It is indeed hard to get to a question first. Often you will answer to find that you've been beaten out by an identical answer (or three!)

One way I got early XP was to be verbose and thorough. Rather than fixing the bad reference usage in a post, explain the concept behind references and helpful uses. Rewrite sections of code. Run Search and Super Search and put up links to previous nodes that addressed the issue.

Another good place for new users to grab XP is from vague questions. If you can weasel out what the user means, you can often be first to answer.

In many ways, new users do the most work, while higher level monks can just sit on their laurels and answer the easy stuff.

This post, for example, isn't addressing your question of identifying unanswered nodes. :) Normally I just want Newest Nodes and refresh every minute or so. When a new node appears, there's usually a 30 second window in which to answer :) I believe someone has a Newest Nodes client, check ZZamboni's or Shendal's home nodes for info.

In reply to Re: Wanting to help by swiftone
in thread Wanting to help by marvell

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