text:
Sharing a .blend file over 30mb
I understand that most of the time, .blend files will and should be under 30mb, and can be shared easily on questions, using blend-exchange or pasteall.
Sometimes, though, and it's happened to me only twice, files will be over 30mb (the pasteall and blend-exchange limit).
Even if you strip it of all sorts of things to make it lighter...
It could be a scene with complex animations, many objects constrained together, or simply a scene where you don't run into the problem anymore when you delete some elements to make it lighter.
In these situations, what file-sharing website should we use?

Can you share an example for one? My first point would be that I'm not too keen at poking around large files.

I understand. I'd love to! (that's the point of the question, heheh...) How should I share it though? Care to recommend a service?

I more meant an example question, I would have suggested ways to possibly slim the file to isolate the problem. Dropbox is a safe good method.

This one for example; I think most questions about cell fracture will be over 20-30mb: http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/43326/linking-cell-fractured-fragments-together-with-rigid-body-constraints-set-as-br
File is here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/md4v1zvhexbswqm/cell-fractured-dude-copy.blend?dl=0

For one, don't bake the physics. Simply provide the model and explain the process you followed or what you did and if you are indeed experiencing a problem someone will be able to reproduce it and continue from there.

I removed the physics, joined the original mesh then separated it back into individual blocks ready for simulation. 2.5MB

Ok, don't forget I'm not an expert, so I couldn't do what you did! Thanks a lot. I'll try to reproduce this and edit my question accordingly... Although it doesn't answer my question - and both dropbox and google drive are "temporary" file hosting sites

(now 200mb, THAT i can understand! but 32, heck, I'll try it... Noobs will be noobs)

@fabriced Also see http://meta.blender.stackexchange.com/questions/1031/allow-permanent-blend-file-hosting?rq=1, so I'd say this probably won't be a problem soon.

You can also try and reproduce the issue from scratch in a fresh file first. This way you can ensure the file contains the bare minimum amount of stuff required to reproduce the issue, and by experimenting you could very well end up finding a solution yourself.

That's a great tip!

@fabriced BTW, If you really really need to upload a large file to blend exchange, you can contact me and I can arrange it.

Ok making a quick list of things you can do to cut your filesize, generally I'd say if it passes 20MB there is definitely something you can drop.

Don't include baked simulations
Don't include large video files
Don't include large textures
Delete unnecessary objects; no need to include your entire world if only your character's head is problematic

In general try to keep your files ~8MB. That's a good small size tho we might argue for a higher cap when and if we get that builtin functionality. Other notes are that your file should demonstrate the specific issue you're having. Nobody is going to volunteer their time to poke through your fancy assets and complex node trees.

Will try to update and refine this later, on mobile atm.

Ok. Also explain how to remove the bake, I couldn't find that anywhere online. I just tried to do what you did, starting by removing the physics, but the file is the same size...

@fabriced IIRC, exact steps. Select the camera, lamp and plane and hide with shift + h. next select any part of the model, hit shift + g and choose siblings. After that join them with Ctrl + J, now use Ctrl + I to inverse select all the empties and delete them, open the dopesheet and delete the keyframes then back into edit mode and use p > separate by loose objects. Finally unhide and you're ready to simulate again. I'm not sure if the model should be split however, your call but TL;DR, delete the constraint and keyframes.

@fabriced There should be a button labeled "Free bake" in the physics cache settings


text:
Question Template for better question structures
We are often faced with questions that are incomplete or unclear. There are alot of prerequisites for solving those issues. Should we not include a simple template so that individuals who ask questions can make sure they include all the important informations.
I would request that these short simple text should be designed to be included in the question entry text box as a visual checklist as to improve the chances of questions and answers being more accurate.
Eg Template.

** Attention Delete the template text as you fill in your questions. The template is only meant to act as a checklist.
1.System - OSX / Windows / Linux ... version
2.Blender version
3.Describe the problem.
4.Describe the solutions you have already tried
and did not work.
5.Describe of the purpose and goal of the question.
-- Add images or gifs to give further example to the problem.
-- Add a simplified blend file that produces the problem.
-- Add code snippets if the question requires.
-- Format your questions so that it's easy to read if it's long.

I like this idea, it's similar to how bug reports should be structured and this would actually help a lot. I'm not sure how practical or feasible however, I'm sure this has been suggested before. I'd check meta.se to see and I'll poke around.

My concern with a template like this is that some of the info is not necessary for every question. OS and blender version are seldom the issue.

Your concern is valid, however it works as a checklist for the person asking the question. In any case the template will be deleted after the OP have filled up the text box with his question. Maybe we could add a line of text suggesting to OP that it's a checklist and remove those text as you fill in the answer. I have updated the example Template.

@cegaton Every point need not be ticked but rather could be used as a guide, maybe some bolded that must be in the body such as blender version.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


text:
What does it mean to review a declined flag?
Recently one my flags was declined (OP revised the flagged post after I flagged it).  However now when I go to flag a post the flag window says

Your last flag was declined - please review it before flagging this post!

and the flag button is grayed out.  "Review it" links to my page of past flags.  But I see now option to review or do anything with any of the flags.  What does it mean to review a declined flag?

Go to the page linked in the message: Your flags (only viewable to you and mods). This is the same page that the "Helpful Flags" link on the "Activity" tab of your profile page goes to.
There is no button, or anything like in the review queue. All SE wants you to do is read the message under the flag(s) in question, and make sure you understand why your flag was declined.

You still can flag posts (it says so on your flags page).

Flagging status

Not banned from flagging
Warned when flagging

You can read the details about how the flag warning and banning system works here: https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/175405/278094.
In short:
If you flag more then 10 flags per week you will get warned when more then 10% are declined, and temporarily banned if more then 25% are declined.
If you have less then 10 per week (this is your case at the moment) you will get warned if your last flag was declined.

Hmmm... I did go there, both before I tried to flag another one and several times by clicking the given link, and it still won't let me do any more flagging.

@PGmath see updated answer (from what I've read I think the grayed out button will still work)

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
What to do with really short answers?
Along with the uptick in new users, we seem to be getting more and more answers in the form:

So just do X and add Y with a Z thing and it will work.

Giving no details as to how to actually do X, Y, and Z.
I find this especially common when users find the answer to their own problem and just write some little snippet like this.
How should these answers be dealt with?  Should they flagged, edited, deleted, down voted, etc.?  If they should be flagged, what flag should be used (none of them seem to fit perfectly)?
I usually try to leave a comment asking them to expand on their answer, but they often don't do so.
To be clear:  I am talking about situations where the answer does technically answer the question, but just makes absolutely no effort to explain itself.

I would say the best thing to do is a DV. By all means leave a comment asking them to expand on their answer; but low quality content should be DVed (that is how the sorting process works to always have the best answers on the top).
There is a rather thick gray line between what is low quality and not an answer, or just a low effort post.
When you are trying to decide whether or not to flag something, ask yourself what you would do?
Is there really any justifiable reason to delete this post? (in the case of an answer that does technically answer the question, but is rather bad the answer is no.)
However if it is better suited as a comment, then by all means please flag it (probably as not an answer).

Short answer: DV low effort posts, flag "answers" that really aren't.

please consider my updated post ;-)

I like Samoth's idea of posting a better answer, with or without a downvote of a correct, but not very detailed one. However, to me two other bits of information should be taken to account: who'd asked the question, and who answered. If an experienced user posted the question, an answer similar to that described in the original question might be quite adequate; on the other hand, if the question is from a brand new user, then I'd suggest that a more elaborate answer would be called for.
Yes, I do know that the idea is to build a knowledge base for future users, in addition to asking the immediate question, but given the same question asked by two different users, they may not both require the same level of detail in the answer.
Then there's the answer of time. Sometimes I have provided a shorter answer than usual because I'm short on time, and I want to get the answer to the questioner as soon as possible. When I feel the answer lacks detail, I generally have the intent to go back and improve the answer, but I know I've not always done this.

