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It's not just noob questions that get roasted though. Last week I had a C++ Windows API problem where something was working when compiled in 32 bit mode and not

by mark-r 9y ago

It's not just noob questions that get roasted though. Last week I had a C++ Windows API problem where something was working when compiled in 32 bit mode and not working in 64 bits. I have over 100K points so I know what I'm doing - I knew it had to be condensed into a toy example that could be examined carefully, or I'd get the same treatment any noob would get. The problem was I couldn't get the toy example to work in 32 bits either. Finally a coworker found a hint somewhere on the web (not StackOverflow) that pointed to a problem with the manifest in the 64-bit version (and both versions of my toy example). I couldn't craft a good question because I didn't know the answer yet!

zbentley 9y ago
> I couldn't craft a good question because I didn't know the answer yet! This might be what you meant originally, but either way, I think there's an important moral there: sometimes, the SO rules encourage people to ask good questions, and sometimes, in formulating a good question, the rules encourage good debugging/distillation skills, and askers end up solving their problem on the way!
- mark-r 9y ago
  But in this case the vital clue still came from the internet, just not SO. And I wasn't able to find it on my own - I generally consider my search skills among the best. I hope that's not just the Dunning-Kruger talking.
ufo 9y ago
Sometimes it is possible to get these questions to fit so format by framing them as "how do I debug this" instead of "how do I solve this". But yeah, it is kind of awkward and doesn't always work out...
cozuya 9y ago
Frankly you've essentially hit on the main issue there - the problem with SO in its current form is "bad questions". But people who are asking questions are typically not people who understand how SO works and don't know how to ask "good questions". The other day I was having a weird problem and after much googling I found this: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/49091270/why-is-socket-io-is-very-slow-on-windows/49212490#49212490 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/49091270/why-is-socket-i... This was sitting at -1 because the asker didn't know how to "craft" his/her question. Its a legitimate problem/bug in NodeJS LTS itself. It still hasn't been touched after I attempted to answer it =/

by mark-r 9y ago

zbentley 9y ago

> I couldn't craft a good question because I didn't know the answer yet! This might be what you meant originally, but either way, I think there's an important moral there: sometimes, the SO rules encourage people to ask good questions, and sometimes, in formulating a good question, the rules encourage good debugging/distillation skills, and askers end up solving their problem on the way!

mark-r 9y ago
But in this case the vital clue still came from the internet, just not SO. And I wasn't able to find it on my own - I generally consider my search skills among the best. I hope that's not just the Dunning-Kruger talking.

ufo 9y ago

Sometimes it is possible to get these questions to fit so format by framing them as "how do I debug this" instead of "how do I solve this". But yeah, it is kind of awkward and doesn't always work out...

cozuya 9y ago

Frankly you've essentially hit on the main issue there - the problem with SO in its current form is "bad questions". But people who are asking questions are typically not people who understand how SO works and don't know how to ask "good questions". The other day I was having a weird problem and after much googling I found this: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/49091270/why-is-socket-io-is-very-slow-on-windows/49212490#49212490 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/49091270/why-is-socket-i... This was sitting at -1 because the asker didn't know how to "craft" his/her question. Its a legitimate problem/bug in NodeJS LTS itself. It still hasn't been touched after I attempted to answer it =/