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Timeline for A note in SIGACT news

Current License: CC BY-SA 2.5

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Jun 17, 2020 at 9:38 history edited CommunityBot
Commonmark migration
Apr 13, 2017 at 12:32 history edited CommunityBot
replaced http://cstheory.stackexchange.com/ with https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/
Mar 16, 2017 at 15:45 history edited CommunityBot
replaced http://meta.cstheory.stackexchange.com/ with https://cstheory.meta.stackexchange.com/
Nov 6, 2010 at 15:55 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod Thanks to all of you ! btw Dave, do you have any contacts within EATCS to submit a version of this there as well ?
Nov 6, 2010 at 13:17 comment added Dave Clarke @Suresh. Good work. Thanks for initiating this and pulling all together in the end. (spanned multiple blogs sounds okay to me.)
Nov 6, 2010 at 9:48 comment added Kaveh @Suresh: Nice job, it looks good. btw, is it "spanned multiple blogs" or "spanned over multiple blogs"?
Nov 5, 2010 at 23:45 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod Some citations reference discussions rather than questions or answers. For those citations, it didn't seem to make sense to single out the questioner or any particular answer (as was discussed on the meta link). Basically there are three kinds of citations: interesting questions, interesting answers, and interesting discussions. For the first two, I use names.
Nov 5, 2010 at 23:42 comment added arnab Thanks, Suresh! One issue is that in the "References" section, some authors of the questions/answers are named, and some are not. What was the reasoning behind this?
Nov 5, 2010 at 22:44 comment added Tsuyoshi Ito “cs.theory.stackexchange.com” is a typo.
Nov 5, 2010 at 22:42 history edited Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 5, 2010 at 22:41 history unlocked Suresh VenkatMod
Nov 5, 2010 at 18:13 history locked Suresh VenkatMod
Nov 5, 2010 at 18:13 history edited Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 5, 2010 at 10:13 comment added András Salamon @Suresh: I feel the same way, which is why I mentioned these in a comment rather than adding them. Thanks for spending time making the article happen!
Nov 4, 2010 at 22:03 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod the problem with Dana's question is that it's a 'big-list' kind of question, and my feeling is that for the most part, people not yet on the site might be more attracted to specific targeted questions (of course people already here like these questions, and I do too). But I'm wishy-washy about this
Nov 4, 2010 at 19:10 comment added András Salamon In case more examples are called for, Dana Moshkovitz's question cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/2674/… has proved popular and has also generated several very high quality answers; and I feel that Scott Aaronson's and Dana's answers to my question cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/2136/… perfectly captured the "revealing hidden folklore" aspect of the site.
Nov 4, 2010 at 17:01 comment added András Salamon @Peter: Agree with your comments; the GCD question is a nice addition. I would be happy to see the current version (revision 40) as the basis text for Suresh to edit.
Nov 4, 2010 at 16:42 comment added Peter Shor I just made the changes addressing the last three comments myself ... I added links to both Watrous's answer and my question to the first paragraph. There's room to add another link as well (although I guess this only affects the online version).
Nov 4, 2010 at 16:40 history edited Peter Shor CC BY-SA 2.5
Reverted first paragraph to before, with two links (my question and the gcd question Watrous answered).
Nov 4, 2010 at 16:29 comment added Peter Shor Another point ... now you have two links to my questions at the end of the first paragraph. I'd really rather not give the impression that I'm the only one who asks interesting questions here (for one thing, that's absolutely not true), so I think you should put it back to the way it was before, which read better anyway, and link to one or the other of these questions I would think the "Interactive proofs for levels of PH" question is a better example, because there I actually got some very good answers.
Nov 4, 2010 at 16:22 comment added Peter Shor If anybody knows any cases where someone from the more practical side of computer science has asked an interesting theory question here, and gotten a useful answer, it might be good to add that as well. I've seen several instances where we've pointed people to a known result, but I don't think these cases are very useful for advertising the site to the theory community. I'd like a case where the theory turned out to be more interesting. I'm not even sure any exist, although I expect such cases to appear eventually.
Nov 4, 2010 at 16:00 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod I really like John Watrous' answer to the gcd problem, and propose that this be a top-level replacement for the note on listing poly-time hardness results ? cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/2708/…
Nov 4, 2010 at 15:40 history edited David Eppstein CC BY-SA 2.5
link meta
Nov 4, 2010 at 15:31 history edited David Eppstein CC BY-SA 2.5
remove unnecessary capitalization
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:55 comment added Lev Reyzin Mod track B?? ;) There are some interesting questions/answers in learning and AGT, but they seem not as highly voted as the algorithms/complexity questions.