I would really encourage not to DV short answers. Commenting about elaboration is good. But if it technically answers the question (what you included), then it is a good answer. There are so many "maybe" answers which should be DVed.
But if you want more details that you'd see yourself that could be added - why not make it a community answer? Or post your own answer with more details and see if it get's UVed?
I know, brilliant and detailled answers are wanted. But UV a good answer to encourage answering at all. If all answers get DVed just because they could be improved, that's cutting your own branch you're sitting on. This site is not about questions only but about answers. And if technically answered it's a help for people who search for answers*.
Not to forget: DV means (as its tooltip explains) "This answer is not useful". So if the answer is technically right but only could be elaborated, you should better not vote than vote and express that it is not useful at all. You should instead probably just UV because you can clearly see that the technical answer is given. And might drop a comment encouraging to elaborate.
And feedback here should be more encouraging, right? Not discouraging with DVs (even more without a comment about why).
* consider that as a programmer I myself often stumble over questions that I have as well and just searched for it in Google and with a bit of a more specific topic I get more hits nowadays on SO than on Forums which is a great thing. And People often look for answers and if they find a technically correct one it will really help them out. When there are open points/details left out, the comment section is the place where one can ask for them. This might remind the author to elaborate. And it might new users to register to ask for more details - and if they get them (probably in another more detailled answer that you just posted later) they might consider sharing their knowledge as well.
I think, it's about answers first and foremost. Elaboration is a process in time. So don't hinder this process from evolving with a DV. ;-)


text:
What is a "well received question"?
The Socratic badge's criteria says

Ask a well-received question on 100 separate days, and maintain a positive question record. This badge can be awarded multiple times.

Unlike most of the other badges' criteria, this seems pretty subjective and not very clear as to what a "well received question" is.  For instance, I have asked 65 questions, but according to the badge tracker only 54 of them are "well received".  So what exactly qualifies as a "well received" question?

According to Meta.SE, the criteria is:
(total questions - negative questions - closed - deleted)/total questions >= 0.5

where each question can be counted more than once (i.e. a closed deleted negative question will counted as -3 total).
So any question with a positive score (that has not been closed or deleted) is considered well-received.
Source: List of all badges with full descriptions


text:
How about a "BSE-OOS" site?
First: "BSE-OOS" is an acronym for "Blender Stack Exchange -  Out of Scope".
I have found a number of situations where a question has been asked that is obviously out of scope of the site as defined in the help page, and yet, for one reason or another, I'd like to provide an answer to the question. One example of this would be a case where an inexperienced user has a problem where the solution amounts to a tutorial, and there I can't find an existing one that would be useful, but I could provide it for the user. A private message facility, like in the forums at Blender-Artists would be one way to do this, but if the Stack-exchange site has a direct contact facility, where I can communicate such a private message to a particular individual, I have yet to discover it. I suppose that one could move a discussion over a particular question to a site like Blender Artists, or one of a host of other forum sites, so these would work, too. Is there some site which would be better for this purpose than others, or would it be worth considering a new site, like "BSE-OOS"?

One thing you can do in a situation like the one you describe, is create a chat room. This allows discussion to continue between specific users without affecting the rest of the site. If you're so inclined, you can always go as far as to make a complete tutorial and post it on youtube/similar, then link the OP to it (in comments or chat)


text:
How can I properly invite people to a chat room so I can ask for resources?
I created this chat room since it's not clear to me what's on topic or not in this SE site, and in most sites asking for resources, books, recommendations, ... is not on-topic.
Should I use meta for this? How can I invite people to join? (In both senses: is there an efficient way? what's SE-legal to do in this cases?)

You might try asking around in our main chatroom


text:
Cannot download Blend files from questions
Anyone else having problems downloading example .Blend files from blend-exchange in posts?  I have tried a couple posts, and the download link to the example blend files leads me to a blank page.
Below is the specific post/link I'm having issues with at the moment.  The OP says he can download it.  Everyone else downloading it ok?  I have tried two browsers on two different computers.  Either I get a blank page (Firefox), or an error, this page doesn't exist (IE10).  I haven't tried at my home, only work, so maybe a firewall issue.
The Post:
Cloth sim; Cloth Pin and Self Collision making very bad/weird behavior?
The link to the file:
http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/b/1151/
Thanks, just trying to get to the bottom of this so I can help this guy out!

This is self hosted by a community member. We are looking into it, thanks for the post.

I'm the guy who wrote the code for blend-exchange and operates it. The issue has been resolved, thanks for posting this message so I could be notified.
The issue was caused by a crashed database due to a ram shortage on my server. This is usually caused by Denial of Service (DoS) attack on the server that hosts blend-exchange. I'm going to do an in-depth investigation as to why this crash occurred, and try to avoid repeat occurrences in the future.
Sorry for any inconvenience caused by unavailable files.

Thank you so much for taking the time and resources to provide this valuable service, and support it.  Damn DoS attacks are from the devil.


text:
Add option to partly reject an edit, or give a warning instead? Should editing guidelines be available on a user's homepage as well?
An edit I proposed was turned down with this explanation: "edit did not correct critical issues with the post". After revisiting the post, I saw that the individual (other user listed as "community") who felt my edit was not beneficial, changed only the way in which a link was displayed and deleted the word "blender", but included the edits I made.
If you look closely, you can see we both missed correcting the last word of the post. I feel this speaks to a need of leniency for rejected edits, as even reviewers miss mistakes.
My edit:

Other user's edit:

Without the edits I made, the question is uncomfortable to read. If I hadn't caught the mistakes, the question would have had less traffic, since the natural inclination is to steer away from an uncomfortable read.
Since both edits are useful, wouldn't it make most sense to award partial credit? Maybe one point instead of two? Or perhaps, instead of a rejected edit: the edit is accepted and no points are awarded, but the user receives a warning with synthetic rejection reason, and a link to guidelines? In this way, the user is not discouraged but learns for next time.
In addition, I almost edited the post to include a word-link as well, but decided against it since I felt my edit might be rejected for changing redundant features. This brings me to my second question:
Prior to editing, I did a search to find some guidelines, (since I couldn't find any on my home page), and gathered an idea of beneficial editing. However, none of the pages I read suggested changing the way in which a link is displayed. I've edited over a dozen questions since then, and every time I missed seeing the helpful sidebar (displayed while editing) with guidelines for editing. I now realize this is because my attention is immediately drawn to the post in need of editing, since my mind is holding the editing ideas as the page loads.
To remedy this, wouldn't it make most sense to have a "Guidelines for Editing" page which can be accessed on a user's homepage? I feel not everyone will know to look for the sidebar while editing, as it did not occur to me.
My primary question is my first question though, since I feel not all users would struggle with noticing the sidebar while editing.

Note that users with the privilege to review edits do not receive reputation upon editing. So it's not especially in their interest to reject and re-edit suggested edits.

The number of "points". Points are called reputation

So one can assume that an editing user with a reputation of at least 2000, does not gain reputation points for their edit? It might be helpful to include that in the privilege to review edits page.

That's correct (there are a couple of other considerations as well)

Thanks. I've edited my post to reflect this info.

I'm the one who reviewed your edit, and I will chalk it up to a mistake.
I think what I did was when switching back and forth between the markdown and normal views (in the review page), and looking at the question (something I do when reviewing) and the review page; I got confused at what was your edit was and what the old question was. I recall after hitting the "reject and edit" button that it did not look quite as I expected it should.
I apparently then proceeded to correct the post putting back many of the same changes you made, and I had just seen. ("reject and edit" rejects your edit and then opens up a place to edit the question)
Here is the revision history for the question we are discussing. If you click on the "side-by-side markdown" button, you will see I actually did cahnge a bit more then the inline view makes it appear.
As for the rep, sorry this edit review was my bad. But don't worry you will gain way more then 2 rep!
Keep up the good edits! (and I'll be more careful reviewing them)
I like your "Guidelines for Editing" idea. Maybe we can get something like that up on the meta.

Here are a few tips on editing. (and things that can be changed in nearly every post)

good image alt text. That is the text that describes what the image is, it goes where the "enter image description here" text is usually in images in questions. ![enter image description here][1] is.
wiki links, back around Jan of 2015 blender switched from using the wiki, to the new manual system. That broke nearly all the wiki links, and many on BSE are still broken.
This is a little delicate, but cutting out useless info (this includes things like "thanks" at the end). Say there is a whole paragraph that adds nothing to the question, (we don't really need to know that somebody spent all week trying to figure out their problem) then delete it.

Thanks, that helps clear my uncertainty. The additional editing tips are useful, i'm still trying to navigate the "cutting out useless info."


text:
How Do I upload a blend file to this forum?
I am sure this is very simple.  I want to upload a .blend file to a question.  How do I do that?
Thank you!

http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/help/


text:
Blender — Top User Swag!

