canadiancow

The small business program or whatever it's called.

YOWgary

If you can't remember the name, and I forgot it even exists, then I feel like my answer met the 95% threshold.

Adam Smith

No worries, we all have those days

As far as I can tell, vBulletin doesn't have the concept of “sub-threads”, which is why stuff tends to get put in to additional posts. I understand what you mean about scrolling though. Would a table of contents in the OP with links to the different topics in posts below fit the bill? The BA Forum Dashboard is a great example – no scrolling required. If you have a minute, would you mind taking a look and seeing whether that fits the bill for what you’re thinking? (No idea whether @Bohemian1 has something quite as graphically fancy in mind, but structurally I think what he’s thinking of is along those lines)

I think this is a good suggestion for @Bohemian1 (possibly + @24left) as the FAQ thread gets refreshed - some way to highlight in that thread which threads contain wikis that may answer the questions that people have? Or would a general notice at the beginning of the OP to look for wikis in the linked threads be sufficient?

All good Nice to have the suggestions, and even if the software doesn’t allow exactly what you had in mind, I think there might be ways to get to the same place… Let us know

I just played around for a few minutes and, as far as I can tell, even as a moderator, there’s no way to either bold the thread title or put it in a different colour. I’ll have to check with IB whether it’s possible.

Certainly something that could work. I guess my question is, for longer threads with lots of info, do people read the OP at all? One of the things I asked early on in the thread is whether it matters what’s in the OP. We’ve certainly heard a number of people say that they may not pay much attention to wikis, but I don’t think anyone has commented on that. I’m wondering, if they’re skipping straight to the latest post, is putting information in the OP (or the OP+2) going to make it any easier to find it?

I hadn’t thought of this before. I guess in my mind, while results are clearly related to each other, those are threads that go stale pretty fast, because once the next quarter rolls around, there’s little attention paid to any previous ones. That would seem to make them naturally suited to new threads each time.

I would like to understand your perspective. Can you help me understand how you see it as a resource? Do you regularly go back and consult threads on previous results? If so, what type of information are you finding useful in those threads?

I know we have a few threads on that type of thing already, and I agree that’s probably a good topic to consolidate. Are there any existing threads that should be merged to start that process?

I had forgotten about that thread (seems you were already working on the topic of this thread several years ago ), and agree it shouldn’t be hard to find the correct thread when they want to know about meals. Would it not be rendered obsolete by a great FAQ/dashboard-type thread though?

I want to keep this thread on topic, so I’m to limit my comments to the following. Times and people change. Some people who have been very active here stop visiting because they stop travelling, or their travel patterns change. FT is also orders of magnitude bigger than it was 15 years ago, and a lot more people are interested in travel, points, etc.

I do still think there’s a sense of community here. I’m sorry to hear you don’t. Come join a Virtual Do and maybe you’ll feel more community-ish (seriously, I'm getting tired of @expert7700 and @canadiancow, could use some new blood )

What we’re trying to do with this thread is respond to some of the feedback we’ve gotten (from the community) and engage with additional members (of the community) to try to make the board as useful to as many people as possible. Then again, maybe that runs counter to your desire for a tight-knit little community… Regardless, we’re trying to make it more enjoyable (or less unenjoyable?) to hang out here, which is about all we can do.

If you have any suggestions on the topic of the thread, please feel free to post them.

I think Internet Brands should hire you

I’m glad someone brought up that thread. Boy does it ever pre-date eUps. And it tries to lump together paper certs/eUps, SAUA, LMUs, op-ups, and some other stuff (take a look at the OP). But somewhere over the years it has become pretty much exclusively the eUp thread.

Given the complexity of the various upgrade programs, I think that’s a topic (upgrading in general) that could be well covered by having separate threads for each type of upgrade (eUp, LMU, bid up, SAUA, etc) and then just a nice list in the FAQ/dashboard thread of the various upgrade threads. Which could probably each have 200-word wikis

Although it seems that many people don’t read wikis…

There are some technical issues with moving large numbers of posts and merging large threads. How useful is the old meal information in your view? If we do annual threads, is there much difference in going back to a 2020 meal thread, or a 2018 one, than just being able to access one master old meal thread that covered 2009 (or whenever) to 2020?

As I’ve reflected on it, I don’t think the meals last all that long – I feel like there are often changes each month. So I feel like keeping a “current menu” thread might be quite a bit of work. @24left, any perspective on frequency of menu refreshes?

Symmetre

Adam - yes, the BA approach to stickies would definitely be an improvement, IMHO. Good suggestion, and thanks - everyone - for taking this on!

Jagboi

Sorry for the delay, I have not been online this last week.

I have used the AC FAQ, but probably not as much as I should. I think the real strength of the BA dashboard is the graphics and classification in the first page. It makes it easy to find what section you're looking for quickly. Obviously you need to know a certain amount of lingo ( like what Avios and Tier points are) but for the most part it's easy for a newcomer to the airline or FF program to narrow down where they need to go quite quickly. I think it's a great index/sorting system to find relevant information quickly.