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:53 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
added functional programming survey question; deleted 8 characters in body
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:46 comment added András Salamon @Aaron, you are right. I squeezed in Kaveh's suggestion, but now the first paragraph seems unbalanced (my phrasing suggests that we should explain the outcomes of all the questions we referenced). I do like the FP question, though, and its answer is likely to remain a useful overview.
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:42 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
added Kaveh's suggestion
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:42 comment added Aaron Sterling That said, I think we are near (or perhaps at) the point where more is not better.
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:41 comment added Aaron Sterling @Lev @Andras: What about the purely functional data structures question? cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/1539/…
Nov 4, 2010 at 14:32 comment added András Salamon @Lev: I would very much like to add a Track B question, any suggestions?
Nov 4, 2010 at 13:20 comment added Lev Reyzin Mod A lot, if not all, of our examples come from complexity theory. I don't know if we should be adding even more, especially if we want to show this site extends beyond STOC/FOCS. But I agree with Andras about this version -- I'm more or less happy with the document as it is now.
Nov 4, 2010 at 11:50 comment added Kaveh I second András, I like this. About success stories, I also like this question. Other than being a very interesting question in itself, it involved a good number of senior researchers, it feels like a coffee-break discussion in a conference. It can be a good example.
Nov 4, 2010 at 10:07 comment added András Salamon I like this version, and it seems to be approaching a fixed point. Any more success stories that should be included?
Nov 4, 2010 at 9:56 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 4, 2010 at 7:56 history edited Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 4, 2010 at 7:39 history edited Dave Clarke CC BY-SA 2.5
edited body
Nov 4, 2010 at 7:30 history edited Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 4, 2010 at 5:54 history edited arnab CC BY-SA 2.5
edited body
Nov 4, 2010 at 5:08 history edited Kaveh CC BY-SA 2.5
fixed grammer; edited title
Nov 4, 2010 at 4:55 history edited Kaveh CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 4, 2010 at 4:41 answer added Kaveh timeline score: 4
Nov 4, 2010 at 1:52 comment added Peter Shor @Aaron: Fixed! And very nicely, too.
Nov 4, 2010 at 1:51 comment added Aaron Sterling @Peter Shor: I made a revision that attempts to address that.
Nov 4, 2010 at 1:50 history edited Aaron Sterling CC BY-SA 2.5
changed final header and reversed order of the pen- and antepenultimate paragraphs, to address Peter Shor's point that the reader should have advance notice of the topic shift to site origin
Nov 4, 2010 at 1:45 history edited Peter Shor CC BY-SA 2.5
tweaked grammar to improve continuity
Nov 4, 2010 at 1:36 comment added Peter Shor Everything looks great except maybe for the second-last paragraph. We really should give readers a hint that this paragraph is describing how cstheory.stackexchange.com got started before they reach the end of the paragraph.
Nov 3, 2010 at 21:58 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
more copy editing (hopefully in the spirit of Aaron's edits)
Nov 3, 2010 at 20:22 history edited Dave Clarke CC BY-SA 2.5
Some minor fixes + Gave appropriate credit to the StackExchange inventors -- it read as if we'd developed the site.
Nov 3, 2010 at 14:29 history edited Lev ReyzinMod CC BY-SA 2.5
demonstrated --> gave, so we dont have two "demonstrated"s in a row
Nov 3, 2010 at 14:19 comment added András Salamon @Suresh: Added several additional links, please edit/remove as you feel appropriate. A useful query for accepted answers with at least 20 votes: cstheory.stackexchange.com/search?q=votes%3A20+isaccepted%3A1
Nov 3, 2010 at 14:13 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
add another soft question
Nov 3, 2010 at 13:59 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
add another example of "more than just answers"
Nov 3, 2010 at 13:50 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
add another soft question
Nov 3, 2010 at 13:45 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
add another example of "more than just answers"
Nov 2, 2010 at 20:03 comment added Aaron Sterling @Suresh: Ok, done. I tweaked some language. I don't know the answer to David Eppstein's question about citations, so I did nothing about that. I also am not sure how to address Joshua Grochow's concern about the first paragraph, so I did nothing about that either. I think what we have is pretty strong at this point. The new proofs, in particular, are a very nice touch.