This has been shipped today! Enjoy your swag, everyone :)
If you still don't have yours and think you should have it by now, please send me an e-mail so I can look into it instead of leaving a comment here. :)

We want to congratulate and thank everyone that helped this site and community grow healthily into what they are today!
If you can find your name among the top 72 users in the first two pages here, we have a surprise for you! We want to send you a token of our appreciation for being among the most prolific users in this community! As such, we're sending you a little box, inside which you'll find:
A T-SHIRT!

STICKERS!

I'll be reaching out to you later today with a link to a form: be sure to fill out the form as soon as you're able to do so! You'll have two weeks to do it, after which I'll close the form and take care of sending all of the swag your way! It should take from 6 to 8 weeks for the package to be delivered to you!
If you're not on the list, don't worry too much about it — we've got some extra swag stored we can send to you for events and such!
Thanks to all of you for making this site great!

Hey I didn't know about this, I was unaware there were BSE prizes! Pretty cool :)

I have the same mailing address as another user on this site. Will it be a problem to have two packages coming to the same address?

I don't expect it to be a problem, no, @X-27.

Awesome, I'll submit my form :)

Yay! By the way, the logo pictured is the wrong logo. I realize this is probably due to a recycling of the demo images of the original logo, but better safe than sorry ;)

To everyone getting some of this nice "swag" congratulations!

I am gonna wear it with pride!

Awesome, got an email out of the blue today offering free swag. Can't complain about that! :D

Wow, this is awesome. Gonna be wearing this around. Not sure if anyone will recognize it though.

I've let our designers know, @gandalf3 (though I'm pretty sure it was an oversight ;)

Wow, cool!  Though the lack of mousepads is dissapointing I'm looking forward to my t-shirt!

Eagerly awaiting my shirt, stickers and tablet! :)

Approximately how big are the stickers going to be, and how many are coming in the surprise pack?

The picture above gives you a sense of the stickers' size, @X-27. And we usually send 3 to each user, IIRC.

Dang... three pages away from Swag!

Serious question: If I fill out the form twice will I get two shirts?

Serious answer: nope :P

is the forms up yet cause I can't see them ?

You should have received an e-mail with a link to it, @Chebhou.

Hello! Has anyone recieved the shirt yet? Have they been shipped? No hurry, just asking, maybe mine sank in the ocean? :D

I don't believe these have been shipped yet, @RóbertLászlóPáli. I'll let you know once they have.

Thanks for notifying about status! As a warning, I started to receive spam mails from something calling itself FedEX failing to deliver parcel, which contain .zip with strong encoding trojain .crypted Ransomware. So be careful when checking these.

Alright, thanks for the update and also for the warning.

I was just loosing hope, here in Italy... :) I just wish they don't come in middle august, since I could not be at home, for the holidays...

@JNat Soo.. 15 weeks passed and no sign of the shipment. I will move to different address in a week, If the shipment wasn't shipped yet, I might need to change the shipping adress..

I'll check on the status of this, @Jerryno. In the meantime, you can always send me an e-mail with your new details.

My package has arrived!

Thank you SE for my shirt stickers and tablet!
The shirt is greyer then expected.
The stickers are a little smaller then expected.
The tablet is completely unexpected!
I'm also glad to finally figured out the secret meaning behind 6 to 8 weeks. It is not 6 to 8, but 6 + 8 weeks, meaning about 14 weeks (or in my case 16).

Edit: this should help

Did moderators get an Intuos? I'll trade you my stickers for the tablet !

We did not send tablets to anyone, no, @cegaton :P

How lucky you are you've got Intuos 4!. I've only got Intuos 2 in my package :(. Your answer made my day BTW :D.

@PaulGonet Glad to hear it made you smile. that was the main point.

@David My offer stands. I'll even throw in a CD with blender 2.68...

@JNat I've been meaning to say - I recently received my package. The shirt is even nicer than expected (love the color and material). Thank you guys so much for the awesome swag!

I got mine today... :D the t-shirt color is a little different, but my smile is big anyway, thanks!


text:
Where to ask questions about animations created with OpenToonz?
Recently a new open source project was created called OpenToonz. OpenToonz is software for creating 2D animations (whether small and low res or full length feature films with high res 8k frames (See "Studio Ghibli". One of the main users of OpenToonz.)
Where on stackexchange could I ask questions about 2D animation and OpenToonz? Would this stackexchange be a place to ask (I'm pretty sure the answer is no. given the FAQ/about/name-of-the-url)?
I tried superuser.com but didn't get any response. I saw graphicdesign.stackexchange has an animation tag but the description of the tag IMO sounds like small animations or single frame type questions.
Maybe a new animation stackexchange needs to be created?
(For general animation questions whether by hand or by OpenToonz. Or maybe limit it to only 2D animation.)

This is not the place, but the project sounds interesting. I'm not sure a suitable SE site exists yet, so you might consider proposing a new one

@gandalf3 hey for the Blender Area51 proposal what section did you put it under: arts, recreation, technology, professional, etc?

It's up to you, what category do you think your idea of the site fits under most? (perhaps have a look at the faq if you haven't already)

Yes it would definatly be off topic here on this site. We are for everything blender.
As you correctly discovered there is no good SE site now.
I would say try on Graphic Design they do have some animation questions using after effects and adobe animate, which are similarish.

Thanks for the help. I will accept but I also agree with @gandalf3 comments, in addition to your answer, that creating a new SE is also a possible way forward.


text:
Frequently Asked Questions on Blender Stack Exchange
Anyone who's been around this site for a while, has seen the never ending cycle of the same questions being asked over and over again.
Users hardly ever use the search function... and the search engine... is not good at all...
Just like there is a resources page, should there be a FAQ one linking to the highest quality posts?
I propose having 20 to 25 FAQ to start and find out their usefulness.
The list could work as a form of troubleshooting list either for users to find their own answers or for folks writing answers looking for a known duplicate.
Propposed format:

Commonly asked problem/question as header.
Possible causes of the issue.
Each one of the causes can be then linked to a post that has an accepted or high quality answer that explains the issue and solution in detail.

That proposal was from back when SE sites had FAQ pages. It's now called the Help Center. Perhaps we could make a page in the Help Center to collect all the frequent questions, canonical answers and other resources.

The difference is that this shouldn't be about the rules for the site but questions about blender that get asked every other day. Things like "My render is blank", "armature deforms strangely" "enable GPU" "background images" "audio and video don't match" "boolean not working" etc.

Here is a good start for an FAQ. "Ugly black artifacts on my model!" - Z fighting. "I can see through my model!" - Normals. "Cross hair thing keeps moving and I can't select anything" - Right click noob. "I keep pressing 'p' and I can't start my game" your in blender internal or cycles. change to the BGE. "My render is all black" - add a lamp. "Buy overpriced sneakers" - flag as spam. "I have no idea what to ask, but I have a problem" - you certainly do. "How do I make my model look as cool as gandalf's test scenes?" - add a Suzanne and be Gandalf.

The SE way is to immediately mark these as duplicates and encourage people to search but as usual since we have a stricter scope (software), I could see this being useful.

Possible duplicate of Helpful post reference index

@Gwenn i feel like merging this with the other list would just result in clutter. The other list seems more resource/theory oriented while this is about very specific issues and found solutions.

Somewhat related: I created a similar list a little while ago for answers I find myself linking to a lot.  (i.e. in-site "see he for more information on " links.)  It didn't get much attention though.

@Gwenn - I added that link (http://meta.blender.stackexchange.com/questions/867/helpful-post-reference-index) to the "FAQ" answer below

Proposed FAQ questions
Feel free to edit:
Where can I find links to learn blender

Resources for blender

Black artifacts / Strange shadows / Some faces are black or darker than others

Z fighting caused by overlapping geometry, remove doubles (Alternative answer here)

Normals are flipped

Not enough transparent bounces when using transparent materials in cycles

Z-fighting caused by depth precision on very large distances between clipping points

Pink textures

Missing Textures, Images not packed or file path broken

Texture coordinates set incorrectly

Trying to use blender materials on cycles render

GPU Rendering

Enable GPU

OpenCL in AMD, (non Nvidia) Cards

Older Nvidia GPUs (lower than cuda 2.0)

Render is blank

There are no lights in scene

Objects disabled for Render in Outliner (camera icon)

Strips in VSE and Sequencer box enabled in Post-Processing

Objects in different layer or not part of the render Layers

Camera view blocked by other objects

Active camera set incorrectly or aiming in a different direction

An object in the scene has been set as camera

Output node in compositor disconnected

Film exposure is set to 0 (Cycles)

The scene is so out of focus that there is no recognizable image

Scene was created using cycles and will render all gray in blender render

A COMPILATION OF MANY OF THESE ANSERS found here

My cycles render is fuzzy/noisy

use denoise

Render Samples set too low

Samples set on render layer override regular sample settings.

