So, I like this format. When you are an arse in your posts, people let you know. They also let you know that they like what you are saying... the more they like these things the higher (status?) level you earn. Having to take a quiz to move up a level may not be a good thing. I wouldn't want someone to be at a lower level because they know less Perl. And, I wouldn't want certain people to move up when consistenly being anti-community, but they can pass some quizes.

That being said (the half I don't like of the idea :), I do like the idea of quizes and such. I like it because the community could then really provide a way for people to learn. Of course, they can learn here now (in a hunt and peck sort of way) but quizes are a more structured way. Possibly having N number of quizes, and each quiz would have suggested readings (and maybe suggested exercises) before taking them.

So, if you wouldn't get levels, what would you get (except some learnin')? Well, maybe some 'badge' could show on home nodes. Or your name would be a special color in the CB and Other Users nodelet. Maybe by passing tests you can submit questions to previous tests. Who knows! But, I think this is a really good idea.

Cheers,
KM

I am not sure that I like the involuntary nature. I like KM's badge idea.

How would it shake out practically? Would you be able to view which badges monks had acquired?

Who writes the tests? I wouldn't recommend testing on Perl -- that seems disingenuous, the site is supposed to give you a place to teach yourself at your own pace the parts of Perl that you need or want to learn. You get to Saint by a lot of hard work and participation, not because you know some incredibly obscure property of a Perl function. You get there faster if you know the obscure parts, of course.

I support the idea, though maybe it will turn into the equivalent of the hated and burdensome "Civics" class one often has to take in public schools. These things often go horribly wrong because people forget to tell the test-taker the reason for the test. Or the reason is only written down as part of the required reading for the test. Or something like that.

e-mail neshura

Just to respond to a couple things multiple people have said.. this was an outline of an idea. Testing on Perl is probably a bad idea.. but that wasn't anything fundimental to the thought.

Making it manditory for gaining a level could be changed to something else. I just thought it would be a way to encourage participation.

Rich

As for my opinion... I don't really see the benefit of tests; what is gained as a result even if we assume testing is an accurate measure of ability? It's already evident which people have absorbed the site documentation simply by looking at their posts. And what does testing perl knowledge have to do with the supposed goal of establishing a community? (This was mentioned earlier in the thread as well, so I won't elaborate.)

I am here to enjoy myself and learn something, not to be tested on it.

As I see mostly people who agree answering, and instead of -- all of them ;--), I'll just add my voice to kudra's: tests are not what Perl Monks is all about. Perlmonk is about getting help and helping people while improving our Perl skills. Along with having fun, yacking and arguing which editor is the best of course!

Most problems (or perceived problems or whatever leads to a rant) have nothing to do with how much people know about Perl. I don't think merlyn's knowledge can be denied {grin} (although I'd like to see his answers to an open-answer test!) to name just a common cause of rants ;--) Do you think anyone is going to behave better because they have been held to level 4 instead of getting to level 5?

Plus it's not like we have an unlimited supply of time, I'd rather see people spending time on helping each other (or taking a walk outside, yes KM, you can even have a smoke!) rather than on taking meaningless tests.

One more word about quizzes (?). This is not how you test programming skills. I am pretty sure there are brilliant coders here who could not tell $/ from $\ to save their life. So what? I did the BrainBench test once an my only conclusion was that I would never, EVER, use something like that to hire someone. That's just what it's all about. I haven't done socket programming in years and if you ask me how to create a socket I sure as hell would not be able to answer you. Does it mean that I would not be able to do it if after reading the doc and spending a day playing with it?

A good programmer is able to read the docs and apply is general problem-solving and algorythmic skills to all kinds of problems. It is not someone who has memorized all the special variables names, to name a never-ending source of quiz questions (besides what makes you think someone who starts all of their scripts with use English; is not a good programmer? And before anyone mentions it, yes, I know about the performance penalty in regexps ;--)

Finally, this community is big, and as any community it goes through bumps, that's all. Sometimes people get annoyed or have a bad day. But all in all we are all a bunch of pretty decent people, who behave quite well, especially for an on-line community. Rants show that we care and they also introduce newcomers to the spirit of Perl Monks. I expect to see a couple of them a month for the next 50 years or so, mostly about the same topics! So let's just leave it at that, and keep it as simple as we can.

