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The problem with being a beginner is that you probably don't know what those few lines are that make the most difference. Mods haughtily saying "You're doing it

The problem with being a beginner is that you probably don't know what those few lines are that make the most difference. Mods haughtily saying "You're doing it wrong; come back when you can do it right; here's a wall of meta-documentation that only tells you why your post sucks and doesn't help you figure out what part of your code matters" doesn't help anybody. If the bar to getting your question answered is to figure out on their own with no actual guidance how to ask the question perfectly, then you've already eliminated the 1/2 of developers out there who need the most help. I'll never understand the mentality of people who put themselves in a position of answering questions, but are genuinely perturbed by the prospect of helping people with basic/misguided/imperfectly conceived questions. If they're the kind of person who could just read the documentation and solve all but the most complex of their own problems, congratulations. They should feel free to set that as the bar for anybody you hire or collaborate with. Or even set it as the bar for questions that they answer, but don't penalize people who are coming to a Q&A for not living up to those standards. If you're of that disposition on such a site, you're probably more interested in stroking your ego and watching some arbitrary points accumulate rather than actually helping people. There are lots of hobbies in development that don't expose you to beginner questions: go join a more esoteric users group, or contribute to an open source project without looking in the users forums/chat channels. Just do something that doesn't involve alienating inexperience developers.

umvi 8y ago
But if you answer such questions at face value, the asker still doesn't know how to write concise questions and will continue to post walls of code, since, after all, it worked and produced an answer for them. It's almost like you need to pivot the question at that point to be "how do I isolate problems?" or "how do I debug?" because the asker lacks those basic skills needed to ask a good question.
- chefandy 8y ago
  False dichotomy. It's not like you can only tell the poster one thing. There are questions on SO where someone says "this is how you fix your problem. This is how I figured that out. Here are some good docs/articles/etc. on this topic." Both pointing out the problem with the code/methodology/etc. and helping them see something from a different perspective so they do better next time are valuable educational goals, and I don't understand why so many people think SO should address only one of them. It's almost as if people think coding problems are OK, but helping people with more amorphous skills is either beyond or beneath them. Troubleshooting is a skill that can be taught— having someone more experienced giving you advice is an invaluable asset when you're trying to learn how to do it. Refusing to help people because they don't already know how to do it themselves helps nobody.
jmrobertson 8y ago
yup it's all about that empathy, and having a constructive, vs. destructive approach to candid criticism and conversation. SO somehow swung far in the destructive direction. Candid discussion does not have to be toxic to be direct, no matter what Linus and co might say, and SO seems to embody.
everfree 8y ago
The goal of Stack Overflow is to produce posts that are useful for others who stumble across them. There's every reason to be friendly to newbies, but not much reason to answer questions that will never be of use to anyone else. Stack Overflow isn't a free tutoring service, it's a collaborative wiki of answers to common programming questions. That being said, I agree that the current culture of "you're doing it wrong" is toxic, and should be replaced with a culture of "here's how to do it right".
- chefandy 8y ago
  And so very often as a beginner, I stumbled across someone's question that I also had, which was somehow deemed unacceptable by the bureaucracy so there were no useful answers, there was no link to where the 'correct' question with the correct answer was, and because there was often different exception, or a different library was being used, or something along those lines, I didn't have the skills to find it. So, maybe it's time to abandon that strategy and concentrate on actually helping people who need it.
- enraged_camel 8y ago
  >>The goal of Stack Overflow is to produce posts that are useful for others who stumble across them. That's one of the goals. I wouldn't say it's the goal. I would argue that the goal of any software should be to help the immediate user. If it is not, then why should the user continue using it? Stackoverflow is successful because helping the immediate user has secondary benefits, namely that it also helps others. But that doesn't mean this secondary benefit should override the primary goal.
  - umvi 8y ago
    > I would argue that the goal of any software should be to help the immediate user. If it is not, then why should the user continue using it? That's like saying "I as the immediate user of Wikipedia want to be able to upload my research paper and have it check if there are any mistakes in my citations. If Wikipedia can't serve that immediate need, why should I continue using it?" Yet even if Wikipedia isn't good at auto-checking your homework, it's still immensely useful for the vast majority of other users who don't care about auto-checking homework. You can't build software that satisfies everyone's requirements. It's okay if some users choose not to use your software because it doesn't fulfill their requirements.

umvi 8y ago

But if you answer such questions at face value, the asker still doesn't know how to write concise questions and will continue to post walls of code, since, after all, it worked and produced an answer for them. It's almost like you need to pivot the question at that point to be "how do I isolate problems?" or "how do I debug?" because the asker lacks those basic skills needed to ask a good question.

chefandy 8y ago
False dichotomy. It's not like you can only tell the poster one thing. There are questions on SO where someone says "this is how you fix your problem. This is how I figured that out. Here are some good docs/articles/etc. on this topic." Both pointing out the problem with the code/methodology/etc. and helping them see something from a different perspective so they do better next time are valuable educational goals, and I don't understand why so many people think SO should address only one of them. It's almost as if people think coding problems are OK, but helping people with more amorphous skills is either beyond or beneath them. Troubleshooting is a skill that can be taught— having someone more experienced giving you advice is an invaluable asset when you're trying to learn how to do it. Refusing to help people because they don't already know how to do it themselves helps nobody.

jmrobertson 8y ago

yup it's all about that empathy, and having a constructive, vs. destructive approach to candid criticism and conversation. SO somehow swung far in the destructive direction. Candid discussion does not have to be toxic to be direct, no matter what Linus and co might say, and SO seems to embody.

everfree 8y ago

The goal of Stack Overflow is to produce posts that are useful for others who stumble across them. There's every reason to be friendly to newbies, but not much reason to answer questions that will never be of use to anyone else. Stack Overflow isn't a free tutoring service, it's a collaborative wiki of answers to common programming questions. That being said, I agree that the current culture of "you're doing it wrong" is toxic, and should be replaced with a culture of "here's how to do it right".

chefandy 8y ago
And so very often as a beginner, I stumbled across someone's question that I also had, which was somehow deemed unacceptable by the bureaucracy so there were no useful answers, there was no link to where the 'correct' question with the correct answer was, and because there was often different exception, or a different library was being used, or something along those lines, I didn't have the skills to find it. So, maybe it's time to abandon that strategy and concentrate on actually helping people who need it.
enraged_camel 8y ago
>>The goal of Stack Overflow is to produce posts that are useful for others who stumble across them. That's one of the goals. I wouldn't say it's the goal. I would argue that the goal of any software should be to help the immediate user. If it is not, then why should the user continue using it? Stackoverflow is successful because helping the immediate user has secondary benefits, namely that it also helps others. But that doesn't mean this secondary benefit should override the primary goal.
- umvi 8y ago
  > I would argue that the goal of any software should be to help the immediate user. If it is not, then why should the user continue using it? That's like saying "I as the immediate user of Wikipedia want to be able to upload my research paper and have it check if there are any mistakes in my citations. If Wikipedia can't serve that immediate need, why should I continue using it?" Yet even if Wikipedia isn't good at auto-checking your homework, it's still immensely useful for the vast majority of other users who don't care about auto-checking homework. You can't build software that satisfies everyone's requirements. It's okay if some users choose not to use your software because it doesn't fulfill their requirements.