Lights or environment not set to multiple importance. Aditionally this link

render resolution is set to less than 100%

Use branched path tracing instead of the default samples

Differences between Renderers: Cycles, Blender Internal, and Game Engine

Cycles vs internal vs game engine
How is Cycles different from Blender Internal?
Cycles vs Internal for a small animated outdoor scene?

Armature deforms strangely
Boolean not working

A comprehensive answer of boolean issues on this post

Non-Manifold geometry

Inconsistent normals

Booleans don't work with curves or text

The scale for the object uses negative values

Missing background images

3D view not in camera perspective any of the preset orthogonal views

Background images not visible in render mode

Background images not present in final render

VSE audio and video don't match

Framerate of imported video and blender project mismatch

Codec issues with GOP size

Audio using different frequency than that of project

video compressed using variable framerate

Video needs to be cached before playback

AV Sync has to be enabled for playback

See through an object/Object missing parts

Clip distance set incorrectly for 3D viewport or camera

Normals are Flipped

Object not rendering but visible in preview

Rendering is disabled for object in outliner (camera icon)

Object in layer not included in render layer

Ray visibility to camera disabled

Imported object has no texture

Textures were not packed

Imported OBJ object has no .mtl associated

there are no materials assigned to the mesh,

the .obj importer does not create materials in Cycles.

Exported object is missing textures

Exported format is not compatible with blender materials

Bake Textures

Moving selected vertices/edges/faces, moves unselected ones as well

Proportional Editing is enabled Disable pressing O Alternative answer.

Switched to/from Cycles to Internal materials are gone.

how is cycles different than internal?

convert materials from internal to cycles

Mix different scenes

Mirror Modifier creates a gap or a crease in the middle of the model.

Mirror modifier should be used before the subsurf modifier in the stack.

There are interior faces on the model at the edge of the mesh

How to combine Smooth and Sharp Edges?

Use Edge Split Modifier
Add supporting geometry
use Creases or bevel modifier

If I had a dollar for every z-fighting question.

@iKlsR you would have about 10 dollars :)

Maybe if we start linking some of the best answers under the heading we can accomplish somethig together.

@David I was going to say that, I'd say it's probably close to 2 dozen tho. That's just a specific title.

Just added my answer for objects not being visible in render, but are there in preview

Surprised no one has mentioned the many questions about cycles render noise

Just a tip for anyone editing this list you can use the share button below any post to get a shorter URL. Also you can simply past the link in here and SE will render the question title. (Which will make the links a lot cleaner and easier to change.)

Added "Differences between Renderers: Cycles, Blender Internal, and Game Engine" thanks to links provided by David and Gandalf3


text:
I would like to improve my question reputation
I asked a question on the Blender Stack Exchange that received many downvotes.  I think it is because I was making more of a "request" without showing I had worked on the problem myself.  I truthfully did not have any idea how to start!  The answer is very helpful and I learned from it, and i am sure others will continue to benefit from it.  I care about my reputation and would like to somehow undo my negative score on that question.  Can this be done?
Thank you!

You would be better to answer questions and ask questions than to worry about a past few negative points.  One day you will receive more points than expected for some action.  Its very entertaining that for larger Stack Exchange sites people can earn 300 points for a single question.

@atomicbezierslinger  Thank you for encouragement !

I assuming you are referring to: How to make glowing particles, with a solid glowing center. Well there is not much you can do to change the votes on that question now.
You could edit it to make it a bit clearer what you mean, specify that you are looking for the particle and material settings to make that particle effect.
Yet even then the people who originally DVed probably won't be back to your question to change their votes.
However you shouldn't get too bothered by the down votes. You lost 6 rep from the three DVs, but gained 5 from the one UV, and two more from accepting the answer. So net on that question you actually gained one rep (so far).
I personally don't know why that question got so many DVs. We have had many others that simply ask how to do X, and are well received. For example:
How can I make a wrought iron basket?
How to animate morphing a rectangular plane into a sphere
How did I make this soccer-ball/honeycomb shape?
How to make a jelly material?
So in the end, no there is no way to "really undo" the negative rep.


text:
What is the best practice for allowing someone time to give an answer?
I suppose this is a straight forward enough question, but I see this happen from time to time. Someone will ask a question, and then in the comments, a user will give a suggestion, or ask "have you tried 'XYZ?". Then not much longer after, an answer is posted and voted up and accepted with this suggestion or query for information starting with something like "as mentioned by..." or something similar by yet another user.
So my question is, do we have a generally accepted best practice for giving someone time to give a good answer if they have posted a viable solution in the comments to a problem, or do we not? I would expect that most people with the intent of answering questions have  read the comments as well as the question in detail, so would likely have seen if someone had just given the same idea, and in my mind should be given a chance to answer and earn the reputation deserved for a good answer.

Related: http://meta.blender.stackexchange.com/q/436/599.

The person chooses an comment submission or answer submission. You stated [should be given a chance to answer].  What do you meant by that?  Is that an amount of time?

Once or twice I have mentioned the comment author by name who may have enhanced or inspired an answer in any temporal order.  A useful comment may come after an initial answer is submitted.   The comment does not always come before.  On one hand many comments are useful.  On the other hand comments may not be a direct answer to the question. If someone takes time and energy and 5 comments and creates a better summation as an [answer] than the comments then I say [Bravo].  Having excessively clear questions or answers is not a problem at BSE.  Attribution is easy to achieve if necessary.

Remember that answers can be downvoted, while comments cannot. This makes answers a riskier type of post if you don't have time to explain the answer well. I have encountered many questions that I wanted to answer in detail but due to time constraints I left a comment instead. If another user uses the info from the comment to post an answer that's perfectly fine. But if we post a comment with the intention of answering later, we should state that intention, like "I'll post an answer soon, but for now..." and in that case I think others should give the commenter time to answer.

I think it's important that all users at stackexchange have the mentally that it's not all about earning points. It's all about helping your fellow human beings on the topic. So usually I have no problem with people using my comment as answers ... as long as it's a clear answer to the initial question. I hope we can all have that mentally so that we are all focus on the questions and not all about points.

I asked a similar question a long time ago: What to do with questions which have been answered in comments?.
From the accepted answer:

I would try to notify the user first to give them the opportunity to answer the post and get the reputation. If they don't respond in a few days then answer it.

Note that this was written way back while we were in beta and only got a few questions a day. Since then the site has picked up a lot more traffic and generally runs at a faster pace. So maybe instead of waiting a few days, it's fair to wait a few hours instead.
That said, I wouldn't expect other users to always follow this sort of etiquette. It's a nice gesture (I always try to do this), but be prepared to graciously forgive others for "stealing" your comment answers.
If that happens, consider writing up an answer anyway, even if their answer uses all the same techniques which you planned to answer with. A new explanation of the same thing can sometimes make all the difference. In other words, the more answers the merrier.

I totally agree. It's a bit frustrating as an asker to see someone make a comment that COULD be a really great answer if they'd take the time to write it up and add the detail I need to fully understand their answer. As an asker and and answerer I'll often say something like "That'd make a great answer! Write that up!" Other times, if it's clear that they've had a chance to make an answer my thinking is "getting your answer stolen is the cost of not using the site properly."

When someone posts an answer saying the same thing as someone else's comment I usually like to leave a comment referring them to that meta post.

I think this makes perfect sense, I had missed the post linked despite searching for something to clarify. Nonetheless, it is understandable that not everyone will follow the same etiquette across the site.

I personally feel as if someone does post someones comment as an answer, they should not get angry or upset, as it's not a game, it's a Q&A site.


text:
Where to upload files other than .blend files and images?
Let's say I want to upload my blend file but due to it being linked to other blend files I have to upload the linked blend files too. blend-exchange doesn't let you upload more than one file at a time neither can you upload .zip files. The addon from ideasman's answer only creates a .zip and doesn't really pack the files into the blend file. So should you use services like Dropbox or Google Drive for uploading a zip file (containing several blend files)? Or where should you upload it?
This question refers to my question. Since the question is about a problem with linked files I can't leave them out. When posting the question with the Dropbox link I knew that links from external sources are not welcome but I couldn't find another way.

hmm, very good question. This is an interesting edge case that I had not thought of. We normally would say something like "just create a small example file to show the problem" but for file linking you need more then one file.

