What I fell is, why can't the moderators send a message to the user asking them to format it

We do. You'll often see considerations saying "Add code tags. OP messaged."

or if the post is not formatted don't approve it?

Lots of them are newcomers. We don't want to discourage them. The posts do tend to get approved slower. And if they keep it up, they eventually start losing XP and get less of our ear. Most learn at this point if they didn't before.

But of course, there's always a fresh batch of newcomers.

If the formatting is not done, then the moderators can apply some default formatting.

Just about everyone is a moderator. It's the Janitors that have the ability to edit, and only under some conditions.

And it's not a good idea. You're rewarding poor behaviour.

One solution might be to provide, just below the edit box, a prominent link to an even simpler guide to formatting than we already have. Yes, some people just don't care, but based on the number of poorly formatted posts, the failure of people to fix them on their own, and quotes from posts like this one:

Not everyone is conversant with HTML, and, for the occasional posting, I don't want to go through the "approved html tags" list or the like. Source: Wiki-Style syntax for posting, by Anonymous Monk

Here is an example of what I mean. The title is intentional and the entire post teaches only two tags at a level that I hope even the most HTML inept among us can understand. Many of you have a much better sense of humor than I, so perhaps you can improve on it:

I'd go even farther and modify the help text right under the edit box to include your advice to use at least <p></p> and <c></c> The current help text ( If you think you're going to use <pre> tags — don't! Use <code> tags instead! This applies to data as well as code. ) is too small and not visible enough IMO.

My main concern with that sentence "If you think you're going to use pre tags..." is it talks only to the few who would have thought of using pre tags here, or at least KNOW what a pre tag does. To tell you the truth, if I hadn't read that sentence on perlmonks so often, my knowledge about a pre tags would still amount to zero.

That sentence should simply be "Use code-tags for code and data". Not as clever or witty but to the point.

I must admit i had my difficulties with formatting here at the beginning too, i did some html long ago but someone who is totally new might find it difficult: and to be honest i dont read all manuals on a new site, people might be eager to post and get their burning questions answered ...

Maybe it would be fine to just present a "preformatted new message box" which reads something like:

<p> "Write your text here, the "p" tags keep some general formatting on it, you might want to use <br>
(for new lines) or "code" or "c" tags for sample code:
<c> Write your code here </c>
see Writeup Formatting Tips for more information <p> And Please dont forget to use the "preview" button

We've tried that for signatures and it ended with people putting the whole post into the signatures. So this would end in people posting the template and slapping their content below the template, which I consider worse than people just slapping their content into a node :)

Ok. Didnt know you already tried it, for me this would have been fine,
but you are right, there are always some people out there who will never read any manuals/tips (even if you give them a really huge warning sign in front of their face) in my job as a sysadmin i face these people, luckily this is not the majority ;-). But i think the situation like "it is now" is also not perfect, so why dont try it again, and let those that ignore all rules face the consequences,

I fully agree with ELISHEVA the information should be short, pregnant not more than 5 lines.

Maybe it could even be possible to remove the (unchanged) "template text" automatically for those who just post below it, or let it be there and let the community "solve the problem" (some might send personal messages for those that never listen) ;-)?
btw:
Personally i did not read through all the writeup tips, e.g.and it took me around 2 hours iirc before i got my first posts written, and formatted right (with links to other ids, read through all the tips on formatting, posting ...), that is too long, or maybe i am too silly and other new users do it in 5 min ....
I know this is a difficult task and there are always some drawbacks, no solution is perfect ...


MH

Yes good idea. Only listing most common used should be enough to give an overview to the hasty reader,
if special formatting is needed there are the links that are already there, (I think writeup formatting tips should maybe first before where to post?) perhaps with a short Preview like
"Code Tags will look like this e.g. ..."

#!/usr/bin/perl
print "Hello World\n";
[download]


MH