Are you having trouble getting that elusive First Accepted Solution badge?
As many of you have pointed out, it’s not really in your control. You can provide lots of accepted solutions, but it’s the original poster who has to mark it as such. We can’t promise we can help you earn that badge, but we have a handy tip. Let’s look at an example:
Say you’re an expert on the INTCK function. You know if you find a question on it, you’re likely to be able to offer a solution. Enter the term in the search box and click on Search.
You’ll see a whole list of posts that include INTCK. Some of them will already have an accepted solution (the green check mark), some won’t. How do you know which of the outstanding questions you should answer?
Here’s where the secret sauce kicks in. Filter your search for a recent time period, say the past month, and look only in the forums.
That will bring up more recent posts in the discussion forums. You want recent posts because those posters are likely still looking for an answer and may be more likely to respond to a reply and possibly mark it as accepted.
If you want to keep an eye on these types of posts, subscribe to the RSS feed and emails will be sent via your favorite RSS reader. You can then provide solutions to any post that interests you.
And don’t forget, you can now reply by email. It makes it even easier than ever to add your helpful ideas to conversations.
This isn’t a guarantee that you’ll get that First Accepted Solution badge, but it just might help you. If you have other tips for earning badges, please let us know. We’re all here to help each other.
Good luck!