This could be a hassle, but couldn't you upload each linked blend separately? as long as they are all downloaded to the same directory it should work. All other kinds of linked data can be packed into the .blend.

@GiantCowFilms You're right, this would work, but it would be more work for both, the one asking and the one answering. Besides that there can be other cases as well. For example if you want to upload a 3D model that isn't a .blend but something like .obj


text:
Non-mod Steward Badge: Keep Reviewing or Don't
For those of you who don't know, I have been very active on the Review Queues lately, achieving Top Reveiwer of the Day almost every day by a wide margin. This means that I am currently 80 First Posts away from a Steward badge.
It occurs to me that I will likely be the first non-moderator to achieve this badge, and this sparked a question in my mind. It makes sense for someone like David to continue reviewing long past his Steward badges because he is a moderator. However, as a non-mod, perhaps I should step aside at 1000 and let other users reach 1000 themselves.
Should I continue reviewing past 1000 reviews or should I step aside to let other users achieve what I might soon?

Why limit yourself? If you feel that you can contribute to make this a better site, GO FOR IT!

Granted getting a gold badge was a good incentive there's no reason to stop. Tho not in the diamond sense you are a moderator as you have certain privileges the average user doesn't and as such should exercise them as such. This site is curated and run by us the community, not everyone will set such a goal and as long as you're helping to clear the queues and guide new users, that is always welcome and appreciated. Perhaps set a new steward goal in another queue, some users stick to specific tags or queues. I personally focus on flags (lots), troublesome users, low quality content and spam.

Note that badges are mainly there to encourage good community service.  IMO nothing should be done just to get a badge, doing something for the sole purpose of getting a badge is called farming and is forbidden.  Badges are there to show off devotion to the site and community, they're not "objectives".  The purpose of reviewing is to enrich the site, not to get a badge, so by all means, go on reviewing!

1000 reviews,  19 800 more to do...

step aside to let other users achieve

As you may have noticed, I've done a bit of reviewing over the past few days, since I reached the 500 limit. Just so you know, I'm not trying to compete. :) I'm on long term sick leave, and have quite a lot of time on my hands.

@DuaneDibbley I have, but I would encourage you to continue. As long as your taking your time, go review everything, if you want ;-) p.s. Get better!

Thanks for both the encouragement and the well wishes. :-)

First off congratulations on doing so many reviews and so quickly! Steward badge in 7 months is quite something!
So long as you are doing good reviews, and not just hammering on the buttons to get the badge, then there is no reason at all that you should stop*.
If you want to keep reviewing, then keep reviewing!
(Top reviewers on SO have over 45K reviews in one queue!)
SE actually does has review limits (20 per queue per day), that is all SE does to rate limit users; there is not max cap.
There is no reason why you should sop at 1000 reviews. I do not think SE ever designed it so that users feel that they should stop. (That would be quite counter intuitive) this is a community run site, if the most active users stop running the site what will happen?
Fun fact, moderators as part of the job description are not required to do reviews.
That by design, as part of the reputation system, is left to the general users so the mods only have to deal with the emergency situation stuff AKA "flags."

* Only reason to stop is so David ♦ could remain in first :)

Just wanted to say thanks for this great answer and letting you know that I will continue reviewing past 1,000 (just earned my Steward Badge; Yay!). I'm not sure I'll ever pass 45k, as that would be nuts, especially considering the size of our site. Once again, thanks!


text:
Add blender ID as a login option for BSE
On the SE login page could we get a option to login with a Blender ID? kind of like in this picture:

There are other non-offical blender sites (graphicall, rightclickselect) that are already using the blender ID system for their logins.
It seems that BSE would be a great fit for it. SE already has the login with other sites option, and BSE is all about blender.
Now I know this is rather unlikely to happen, the login is shared across all SE sites, and BSE is the only place it would make sense. However I wanted to put the idea out there.

What are the actual benefits of being able to sign in with the blender ID as opposed to other logins?

@RayMairlot its blender's login, with ties through all blender services (and now in blender its self). Doesn't it seem that if there is a standard blender login a fully blender site should use it? As an aside, what are the benefits to login in with AOL?! as apposed to just creating a password for SE? Convenience through the community's already used sites.

No, I don't think there is a reason to add it if it doesn't actually do anything. Sites like blender.today use the blender ID so it can use my name and email address, add-ons use it so I can access textures on the blender cloud. My point is, they use the Blender ID because it adds functionality, not just for the sake of having another way of logging it. And no, I don't see the purpose of having all those other login methods, but that doesn't mean we should add another.


text:
How should I flag tutorial requests?
I recently came across a question that is nothing but a request for a tutorial. I looked into flagging it, but I couldn't decide what flag to use.
Off topic gives me the choices of bug report, too localized, blatantly off topic, and belongs on another SE. The closest one there would be too localized, but that doesn't feel quite right.
The question is certainly not unclear. I wouldn't say it's opinion based either. Too broad perhaps?
Is there a community consensus about how to flag these?

Localized is a good goto if you're unsure I should think. How many people want to model and texture a realistic big bird for example.

@iKlsR I for one done. :) Thanks.

I will talk to the other mods and see if we can get a close reason something like

Blatantly off-topic (this question has nothing to do with blender, or is off topic for this site).

Until then you can, vote to close with a custom reason such as "This is a tutorial request." Or in your case flag to close. Flag > should be closed... > off-topic because... > Other.

While I agree with having a tutorial close reason (though it will need very careful thought put into phrasing and definition, as IMO some kinds of broader questions are good), I don't think a "blatantly off topic" reason is a good idea. Yes, some questions fall under such a category (and no other), but I think close reasons should always give a reason for closing (besides "this question is bad and needs to die"). Corner cases where no preset reasons apply are what the "other" option is for.

I'm not understanding how your suggested close reason is better than those that already exist. Wouldn't it just be easier to have a really obvious 'this is a tutorial request' reason?

@RayMairlot My thought for that wording was that we have no current CV reasons to close questions that are on this list (except for bugs). While a "This is a tutorial request" reason defiantly is clear, I thought making it broader would be more useful in more cases.

I see, I didn't realise you were aiming for something broader. In that case, I don't think "this question has nothing to do with blender" is fitting as some of the question types on that list are to do with blender, they're just not good questions (tutorial requests) or questions that can easily be answered (compiling blender).

The problem is that there is no reason named "Other". There are the four that I listed. Perhaps something to do with my rep not being high enough for some flags yet, or possibly reviews and flags look slightly different..

@RayMairlot We have limited close reasons so we have to make them as wide as their scope phrase can cover while still toting some specificity. There has been a gap for a while and I think outright saying a question is off-topic and linking to our meta is an ok way to proceed. The phrasing can be perfected but the idea is a good one.


text:
Answering OP's situation vs. actual question?
We get a fair number of questions here that are something like this:

How to do X

While trying to create/do Y I tried doing X and couldn't figure out how to do it.  I tried various ways of doing X and nothing worked.  How can I do X in Blender?

Even though the question is how to do X, I often see answers on another way to do Y that doesn't have anything to do with X at all.  These answers are often upvoted, and not infrequently even accepted.
I have mixed feelings about such answers.

On one hand, the OP's original problem is fixed and end goal achieved.  The OP is happy and the answer may even help some future potential visitors with similar situations and trains of thought as the OP.
But on the other hand, such an answer doesn't really answer the question at all, it just addresses some backstory/context specific to the OP.  After all, if I was looking for how to do X in my own situation, I would probably want an answer on how to actually do X, not Y.  And if I wanted to do Y, I would be searching for how to do Y, not X.

Personally, I tend to lean towards the latter viewpoint (though thinking back I have posted a few answers like this myself), but I don't really have any idea what do do with such answers either.
So do we (or SE in general) have any guidelines on what our policy is with regards to answers giving different ways of going about the OP's situation instead of answering the actual question?  Are these answers OK, encouraged, or discouraged?  What should be done with such answers?

To be clear, I am talking about situations in which the question is actually asking how to do X, the OP just also mentions to some degree that in their project, they are trying to do Y.

Found this somewhat related post on global meta.

If it turns out they're asking about x, but really mean y and all the answers point to y, then maybe their question should be edited to reflect that.

