII
 
Depends on the number.
 
Rob
@ShadowWizardWearingMask I guess if you sit backwards, then your feet will be out of the way.
 
2:54 PM
Well that's just uncomfortable. Source: Tried that.
 
Rob
@Spevacus That's called a reverse 🦘
 
@Rob true
@Spevacus true
Wait, what made you try it? :D
 
Rob
Then you could both use it at the same time!
 
Only reason I can think of is dirty toilets, but then you can just stand or hover.
 
... We don't talk about the why, okay?
 
3:01 PM
@Rob true
@Spevacus you talk, I listen. :D
 
As is the case with almost all weird choices: I was bored. xD
 
ohh
I did weirder things when bored and when teenager.
:D
And in army learned things as well, not out of boredom. ;)
 
Rob
I hear the Alka Seltzer ad ...
 
Rob
Google ...
 
3:05 PM
Gave me aspirin and I don't have headache.
 
Rob
or a TV.
 
> Alka-Seltzer is an effervescent antacid and pain reliever first marketed by the Dr. Miles Medicine Company of Elkhart, Indiana, United States. Alka-Seltzer contains three active ingredients: aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) (ASA), sodium bicarbonate, and anhydrous citric acid.[1] The aspirin is a pain reliever and anti-inflammatory, the sodium bicarbonate is an antacid, and the citric acid reacts with the sodium bicarbonate and water to form effervescence.[2]
@Rob I do have a TV. Not big, not smart, but a TV. ;)
 
Rob
"alka seltzer ad"
 
Rob
@ShadowWizardWearingMask @Shadow's TV.
 
Ayyy
Caffeine.
 
 
2 hours later…
5:09 PM
@ShadowWizardWearingMask meh, let's be honest: I'm burning all of my rep in bounties because why not
16 active bounties and counting
 
5:38 PM
23
I once read "rep is optional", I'm curious to test that assertion
 
Rob
5:57 PM
You might be interested in:
6
Q: How can I view my offered bounties across SE?

StevoisiakI want to review questions I have posted bounties on across the Stack Exchange network. I'd like to do this so I can check for active bounties with answers I need to review. I can view my offered bounties for a specific site by appending ?tab=bounties to my user profile, but this isn't an option...

 
I'm fine with the toast I receive a day before it closes :)
 
6:19 PM
wew, created my first tag on unix.se: operators
surprised this doesn't already exist, given this is in nearly every languages (albeit in different forms)
 
@NordineLotfi So why haven't you filled in the tag summary? How are people supposed to know when to use it?
 
@DavidPostill wait, you can? didn't see the option to do so...my bad!
how do i add one?
 
@DavidPostill ah, Thanks!
@DavidPostill do i just explain what it is with my own words, or can i use some external sources? (like wikipedia)
I suppose i need to quote them/reference them?
 
@NordineLotfi Yes, but make sure you provide attribution if you do. It's better to paraphrase in your own words.
 
6:30 PM
@DavidPostill Alright :D
 
@NordineLotfi A really old blog post has some advice for writing tag wikis. Ctrl+F "advice on writing" to hop to it.
 
@Spevacus Thanks! that'll help a lot
 
This is more recent
34
A: What is a tag wiki? How do I write a good one?

Ilmari KaronenWhat is a tag wiki? Each tag on Stack Exchange has two pieces of user-editable content associated with it: a short tag wiki excerpt of up to about 500 characters of plain text, and a full tag wiki page describing the tag in more detail. The excerpt is the "elevator pitch" for the tag, and is ...

 
does anyone have a tag that is well explained? (like in decent details) so i can inspire myself from it?
@DavidPostill oh! nice
 
6:35 PM
@user400654 that's what i call detailed alright :)
 
@user400654 Lol. Great example but most tag wikis don't have that much detail :)
 
😉
 
@NordineLotfi A slightly less detailed one from SU superuser.com/tags/ffmpeg/info
 
@DavidPostill Thanks! Surprising to see this tag less detailed hmm (considering the history and forks/features of ffmpeg)
 
6:55 PM
can anyone peer review my tag? I feel like it is severely lacking: unix.stackexchange.com/tags/operators/info
trying to see how i could paraphrase it's definition from wikipedia hmm
 
the wiki needs to explain when the tag needs to be applied to the question. In other words: which topics covered in a question warrants adding that tag.
It should not be an ad for the topic
 
@rene alright :)
@rene lol
I can't imagine an ad for something like this
but i get your point
 
on SO it's a relatively useless tag, since it covers such a broad range of languages
 
@user400654 I mean, if the question cover only usage of operators, i wouldn't call it useless IMO
though i understand that questions specified as such would be rare
what about now? unix.stackexchange.com/tags/operators/info does the excerpt look better with that disclaimer?
@rene cc
 
Rob
7:19 PM
@NordineLotfi You understand that most of us can't see that.
 
@NordineLotfi We can't see it as your edit needs to be approved
 
@Rob oh, right
@DavidPostill thought rene could see it since they mentioned what to modify
 
@NordineLotfi I can only see the one from 29 minutes ago: unix.stackexchange.com/review/suggested-edits/352978
I found them on your profile: unix.stackexchange.com/users/409852/…
 
:8566611 Interesting! didn't know SO had one already...(given what @user400654 said earlier)
so would it be better to just copy this instead than the current one?
 
Rob
@NordineLotfi Is there any reason that it should look any different than this: stackoverflow.com/tags/operators/info - be certain to include a <sup>Copied from: stackoverflow.com/tags/operators/info </sup>; as the last line of the wiki (not the excerpt (top)).
 
