Reading order is one of those subjects where the general answer and the answer for a specific case diverge, and the thread will go in circles until someone says which one is being asked for.
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Start Here · Welcome · continued
Reading order for a first week here, and what to skip until later posts 91–118
This is a continuation of a long topic, addressed by post number rather than by page. Start at post 1.
Birkeland, post #25: Where I have landed on reading order, having got it wrong once in public: the direction is clear, the magnitude is not, and anyone quoting a precise magnitude has borrowed it from somewhere that did not measure it. Go to post
The tag pages are usually a better entry point than the categories for a first read. A tag cuts across categories, so following one shows you how the same subject is treated by the analytical people and the practical people at once.
h.mbeki, post #66: The compound and evidence pages are updated regularly and they are worth reading when you are new. They answer the meta questions like "do we have data on this" and "what do the trials actually show" before you ask them. Go to post
For anyone finding this later: the short answer on reading order is that it depends on one thing, and the rest of the thread is people identifying which thing.
I keep a log for reading order specifically because my memory of it turned out to be systematically wrong in one direction. Six weeks of notes cost nothing and settled it.
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Introducing yourself is fine and requires no question. Post in this subcategory, describe the context that matters for why you are here, and lurk for a bit before posting technical questions. That order works well.
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Marked solutions are the site's way of saying that someone asked a good question and someone else gave an answer that actually worked. It is not a competition and it does not appear on your record — it is just how the site learns which topics stay useful six months later.
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orbitrap_ola, post #38: I would call the community position on reading order likely rather than established, and I would be comfortable defending that hedge. Go to post
Where the reading order reasoning breaks down for me is the step from the group result to the individual case. That step is almost never argued for.
The moderation log is public. Every staff action is logged with the rule cited and the reasoning stated. If you get moderated, the explanation is there and it is worth reading even if you disagree with the action.
Worth saying I have only my own numbers here, and n is small.
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Marking my uncertainty on reading order explicitly. I am confident about the direction, much less confident about the size, and not confident at all that it generalises past the case in the first post.
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Hadjipateras, post #91: Reading order is one of those subjects where the general answer and the answer for a specific case diverge, and the thread will go in circles until someone says which one is being asked for. Go to post
Reading the guidelines before you post is genuinely worth the twenty minutes. Not because you will break one, but because the rules explain why the place reads the way it does.
The uncertainty is in the assumption, not in the calculation.
A methods point on reading order rather than a substantive one: if the comparison is not like for like, the difference you are measuring is the difference in method.
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The version of reading order that circulates here is a simplification of a simplification. It is not wrong, but it has lost the conditions under which it holds, and those conditions are where the interesting cases live.
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First week here. The thing I would tell someone arriving behind me is that the answers are slower and much better than anywhere else I have looked, and that trying to hurry one does not work.
Reading it back, the second half matters more than the first.
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k.marchand, post #105: A methods point on reading order rather than a substantive one: if the comparison is not like for like, the difference you are measuring is the difference in method. Go to post
Asking as the newest person in the thread: is there a canonical order to read the documentation set in? I have been going alphabetically and that is clearly not it.
I would want to see it done twice before believing it once.
That is the distinction I keep failing to hold on to. Written down now.
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The Lounge is a real category rather than a dumping ground. The sourcing rule still applies there, which surprises people, but the register is looser and nobody minds a digression.
I would hold that lightly until someone with a larger sample weighs in.
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gradient_slope, post #107: First week here. The thing I would tell someone arriving behind me is that the answers are slower and much better than anywhere else I have looked, and that trying to hurry one does not work. Reading it back, the second half matters more than the first. Go to post
A note on scope: what I am saying about reading order applies to the case in the first post and I would not extend it further without checking.
ambient_review, post #83: Reading counts toward trust level, so lurking is not wasted. That is unusual and it is the reason the levels here track familiarity rather than volume. Not disagreeing with anyone above, just adding the bit I keep having to look up. Go to post
Staff post. Actions described here are recorded in the public moderation log and may be challenged in Meta.
Welcome. Two practical notes from staff. Your first few posts are rate-limited, which is an anti-spam measure and not a comment on you, and it lifts on its own. If you hit it and have something to add, edit the post you already made.
Collapsed as off-topic by two members at trust level 3 or above
The Lounge is a real category rather than a dumping ground. The sourcing rule still applies there, which surprises people, but the register is looser and nobody minds a digression.
One more caveat and then I will stop qualifying: the sample selected itself.
batchlog, post #99: Where the reading order reasoning breaks down for me is the step from the group result to the individual case. That step is almost never argued for. Go to post
Reading the guidelines before you post is genuinely worth the twenty minutes. Not because you will break one, but because the rules explain why the place reads the way it does.
Someone should write this up properly, and it should probably not be me.
The compound and evidence pages are updated regularly and they are worth reading when you are new. They answer the meta questions like "do we have data on this" and "what do the trials actually show" before you ask them.
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Reading order has been discussed here with more heat than it deserves, mostly because two definitions have been in play the whole time.
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Clear enough that I do not think I have a follow-up, which is unusual.
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