Related: http://meta.blender.stackexchange.com/q/1119/599

Answering a question is not just a maths operation
Hi,
I think that the X you mention would rarely be X in reality. It is much more likely to be Xa, Xe, Xn, ..., and so on. In my opinion, a question/problem is a scenario not just one variable. Therefore, I am inclined to support @aliasguru's answer above.
PS: I would have just commented but I do not have enough rep points.:))))

Introduction
Personally, I'm coming from a Design background. At University, one thing that we were taught is the design way of dealing with problems (or questions, in BSE terms):

Solving problems in essence means freeing yourself from the problem

(I hope the translation somehow makes sense, the original quote is German). In other words, if you really want to solve a tricky issue, sometimes you need to step back and rethink the issue itself. This leads to 'thinking out of the box'.
As an example, we were given the following scenario:

Each cigarette lighter is suffering from the same issue. Whenever you'll try to light a cigarette in strong wind conditions, the wind would extinguish the flame before the cigarette burns. Come up with solutions to this.

At first, you think of the problem as a flame being extinguished by wind. The solutions you come up with are all kinds of shields, tubes that surround the flame, higher power fuels, whatnot. Then, you run out of ideas.
At this point, you look at the top quote again, and realise something: The question made you think in a certain way. You were thinking of flames, not cigarettes! The problem to you always was the flame going out, while the actual issue was to light a cigarette in stormy conditions. BOOM creativity and ideas come back. The best solution in the end was to spawn a mini electric lightning (like those devices you see in action movies sometimes do put people out), as this one doesn't care about wind speed at all, and will also work indoors by the way. So, to forget about flames was necessary to get to a solution.
Why am I saying all this?
For me, it is valid to provide alternative solutions to questions, as long as the essence of the question is answered. Think about it: The OP has decided to ask the community because he or she navigated himself into a dead end many times. The solution he's looking is inspired by his own background, and many users have little experience yet in how to tackle 3D geometry, and also polymodelling. Some have a NURBS modelling background, and still think in that terms. So they tend to think their way, and that might be the reason why they fail to achieve X. A question which solves the actual issue, but not necessarily answers the question literally, can open much wider corridors and inspire new users in a very powerful way.
That's why for me, such answers are encouraged.

My issue with this train of thought is that even though the OP may come off completely satisfied, the purpose of SE is to create a valuable resource for everybody who uses Blender, and knowing how to do Y won't help most future people looking for a way to do X.

Sometimes there's an obvious end goal as stated by an OP, the OP has nothing invested in doing it any specific way other than what works and is a useful technique for future projects (like non-destructive editing where possible).
I think a good analogy is the problem of 'be careful what you wish for'. Do you really want the literal answer to your question, or do you want to get an answer which takes a different but educated perspective into account.
Part of the Zen of BSE is to ask more information in the comments before answering. Often we have to unpack the information if the OP glosses over important details, knowing how they got into a situation in the first place can help suggest a line of answers. It's not unheard of that a new user takes a very roundabout approach to modelling something, I think we do them a disservice (and future readers) if we don't take a step back and give the alternative view.

That was and is my intention as well. A good answer brings you further, enables you to see new horizons. It reminds me of a question asked here on how to model a piano key a certain way. The way the questions (there was more than one thread) were asked clearly showed this persons mind was so far trained in Solid Modelling. The task X was so narrow that anything except booleans was not accepted as an answer. If in this case you keep on answering X, this person never gets the idea of polymodelling.

@aliasguru yes we have to use our discretion sometimes, even if the OP doesn't want to hear about it. A group of us take a step back and look at what the OP is trying to achieve and how, and those of us with more experience will try to persuade (with reasoning) a different approach. therefor only answer X as X if Y isn't a much better solution, else hint at Y.

we don't get that many unhappy people, but if they are unhappy they tend to be more vocal , and they throw stones into our zen garden :)

X should be X
I agree with you on that point and often I feel that some people see SE/SO as some kind of game where the goal is to collect all of the achievements. So answering Y instead of X, as long as it is mentioned in the question, seems to be legit to proceed faster.
BlenderSE's goal should not only to be a Q&A or a FAQ, it should try to deliver quality content. But most of the time the problem is not necessarily on the side of the person who delivers an answer.
My problem with this is actually the exact opposite. We all know and love people who drop those annoying one-liners, right?
When X actually isn't X
Sometimes I catch myself answering X instead of Y, which would be the actual answer to the OP's question and most of the time the reason for this is that people don't give all the needed information in their questions, like ...

what render engine they intend to use
what's the purpose of their model (still render, animation, game asset)
what have they tried already

...in short: Well... relevant stuff.
So, you went through the process of creating a detailed-as-necessary answer on how to create a nice looking thingy for a still render in cycles and then you read the comment "Yeah, right... but dude, how does that apply to my question? I want to create a game asset".
Actually I remember at least one case where I completely lost any interest (aka being p'd off a little) in correcting my answer after such a comment and just let it stay there as it was. Some days after that it got UVd by someone who had the same problem but actually wanted to do a still render instead of a game asset. Problem solved, the upvoter was happy, I was happy again, case closed.
Quality Content
Quality content comes not out of thin air.
If someone answers Y instead of X for the sole purpose of gaining reputation we could at least comment that and remember him to stay on topic.
We get a lot if trivial questions that are answered in nearly every "Blender for Beginners" tutorial you can find on youtube, vimeo or (for those who prefer to read) on the various blogs and websites that pop up when you feed "Blender for Beginners" to google. In my opinion those questions should not be answered on BlenderSE directly, at least not for the sole purpose of "grinding" (to stick with game terminology) reputation.
There are quite some tutorial requests on how to create complete scenes, building game assets and exporting them to unity/UE4 and the like. Instead of answering those questions here over and over again or redirecting the OPs to related questions, there should be a possibility for us to create that kind of tutorials somewhere within BlenderSE or maybe outside of it.
I also suggest that we should improve the help section and in particular the "How do I ask a good question?" part. That certainly won't prevent vague questions and annoying one-liners but at least we wouldn't have to write the whole sermon into a comment over and over again. Those new users who are really committed to learning Blender would certainly try to adapt to the ruleset and over time become valuable contributors themselves.
Reviewing
We should encourage (not only, but especially) new users a little more to review their own questions and adding relevant stuff to them instead of writing it into the comment section. And we should quit answering vague questions for the purpose of grinding reputation.
If they won't do it and the topic seems to be interesting and important enough to us, we should do it on their behalf.

Mostly agreed (although it's maybe quite difficult to differentiate between simple helping and gaining rep), but what does it mean "to stay OT" ?

@MrZak - It should mean "on topic", I just realized, that  OT is the abbreviation for "off topic"... ;-)


text:
Reputation for new users
I was trying to understand how the reputation works and I don't quite get it. It is not the first time, that I see users who ask their first question, don't have other activities (like answering questions) and having 100+ reputation. Is transferred from other websites like stackoverflow?

Extra 100 is only awarded to the StackExchange Rich and Powerful Elite (tm) ;-P

Kind of.
Reputation isn't shared between sites, but once you've earned 200 reputation on one SE site, you automatically receive an "association bonus" of 100 reputation on any SE site.
This includes sites you are already a part of (including the site where you earned the 200 reputation), and sites you join later.


text:
Move posts from game development to blender?
Some old posts before the blender SE like https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/18312/how-can-i-see-the-height-of-an-object-within-blender?rq=1 don't really belong in the game dev SE. Is there a procedure for moving them, or marking them as duplicates?

I was a bit surprised to see you do not have an account on game dev. What prompted this question?

Lol, I can see why you are confused, @david I googled a blender problem and was surprised when it came up on game dev

In short you can't, they are stuck on game dev.
Any question older then 60 days can not be migrated. (Just a hard limit SE has coded into their system.)
Now for questions newer then 60 days. Most of the time site's migration paths will not be set up, so you can not simply vote to close because it should be on another site, and choose the correct site. (Mods can do that.)
Instead, you can flag for moderator attention with a custom message. Say why the question is off topic, and what site you are asking it be moved to (put the whole http://blender.stackexchange.com so it gets automatically turned in to a link).
I've flagged on a few blender questions on SO exactly like that.
This is the message I used on one of my flags.

This question has nothing to do with programing, and should be moved to blender.stackexchange.com


text:
Wow... here, I feel I give a great/complete answer, but.. the OP does not react
Discussion, pure discussion !
Does someone knows why (sometimes, but often) the answers you feel to be the best (and the more time consuming, and often the more accurate) "statically" are the worst received ?
Human matter, surely... or... the less a subject is specialized (and so the more simple it is), the more it is useful ?
Open discussion (if this matters to someone)... not about the rep points in the points sens, but much more about how you feel BSE answers to be perceived by readers from this point of view.

