Ask Ubuntu is a community-driven question and answer website for the

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed mostly of free and open-source software. Ubuntu is officially released in three editions: '' Desktop'', ''Server'', and ''Core'' for Internet of things devices and robots. All ...

operating system. It is part of the Stack Exchange Network, running the same software as

Stack Overflow In software, a stack overflow occurs if the call stack pointer exceeds the stack bound. The call stack may consist of a limited amount of address space, often determined at the start of the program. The size of the call stack depends on many fac ...

. Members gain reputation based on the community's response (through voting) to their questions and answers. Reputation signifies trust for users in the answers they give. Privileges are given based on reputation levels, with users with the highest reputation having similar privileges to moderators. All the

user-generated content User-generated content (UGC), alternatively known as user-created content (UCC), is any form of content, such as images, videos, text, testimonials, and audio, that has been posted by users on online platforms such as social media, discussion f ...

is licensed under a

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike A Creative Commons (CC) license is one of several public copyright licenses that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted "work".A "work" is any creative material made by a person. A painting, a graphic, a book, a song/lyrics ...

license. The site came out of public beta on 10 October 2010, launching alongside Ubuntu 10.10. , Ask Ubuntu has about 1.3 million registered users and more than 380,000 questions.

History

Ask Ubuntu came into existence as a "Proposed Q&A site for Ubuntu users and developers" on the

Stack Exchange Stack Exchange is a network of question-and-answer (Q&A) websites on topics in diverse fields, each site covering a specific topic, where questions, answers, and users are subject to a reputation award process. The reputation system allows th ...

Area 51. With other Internet users supporting the proposal of the site through "commitment", Stack Exchange chose to launch Ask Ubuntu in private beta. Eventually, the site came out of public beta with the name ''Ask Ubuntu'', which was chosen through a community voting process, and was launched alongside Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat in October 2010. Despite the Stack Exchange policy against fragmentation, after deliberation and voting, Ask Ubuntu was allowed to continue alongside a separate 'Linux and Unix' site. Ask Ubuntu has received help from

Canonical Ltd. Canonical Ltd. is a UK-based privately held computer software company founded and funded by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth to market commercial support and related services for Ubuntu and related projects. Canonical employs staff ...

, which has allowed the site to use their trademark. Canonical Ltd has also helped in the designing of the site, ensuring that Ask Ubuntu's theme follows the Ubuntu brand guidelines.

Format

The website allows the users to ask and answer questions. The users are given the ability to vote the questions and answers up or down. They can also earn reputation points and "badges" for their various contributions to the site. For example, a person is rewarded with 10 reputation points if their answer for a question receives an "up" vote. All users can submit edits to the questions and answers in a

wiki A wiki ( ) is an online hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience, using a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages for the subjects or scope of the project, and could be either open to the pu ...

style, and their suggested edits go through a peer review process. Users with 2,000 reputation points or more can edit the questions and answers directly, without having their edits go through a similar peer review process. Some posts are designated as "community wiki", which have a lower reputation requirement for editing. Ask Ubuntu has two sub-sites: a "meta" where users can ask and answer questions about the site itself, and a set of real time chat rooms as part of the

network of sites.

Notes

References

External links

* {{Ubuntu Computing websites Internet properties established in 2010 Ubuntu Stack Exchange network Linux websites Question-and-answer websites