Nov 2, 2010 at 20:00 history edited Aaron Sterling CC BY-SA 2.5
made the language more journalistic, less standoffish, eg removed passive voice - matters of taste, not content
Nov 2, 2010 at 19:35 answer added David Eppstein timeline score: 1
Nov 2, 2010 at 19:28 history edited David Eppstein CC BY-SA 2.5
refactor content section
Nov 2, 2010 at 19:19 history edited David Eppstein CC BY-SA 2.5
people => participants
Nov 2, 2010 at 18:53 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod Yes, I've been trying to get time to do that. Aaron, go ahead with your edits and I'll work around them
Nov 2, 2010 at 18:53 comment added Aaron Sterling @Andras: In a comment to an answer further down, @Suresh said that he wants to work on the middle part. I'd rather wait until he does that.
Nov 2, 2010 at 17:52 comment added András Salamon I've made some changes to incorporate the comments so far. @Aaron, could you take a look at some of the suggested cuts? I wasn't clear on what to remove based on the comments here.
Nov 2, 2010 at 14:11 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
add links
Nov 2, 2010 at 13:09 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
added suggestions by Peter Shor and arnab
Nov 2, 2010 at 10:41 history edited Kaveh CC BY-SA 2.5
removing name
Nov 2, 2010 at 1:04 comment added Peter Shor @arnab: Very nice
Nov 2, 2010 at 0:00 comment added arnab @Peter: I also like Vognsen's "new" proof of the Schwartz-Zippel lemma here: cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/1772/…
Nov 1, 2010 at 21:31 comment added Peter Shor We could say "Some of the answers contain new proofs which were discovered in response to the question" There are at two of these I'm aware of, and probably a bunch more. cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/2505/… and cstheory.stackexchange.com/questions/2312/…
Nov 1, 2010 at 18:40 comment added Aaron Sterling @Lev - Either way, as I read people's responses, the main thing lacking is additional victory(ies) of the site. Peter S and Suresh V suggested lines to remove, which is easily done. Content to add is perhaps a harder decision. If others decide what questions or stories to include, I can try to stitch it all together with purty English, because that's a skill I have. However, I'm not comfortable re-editing until there's a general consensus on what else to include, if anything. Currently people are busy, or perhaps waiting to see what others think.
Nov 1, 2010 at 18:09 comment added Lev Reyzin Mod @Aaron - I am not sure I agree. We are not making a definitive journal version of a proof, but rather an announcement to the community. We want the theory community to use this site so that it doesn't just die out, and timing is often crucial in these things. Whether we describe the site mechanics exactly right in our bulletin doesn't seem to make much difference to me.
Nov 1, 2010 at 17:59 history edited András Salamon CC BY-SA 2.5
some copy editing and a few new sentences
Nov 1, 2010 at 17:26 comment added Aaron Sterling Comment continued: Also, I don't think it makes sense to assume only SIGACT readership, if it's going to be posted places in addition to SIGACT News.
Nov 1, 2010 at 17:20 comment added Aaron Sterling To respond to @Lev and @Joshua: It is more important to get this right than to get it out fast. SIGACT News provides an official imprimatur, but not speed, even if we got it to them today. For speed, there are the blogs and mainstream media outlets that appear on the Deolalikar wiki. This is the logical followup story -- the phoenix that arose from the ashes of the proof. So there's a boatload of right-away publicity available if we want it. Since it's likely to appear on the web before it appears in print, it makes sense to embed hyperlinks.
Nov 1, 2010 at 15:27 answer added Lev ReyzinMod timeline score: 3
Nov 1, 2010 at 9:14 history edited Kaveh CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 1, 2010 at 8:00 history edited Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5
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Nov 1, 2010 at 6:46 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod I also wonder if we need a self-referential throw in of the form "This very article you're reading was written by the community on the site"
Nov 1, 2010 at 6:46 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod I really like the paragraph referencing the P vs NP discussions. makes an excellent point
Nov 1, 2010 at 1:57 comment added Peter Shor What did we want "There is no financial obligation to participate" to mean? (Literally, it means that nobody pays you money to participate.) We should rephrase or drop that. Maybe "Participation costs you nothing but time."
