Difference between Ask Question vs Discussion

[Narahari Lakshminarayana]

What are the differences between "Ask a question" vs "Discussion" in this community ?

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist- · Accepted solution]

The main thing is that questions are intended to be answered and then closed off (and act as a bit of a knowledge base), but discussions do not have a lifecycle, they're aimed at a conversation.

There are other differences - questions can have their answers accepted as correct, discussions just have replies with comment threads and no "close" action.  People earn points for answers on questions, but discussions don't have anything beyond "you contributed to this discussion"

However, the functions are not well used.  Whilst a lot of people get it right, there's also a substantial minority who do not.  Despite questions being the default and clearly described, a lot of people seem to want to create discussions that really ought to be classed as questions because they can be answered and closed off.

It is very rare that someone asks a question which would be better done as a discussion, but I know I've converted at least 4 questions to discussions in the past.  I've given up going the other way, there's just too many discussions that should be questions, and the process of doing it is not exactly fast or easy.

A lot of answerers, myself included, don't really care much about the points though and treat the questioning discussions as questions.  We don't score for an answer, but a happier questioner is far more important than a point.

[Clark Everson]

Ask a question is when you have a specific year Jon, like what you just asked. And you hope for there to be a straightforward answer that you can then tag as an answer to help others put that may have the same answer

Discussuon is more open ended. Like asking the community how they do things. While company A may do something one way Company B may do it a different way. With Atlassian products both those ways are probably acceptable but sometimes your company may need all answers to figure out your path forward. discussions are also for community fun topics as well or some of the interest groups. Like Atlassian announces new features, so you want to discuss why they are interesting etc.  

[Narahari Lakshminarayana]

Thank you for that explanation.