Once thing I didn't see in the AC FAQ is a seating guide that isn't for J seats. Some of us don't have other peoples money to buy tickets; so travel in Y. There, more than anything seat selection can be very important to make the flight more bearable. I don't know if there is a seatguru equivalent based on FT knowledge, which I find is always better than seatguru. With Covid and other thngs I have not been on a plane in over a year so I have not looked to see if such a guide even exists, but it would be on my wishlish to have such a resource easily findable.

Adam Smith

I'm trying to figure out whether there's a good place to bifurcate the old upgrade thread or whether it needs a new post with some meat to it to kick it off. I recognize that there's some useful historical information in that thread, but so many of the ~1,600 posts are out of date that I'm sure they don't all need to be kept. I had wondered about bifurcating it around when the new chart was implemented last fall, but I don't really see a natural break. And I'm not inclined to go back ~10 years to when eUps replaced paper certs and try to carve all the eUp posts out into a new thread.

Anyone have any thoughts on that one?

Depends also on whether people see value in content-laden OPs vs just having threads start with random posts because those posts were made at a certain time (and of course made by @canadiancow, since he's going to be the "author" of all bifurcated threads ). If a wiki is as good as, or better than, having a detailed OP, might as well just split it whenever.

I'm envisioning the following threads on upgrades, with a brief overview and links to each in the new FAQ/dashboard thread:

• New eUp thread (either brand new or partial carve-out of existing thread, per above)
• Star Alliance Upgrade Awards post-2020
• Air Canada Bid Upgrade Program
• LMUs.... right now we have two main threads on the topic, LMU (Last Minute Upgrades) fare discussion & questions and Post your LMUs (Last Minute Upgrades) here.. Do we really need both? It seems like a lot of the posts in the discussion thread just end up being people posting their LMU offers anyway. Is this a place where, as much as we're trying to slim down some of the threads, it might make more sense to consolidate? And in terms of threads that could use a time-based reboot, that one seems like a good candidate (first post nearly 12 years ago - surely there's not a lot of value in data points that are a decade old?)

Again, input welcome.

Agreed. I also noticed that the DL COVID thread dashboard uses very similar images to the BA one. @Bohemian1 (or @24left), if you're thinking of going with fancy images, maybe the BA or DL mods can help you generate similar-looking images for AC?

A fair comment. I don't know that there's any discrimination against that topic here, I just don't think it's something people have asked about much.

Do you feel like that's something that needs its own thread? Like do we need one thread for 787 J seats, another for 787 PY, a third for 787 Y, same three for 777, etc? Or would having a singular thread for all 787 seats be enough?

cooleddie

We should have folders

- Aeroplan, miles and status
- Incidents and experiences
- Advice needed
- General and other

Adam Smith

vBulletin doesn't have folders, and as mentioned above, @tcook052 and I have very limited ability to make fundamental changes to the infrastructure like that (although you're welcome to post those kind of suggestions over in the tech forum) Do you have any suggestions on how to put some structure to those things you're suggesting, within the confines of the current software setup? Would listing threads in some of those areas in the new and improved FAQ/dashboard fit what you're thinking? Are these some new threads that need to be created to cover some of these topics? Wikis?

Bohemian1

I like the BA FAQ less for the eye candy than the overall organization.

I will try to make some time to see how that kind of structure could map onto updated AC content and our existing threads.

Adam Smith

I agree that the functionality is the important thing.

For those who felt there would be substantial value in the updated FAQ/dashboard concept, how important are snazzy graphics like the BA or DL threads I've linked, vs just getting the information there (i.e. text links)? @Jagboi @Symmetre @flamengo or @ anyone else who cares to share an opinion

24left

From: @ anyone else who cares to share an opinion

I would like for AC FT not to use the acronym "FAQ". It doesn't offer clarity and it's too catch-all. There are better words, phrases, sentences, emoji.

(either way, it won't be a useful master thread as long as people avoid looking at it and instead asking which is the best seat on a plane )

Adam Smith

Does the term "dashboard" appeal to you more than FAQ?

I think the hope is that people will consult it because it will be useful

24left

Yes

Jagboi

I think a seating guide for aircraft type is good. Even if your on Expedia it will say a generic aircraft type (e,g. "777") and then you can go to that and drill down for the class and variant of aircraft. I think if there are threads for each class of service for each aircraft as a headline it will get cluttered quickly. If I'm flying on an A320 I know I can just skip over the 777 section, and not have to look over the 777 J, 777 PE, 777 Y etc

I think an objective is to have relatively few initial categories ( although I admit the BA one has quite a few) and then drill down from a master heading to get the specific information you are looking for. Such as one 777 seating guide header, then drill down for J, PE, Y, HD variants etc,.My non-scientifically proven thought is that depth over breath in the headings will enable faster, more accurate information finding.

For me a row of text links is hard to distinguish at a glance. I have to read each one to determine if it's what I am looking for. I thought the BA graphics with the small amount of descriptive text enabled me to scan very quickly to see what I was looking for.

Adam Smith

So does that mean one thread per aircraft type? i.e. a 788 thread, a 789 thread, a 772 thread, a 77W thread, etc? With J, PY, and Y all in one thread?

When you refer to "headers", are you talking about in the dashboard thread, and then having those "headers" link to the thread for the aircraft type? I don't think there's really a way to accomplish that within a thread other than in a wiki, and I feel like a single seating guide thread with... 15 or so? aircraft layouts in it might get a bit unwieldy.