Oct 31, 2010 at 16:24 answer added Joshua Grochow timeline score: 2
Oct 31, 2010 at 14:49 comment added Aaron Sterling Okay, done with edit. Please hack and slay.
Oct 31, 2010 at 14:48 history edited Aaron Sterling CC BY-SA 2.5
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Oct 31, 2010 at 7:50 answer added Dave Clarke timeline score: 3
Oct 31, 2010 at 7:48 comment added Dave Clarke The question is: how long should this piece be? Then it will be easier to see how balanced the text is.
Oct 31, 2010 at 6:34 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod is there possibly too much information about SE ?
Oct 31, 2010 at 0:40 comment added arnab Offtopic, but this comic illustrates well the value of reputation systems :) imgs.xkcd.com/comics/constructive.png
Oct 30, 2010 at 20:23 comment added Dave Clarke @Aaron: looking forward to it!
Oct 30, 2010 at 20:07 comment added Aaron Sterling @Dave Clarke: Agreed. That's still to come. Lead with the teasers, meat in the middle, close with a closer. Not sure what the closer should be yet, and the Shiva Kintali example is part of the middle (unless he disapproves). Hopefully, I'll have a clearer picture in the morning.
Oct 30, 2010 at 19:21 comment added Dave Clarke @Aaron: My main criticism is that you deleted much of the success stories suggested by Peter Shor, without providing adequate replacement text. I see that it is implicit in the introductory paragraph, but having more explicit success stories would be, in my opinion, better.
Oct 30, 2010 at 18:30 comment added Aaron Sterling I changed the opening structure a fair amount, toward something I thought would better capture and maintain the reader's interest. I'll try to get to the second half tomorrow, unless people decide they prefer the structure to be the way it was before.
Oct 30, 2010 at 18:29 history edited Aaron Sterling CC BY-SA 2.5
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Oct 30, 2010 at 10:49 history edited Peter Shor CC BY-SA 2.5
Added another possible kind of success story. I don't know if there have been any of these yet, though
Oct 30, 2010 at 10:45 answer added Peter Shor timeline score: 5
Oct 29, 2010 at 14:54 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod sure. that can be done
Oct 29, 2010 at 13:42 comment added Aaron Sterling Suggestion: Once it's written, in addition to submitting it to SIGACT News, perhaps it could be guestblogged as well (someplace other than/in addition to the GeomBlog, as I am assuming people who follow the GeomBlog are aware of this site), much as Bill Gasarch posts his book review columns.
Oct 29, 2010 at 12:39 history edited Dave Clarke CC BY-SA 2.5
Expanded text about stack exchange and how it works
Oct 29, 2010 at 5:44 comment added Kaveh Another possibility is to modify that part to become an answer to a problem, e.g. who runs/manages the site? the community! What is the system used for keeping the discussions sane and high quality? the reputation system! and it works this way ... and it is just there to take care of abusers, it is not a big deal, you don't need worry about it after posting your first question/answer.
Oct 29, 2010 at 2:13 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod I'm open to removing it. I've found that it's a source of puzzlement to people not familiar with the MO model, and it does help explain how spam gets removed.
Oct 29, 2010 at 0:30 comment added Warren Schudy Is the reputation system really worth mentioning? That seems to me like an implementation detail that's not worth mentioning in an ad.
Oct 28, 2010 at 21:32 history edited Lev ReyzinMod CC BY-SA 2.5
small edits
Oct 28, 2010 at 21:32 comment added Suresh Venkat Mod I like the point about capturing insights not present in books or papers.
Oct 28, 2010 at 21:12 history edited Lev ReyzinMod CC BY-SA 2.5
lots of edits, mostly stylistic, to the "some background" section
Oct 28, 2010 at 19:37 answer added Kaveh timeline score: 10
Oct 28, 2010 at 19:22 history edited Kaveh CC BY-SA 2.5
motivation for new students
Oct 28, 2010 at 18:42 history edited Dave Clarke CC BY-SA 2.5
added 646 characters in body
Oct 28, 2010 at 17:46 history edited Lev ReyzinMod CC BY-SA 2.5
small edits to "who the site is targeted at"
Oct 28, 2010 at 17:27 history made wiki Post Made Community Wiki by Suresh VenkatMod
Oct 28, 2010 at 17:12 history asked Suresh VenkatMod CC BY-SA 2.5