7:27 PM
@Rob answered you above :P
 
Rob
Had to edit that.
 
yeah, can't edit more than N time right?
can't recall if it's two or three
 
Rob
It let me twice, sometimes.
 
me too, once three times.
 
Rob
Three so far, unusual.
But no more.
 
7:29 PM
This one's good. I set up a trap for bounty hunter cliques: the bounty is actually a preassigned one, but disguised as a draw attention bounty. The clique appeared and attacked the bounty. So I revealed the true preassignation and then flagged the answer as bounty hunter clique. The flag got discarded because the clique is in control of the site.
 
Rob
@NordineLotfi If it should be identical (which I guess it should) then it's possible to copy BUT you must include the 'copied from' line to avoid a plagiarism complaint.
 
@Rob yeah, you're right
was just wondering if copying it would be better than my current post (which i guess it is?)
I guess I'll go with what's on SO then
 
Rob
We can't see your current post, but you can edit it until it's approved.
 
what is even "a bounter hunter clique"?
I know it sounds exactly as what i think it is, but i can't picture this: bunch of people who hunt down bounties??

But even so, you make it sounds like it's a bad thing? just curious
@Rob yeah, i guess using what is already approved on SO would be faster (for getting an approved edit)
 
hi all
 
7:34 PM
@Luuklag Hi
 
Rob
o/
 
Oh the joy of writing recursive loops at 9:30 PM :( Time to spend some time doing nothing I guess
 
@NordineLotfi minimum effort group initiatives towards winning draw attention bounties. The draw attention bounty is broken. If drawing attention fails, once a while passes, someone posts a simple answer and surprisingly in a small time it's upvoted enough to win. Unseen in other sites
first and second times I saw it in action
 
Rob
Got to choose a different answer, so it's not automatically awarded.
 
well this actually was actually a good answer, worth its upvotes and more or less worth the bounty. But it saw clique action near end
 
Rob
7:46 PM
Well I guess it's not entirely unfair, just suspicious.
 
@Rob not true, when there is only one answer. Theory: cliques rotate the bidder and the supporters
 
@202324 so basically, many ppl at once come when there a bounty, and make low effort answer. The one who's first/get the most attention win the bounty. Is that it?
 
They game the system, in unfair no-competetion
 
Rob
They might Tweet, but if you have proof of cheating you can complain.
 
well the rotation doesn't make much sense
but nonaggression pacts could apply
 
7:48 PM
@202324 I seen the same thing happening to one of my post, except i wasn't the first to post an answer (posted after 20 hours or so i recall) and while my post was by far the most detailed, it didn't have as much upvotes as i thought...but i don't think it was unfair given 20+ hours passed.
 
like "first answerer earns the necessary votes"
@NordineLotfi link?
 
@202324 it's probably one of those sites. you know? Like the kind where you can buy views for X site etc. I do not know ones but that wouldn't surprise me if this was a thing for upvotes.
7
A: Keep a history of all the modifications to a text file

Nordine LotfiThere a couple ways that you could do this: Vim Emacs Git Bash/External tool Git-annex (all-in-one solution) Which are all detailed here: If you want to do this in Vim: Then I'd recommend using undo history, which not only (as it's name suggest) relate to the act of undoing an action in the V...

@202324 isn't that normal behavior? not all ppl scroll down to see other answer, and usually only use the accepted answer or search for the one they want...and then don't bother upvoting/downvoting anything else.
 
@NordineLotfi I'm discussing bounties on low traffic questions, you are discussing accepts on high traffic qeustions. I can try to wear your boots on this, but isn't quite easy.
 
@202324 Ah! didn't knew you meant this only for low traffic questions, thought you meant this in a general way
just managed to edit 6 time, but only for the last message (and using the arrow key) + doing so consecutively.

Probably a lower limit for what isn't the last message though. @Rob
 
I mean and you kinda acknowledge, many hours passing on a high traffic question involve many people and it's very hard to feel suspicious activity.
 
7:56 PM
@202324 yeah
 
Compare that to several days of low activity, then suddenly someone writes the answer and two upvotes fortunately arrive on time.
Happens one, two, well the third one I won't buy it.
 
It's a good day for flagging spam.
 
Too bad I couldn't dump my rant on meta because rules :shurg:
 
The more likely case is the answer bumps it to the front, people see a familiar face, and they upvote it.
relatively common in low traffic tags on SO, suspect it's common in low-traffic stacks as well
 
@user400654 not after it reaches the minimum vote count to claim the bounty. They don't even try to hide the thing
by placing a randomly higher number of upvotes
 
8:01 PM
isn't that just speculation?
I personally hate bounties. they get people to answer for the wrong reasons, promote bad questions getting attention when they should instead be closed, etc
 
They're good for rewarding existing answers and that's about it, really.
 
Sep 16 at 18:36, by Mithical
It's great for rewarding existing answers. Not so great for getting new ones.
2
 
@user400654 accurate word for criticism coming from a not a familiar face. Last word I give on the incoming side discussion
 
if you have a group of users who happen to be the people who answer bounties a lot for a given stack or tag, it's easy to look at their answers and assume that they're getting some kind of special treatment, or that they treat each other differently, because they are, and they do.
almost by design
 
alright, if you write that as a behavior it can be fighted, I trust you. I've no reason to think otherwise
 
8:14 PM
@Spevacus An old canned rejection reason used to link to it, as well. Not sure if a newer one does still.
 
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