If this relates in part to my question, I do really like your answer, but I'm also very busy and have not had time to properly read over it and accept it. I will at some point, do not fear!

@ShadyPuck, no no... this was more general, no worries

@ShadyPuck, by the way, I won't be connected to BSE for the next several days. So about your question, if you comment and have no answer, don't be surprised.

I feel this way a lot too, but I have learned that usually in the long run those posts will generally accrue more votes.  Many of my longest, most detailed posts got very little votes and comments at first, but now are some of my top answers.  Looking back, I noticed that six out of my top ten answers are ones I remember didn't get many votes at first.

What does OP stand for?

OP stands for Original Poster. I know, acronyms are frustrating. I use this site to help me find the meanings... http://www.acronymfinder.com/Slang/OP.html

@AnsonSavage Stack Exchange Glossary - Dictionary of Commonly-Used Terms

Do you mean "statistically?"

@cat Original Poster

@AnsonSavage I'm aware, I just thought you might find that interesting reading.

Think of the OP as your immediate target, then the rest of the blender users in the world.
At first the reaction will be from the OP, over time more people will see it, and you very likely will get more positive comments.
Now because the OP is the first target, the OP is the one that dictates the response you get - good bad, or none.
Keep in mind what kind of question you are answering, is it a simple thing where the OP glances at your answer, presses the button you told him to and then never comes back? Or a much more detailed step by step answer where the OP may have further questions?
In a few cases, new users, simple answers, or migrated questions, I don't expect to hear back.
I can definitely relate to your feelings, after writing a long answer just to have it be silently ignored, feels almost like a waste of time.
But it is not.
Even if the OP never sees it, hundreds or thousands of other people will see it and probably learn something from your answer.
Try not to get discouraged (even from a 0 UVed good answer), there are just some times where you will never hear back from the OP - no comments or any accept vote.
That just makes the positive comments you do get all the more special.

To all users reading the site, whenever you find a post that helped you, UV it.
It is like giving the OP a hand shake and saying "thanks." It's just a small thing but it helps keep this site going.

Wish I could +1 again for the last paragraph

Thanks David. But there is another aspect. An example here http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/55355/how-to-model-a-square-starting-with-one-vertex/55359#55359. Very UVed for a so simple thing (that's part of my question too), compared to http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/60562/ellipse-construction-advice/60624#60624. But well, let's say, that's life... I understand your though, thanks for the answer (don't wast more time !!)

@lemon in the two examples in your comment, that is normal. :) A few reasons. The first was a hot network question, it also is a simple thing, every "new" user will get something from that. However the long detailed answer has a very limited scope. (how many people are looking to programmatically make an ellipse?) That is the big difference. No offense, but I did not even read your ellipse answer, it is just not something I care about now. That is where the big vote discrepancy comes from.

People who react negatively to well thought out, well explained, unbiased responses to their questions are not people who are asking questions to learn... They are asking questions to hear what they want to hear. These people are not worth it IMO... If you are asking a question, you better be enough of a critical thinker to accept the responses you receive (as long as those responses are also supportive and well explain/genuinely helpful).
I am new on here and very new to blender but not new to how forums work... These people are everywhere, "Fix my problem right now and your response better be exactly what I want to hear and be super easy to do or else I'm going to scream at you." They are the ones that get a new hobby and throw a hissy-fit because they find out they aren't good at it and are not willing to learn.

This topic seems to be strongly related to Why does no one vote and I believe that most of my explanation from there will also apply to this one.
One of the major problems with this is SE's possibility to post anonymously. Anonymous users (aka userXXXXX) don't log in, so they won't receive notifications when there is new activity in and around their question. I almost feel like these people are using SE as some kind of chat. Post your question, sit and wait for s.o. to answer it, rinse and repeat.
Actually I really wonder how many anonymous posters already asked more than 10 questions without feeling the need to create an account.

Related yes, but, the question is also about the ratio between the effort/complexity of the answer compared to the attention this answer receives. Like saying : much more people feel concern by simple answers

@lemon - yes, Blender is getting quite a lot of attention among Beginners lately. Not long ago those people would have chosen 3dsmax or whatever to approach 3D modeling, because it seams "easier" to understand and also more versatile. Those people might not have the slightest idea of what we are talking about thus favoring the simple answers that solve their problems. That doesn't mean we should quit giving complex in-depth answers.


text:
Can we rethink requesting MathJaX?
I know this has already been brought up and (sort of) rejected, but that was over a year ago and I think it deserves a new discussion.
Computer graphics is an inherently mathematical subject (we do even have a mathematics tag).  As raytracing, shading, and procedural textures are some of my specialties I regularly write questions and answers dealing with vectors and other heavily mathematical topics.  So I often find myself wishing I could include prettyprint mathematical typesetting in my answers.
Currently I usually include mathematical equations by either typing them single-file in code blocks or doing the typesetting in MS Word or Mathematica and taking a screenshot.  Both of these are horribly inefficient and/or hard to read.
So here are my questions:

Does anyone else think being able to natively typeset mathematical expressions would be valuable to Blender.SE?
What would be required to enable MathJaX mathematical typesetting for Blender.SE?
Why would we not want MathJaX?
Do we even still have the option of adding new features now that we have graduated?

This was eventually implemented in 2018, per this post.

I'll answer your bullet points in order.

Does anyone else think being able to natively typeset mathematical expressions would be valuable to Blender.SE?

Yes I asked for it originally, and still think it would be useful.

What would be required to enable MathJaX mathematical typesetting for Blender.SE?

The SE devs set all that up, from our perspective not much. They just add a library (MathJax) and a bit of js.

Why would we not want MathJaX?

The overhead of adding another library to load. It can make pages slower, and the rendering of the math can be slower still.
For 90ish% of our questions it would do nothing.

Do we even still have the option of adding new features now that we have graduated?

Sure! There is a feature-request tag just for asking for things like this; and the meta is the place to suggest them. If you look at SE's update log they are always changing things.

The overhead in loading MathJax seems trivial. It also renders fairly fast in most browsers. "If taken from the MathJax CDN, the actual (compressed) data transferred for MathJax.js will be about 14.4KB. [...]minimal configurations can be as small as 3.7KB." see 1st para of http://docs.mathjax.org/en/latest/misc/faq.html

When you need it - it's incredibly useful. There is math everywhere in Blender (e.g.) and yet right now it's hard to write enough of an equation to talk/ask/answer about it.

I needed it today for this question so I used it in another stackexchange site and then pasted a screenshot.


text:
Chrome bookmarklet to convert old api page links to api_current
I'm not sure if this is the appropriate place to put such a thing, but many of us paste links to docs and older Questions should perhaps be updated whenever it makes sense. This makes that slightly more convenient..

I use this a lot, maybe others will find some use for it
javascript:(function()%7Bvar current %3D window.location %2B ""%3Bvar newUrl %3D current.replace(%2Fpython_api_(.%2B)%5C%2F%2Fgi%2C 'python_api_current%2F')%3Bwindow.location%3DnewUrl%7D)()

the non mangled version:
javascript:(
    function(){
        var current = window.location + "";
        var newUrl = current.replace(/python_api_(.+)\//gi, 'python_api_current/');
        window.location = newUrl
    })()

Installation
To install, go to Other Bookmarks > Add Page > URL and paste the single line javascript at the top, then pick a useful name for the bookmark.

Maybe add a quick "install" line for some users. Useful, thanks.

i might be overlooking something but it appears that bookmarklet link creation is prohibited on SE , which totally makes sense.


text:
Should I be flagging "thanks" comments?
I've seen a lot of "thanks" and "me too" comments (even though whenever you add a comment BSE tells you to not leave such comments), especially from the OP.
Should I be flagging these as "not constructive" or "too chatty"? Or are these supposed to just be silently ignored as long as we don't see too many? One could argue that they are serving some purpose by showing that the OP's question has been completely solved, but that's what the accept button is for.
Here is an example:
How do I create a reflective white material?
Another two examples from today (same question, same comment, OP accepted neither answer):
Mesh artifacts only on render
Mesh artifacts only on render

I think it's good when someone says thanks/+1 and makes a comment why they're thankful. Not in the sense of 'thanks you solved my problem' or '+1 for finishing my homework assignment,'  rather, more along the lines of 'thanks [for answering X], I was having trouble also understanding the related Y & Z.'