No disrepect intended, but testing programming skills has absolutely nothing to do with what I brought up. The idea isn't to see who's Perl Fu is strongest. The idea was to help educate (which is what I think this site is partly about). This education I speak of is around the community, not the language.

Sorry if my intention was mistated. I think one of the strong points of this site is the fact that it remains fairly classless. And I think it's better for reputation to preceed someone than a credential. So no.. my purpose behind this has nothing to do with testing programming skills. In fact, the testing is a more minor part. The intentnion was to offer an idea on how to better acclimate people to this culture, not divide people based on their Perl skills.

Hope this clairifies things..
Rich

OK! So here is a list of questions for the test (do I need to add that these are a bit tongue-in-cheek? Probably!)

• I want to post some code so people can help me find an annoying bug:
  1. I cut and paste all 356 lines of code in the appropriate window, add a title like find th bug!!! and hit submit.
  2. I cut and paste my script in the form, wrap it in <code> before tags slap a title like "regexp" et voila!
  3. I extract the smallest chink of my code that causes the problem, run it (under strict and -w), wrap it in code tags, add a detailed description of the expected result and of the actual one, then use the preview to check the formatting of the post, and then finally hit submit.
• I have a problem involving flock:
  1. I type flock in the search box, thus getting the doc for the function staright out of perldoc
  2. I type flock toto in the search box, and get back a list of nodes including flock in their title, including the doc
  3. I invoque the Super Search and look for flock in the body of message, for an even longer list of nodes
  4. I try to think of a couple more keywords that would narrow down the search and I use them in Super Search for an hopefully better result
• I see a question for which I am quite sure I know the answer:
  1. I post as soon as I can a vague answer, so I don't risk making a mistake
  2. I type a proper answer, including untested code (with a warning), as fast as I can and hit submit, I know the first answer usually gets the most XPs, Yeah!
  3. I write a little piece of code showing the answer, I test it (under use strict and -w) then post it with the appropriate explanations. After all there is more in life than XP's and I don't like posting apologies (plus getting -5 rep on a post is not quite the result I hope for!)
  4. (10 000 XP and above) I state that the answer is given in one of my Web Techniques columns. I add a {grin} just in case.
• I have been downvoted 3 times in the last 5 minutes for a post I thought was uncontroversial:
  1. (10 000 XP and above) I grab the list of people on the site and post it, inevitably generating a lengthy list of rants, counter-rants and generally irrate posts, thus ensuring that a good time is had by all
  2. I suck it up like a man
  3. I downvote a bunch of loosers just to be sure I'm not the only one to be annoyed today
  4. I post a "I love Perl Monks" message to XP-whore the XP's I lost, and more
• A troll is posted, what should I do?
  1. Reply Go s***w yourself !@#$%^&* troll!, thus preventing the node to be automagically reaped
  2. (level 6 an up) Send the node to Nodes to consider do not forget to add my name to the reason, updatedownvote it (thanks arhuman), then go to the list and vote "delete" so the node can be reaped
  3. (level 5 and under) Do nothing

FWIW I am with mirod and kudra. I have absolutely no interest in quizes, I would not take them, and I do not like them. Don't get me wrong, I like it when people learn Perl, and I like getting people used to this culture. But I don't like giving people gratuitous tests where they get silly certifications that say they are really in the in crowd.

You might say it as: To the extent that this culture believes that acceptance is predicated on taking tests, this culture is not my culture.

I find that reading, thinking about, and replying to Seekers of Perl Wisdom threads is a great way of testing my knowledge of Perl, thinking up new ways of doing things, and learning from others. I'd rather consider real problems than arbitrary tests.

I can just see the master intoning "you have passed the final test, so we now welcome you to the seventh circle. Now you will learn that what we have told you was not quite true, but finally we will reveal all to you"

I hear that every year in my univeristy courses (without the seventh circle bit), and I get a thrill.

In fact I like the idea so much I think I'll spend a bit of my holidays coding up a quiz. I'll post when it's done.

____________________
Jeremy
I didn't believe in evil until I dated it.