Should +1 and thanks comments be a declined flag?
Should a "thank you" comment be flagged?
Should “Thank you” comments be flagged? (really is a separate post)
If you read some of the posts on the meta, you will quickly see two things.

Yes you can flag a "Thanks" comments as Too chatty.
"Thanks" comments are not a big deal.

I personally don't going around deleting many comments.
However when you flag any comment that really says nothing about the post, and is just "thanks" I will definitely delete that.
I make a distinction in "thanks" comment where it goes on to say more. A comment like that (examples below) can really mean something to the poster, and can add value. It is different, and I think should be left.

Gandalf, when I posted this I didn't realisticly expect to get such a helpful answer so soon and in such a clear way! It solved my issue exactly as intended and I am impressed how fast you solved it, you got good blender logic I guess! Thanks a lot, I will definitely keep coming to this forum for future problems. I would upvote your answer but I need 15 reputation, which I don't have yet :) Anyway, thanks so much and good luck with your own projects!

- Eegs
However this comment (I did not delete just for this example) adds nothing and certainly could be deleted.

thanks that is also very helpful

- Farhan Anam
Another consideration to take in to account is whether or not the comment is blocking more useful content. If there are other comments, especially if there is a Show more comments button, then it gets a much higher "Should be deleted" value.

I just flagged such a comment that provides no instructional information, but the flag was declined.

@pycoder sorry, that was me earlier. At the time I was thinking I would leave it there until the post author saw it, but I now see that it was you. Again sorry, I'll delete future "thanks" comments.


text:
Is it ok to ask "cycles render versus blender render" questions?
I was thinking along the lines of bullet points comparing the two. (I'm asking for myself as I don't get the full implications).
Or would this just be too broad?
I found the answer to the 'proposed' FAQ quite useful: Frequently Asked Questions on Blender Stack Exchange
Seems like it would be a good place for such.

See http://blender.stackexchange.com/q/5820/599

Yes you can ask that type of question, its not off topic, but I expect it will get closed as a duplicate of one of the following.
Cycles vs Internal for a small animated outdoor scene?
How is Cycles different from Blender Internal?
Cycles vs internal vs game engine
Do note though, that this type of question if not worded very well, has a tendency to get closed as "primarily opinion-based."
If you already read through those, and still have a question about something specific (bullet points may get it closed as "Too Broad") then absolutely ask away.

@gandalf3 & David - wow, I did search for several variations and didn't find any of those. OK, good, don't want to dup.  Might add your lists of links to the 'FAQ' answer my OP mentions.  Hmmm... obviously, the key to triggering relevant 'related questions' while writing new question's subject line is nailing the right word or two for the search to get specific. Not always so obvious is Blender's jargon, requiring a certain amount of knowledge beforehand. I'd not have guessed "Internal" was the keyword ... I know thanks are frowned on, but, well, you know:_____! :))

Done: added "Differences between Renderers: Cycles, Blender Internal, and Game Engine" in http://meta.blender.stackexchange.com/a/1068/1332


text:
Is it possible to retract your own edit suggestions?
I recently suggested an edit to this question, but while I was doing the edit, someone with enough rep to do immediate edits (Shady Puck) finished his edit. While our edits were similar, his was more extensive and definitely better. I looked for a way to retract my suggestion, but I couldn't find any. Is it possible, and if so, how? And if not, why?
I'm not looking to withdraw my suggested edit in this specific case, as it has already been rejected. I wanted to know if I could have withdrawn it before anyone had acted on it, and, by extension, do so if similar situations should arise in the future. I realised that the edit was unecessary.

No, there is no way for you to cancel your own edit.
You can see your suggested edits.
Then going to the review page for the edit in question, you can see it was rejected.

I'm a little confused about how you edited it what you did.
Shady Puck made his edit at 23:30:19 and you suggested your edit at 23:30:48, surely you could not of made all those changes in 29 seconds.
Now normally when you are editing a post, and another user comes along and updates it, you will get a notice at the top of the screen. SE will not let you submit your edit, because you are now working on an "old" version. (It really stinks when you have a big edit, and can't submit it.)
What I do in situations like that is copy all the text, and title if it is a question, reload the page, see what somebody else did, then make my necessary changes again.

No, I didn't do it 29 seconds. My edits were to the OP's original post, not to Shady Puck's edit. He and I probably started editing around the same time, and he finished before me. And I would have expected it to be automatically rejected by the system, just as you say. Seems to be a glitch somewhere. With only 29 seconds difference, it is quite possible that Shady and I clicked Save Edits almost at the same time. With today's high speed connections, that shouldn't be the case, but nothing is flawless. And I do know how and where to find my edit suggestions.


text:
Is there need for an overall 3D stack exchange?
I have a question about 3d in a different program than blender but there is no stack exchange for just 3d , there is programming and graphics.
Can I ask questions about 3ds max here anyway?
The question is about decimating my model with too many polys in 3ds max.

First, ask this on meta. Second, no. Third, ask about 3DS Max on Graphics SE.

@ShadyPuck 3D stuff is now officially off-topic on Graphics SE.

There is currently a proposal on Area 51 for a general 3D non-programming stack exchange, including questions about 3DS Max.  As of this writing it is in the "commitment" phase, so not usable yet.  It needs more committers before it can move into beta.
Update: The above proposal expired.  After spending a year in a particular stage, Area 51 automatically closes a proposal, but they do so with a nice message explaining that some of the most successful Stack Exchange sites have come from stalled proposals that were closed and restarted from scratch.
So, follow the new 3D Modeling and Animation proposal, and add some good sample questions to it, or just vote on the questions there.  The proposed site has potential benefits even users of this site, since it will cover questions about getting Blender assets in and out of other tools like Substance Painter, Marmoset Toolbag, and other rendering packages and engines.  What happens if an artist exports a model from Blender into Unity 3D and it doesn't look right, and Unity settings need to be tweaked?  You shouldn't ask here about Unity settings.  That's why the new proposal is needed.

I'd like to add that this has been tried once before without success, so if this is an SE site you'd like to see in action, please do consider committing and participating in the private beta. They need everyone they can get

With the upsurge in these creative tools from Quixel, Allegorithmic etc, a bit feasible but again one of my main arguments was that people who use these things are usually trained professionals. Same went for the last proposal that centered around Max, ZBrush etc, you have to shell out serious dollars to get access to these tools as opposed to us (Blender) being free. Also arguable seeing how Graphics.SE runs on PS and AI but that is a different niche and this will probably fail again for the same reason(s), lack of traffic ie.

@iKlsR Yep, points well taken.  Still, a lot of engines are embracing this "free for indie devs" strategy lately, and even the lower-tier 3D pros don't always pay for top-tier tech support.  Several packages have demo periods and educational bundles, etc.  Plus, there are a lot of interoperability questions between tools (including Blender) that experts in a single tool may not be familiar with.  So I think there is a community waiting to happen.

So, the 3d graphics proposal died.. That's big news and not good one.

@MrZak bad news indeed!  But it's part of the Area 51 mechanism, after spending a year in a particular stage, a proposal must be closed and restarted from scratch.  For some sites, such as Mathematica, the rebooted proposal is far more successful than the original.  So don't abandon hope, follow the new proposal and add some good sample questions.


text:
where to put this math repo reference link?
I asked this in chat a few days ago, but had no takers: I came across this amazing math formula repository done by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). I think it could be useful for math + blender phreaks ( like me :))

where should I post it - on meta or on main, e.g ask my own question then answer it?

dlmf.nist.gov
I know exterior links are frowned on because the go stale and die, but this one is an entire subdomain that's been around a bit, so it'll like stay good.  (It didn't seem to fit well under the rubric of Python, although, obviously, you'd code the formulas in python.)

There is no reason to ask a new question (I can't think of how you could ask it and keep it on topic). Posting on meta is not the proper place either.
Because it is just a link (unrelated to blender) there is no place where it can stand alone.
The best place on BSE is our Resource for blender list. You may want to add a new answer, because all the existing categories there don't really fit for a math link.

Thx - David ... isn't this resource thing a systemic issue for all SE sites? I mean, it's not easy to find such. Here, for instance, I searched for as many of them as I could find, and added to one, but had no way to know that the page in your answer is blender.se's defacto main resource page.  Does the SE template have a spot for this, e.g. in the bottom menu, or perhaps at the top left corner (like the short links in chat)?