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The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. What good is a programming problem if

by gortok 13y ago

The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. What good is a programming problem if no one else can reproduce it? To have it reopened, all the OP needs to do is give the community all the information they need to reproduce the issue. Should we ask any less? It's also worth noting that the question was not closed by moderators (denoted by diamonds next to their name), but by members of the community with high reputation (> 3000). These users have community moderation powers by virtue of their reputation, but are not moderators per se. If you have over 3000 reputation, you could vote to reopen. Full disclosure: I am an elected moderator for Stack Overflow: http:stackoverflow.com/users/16587/george-stocker

RogerL 13y ago
And yet the community did find the answer.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
overgard 13y ago
A) The community did find the answer, regardless. B) Someone is gifting free interesting content to the site; even if it's imperfect does the reaction have to be so harsh? This is, personally, exactly why I never post on stack overflow. You're acting like you're doing them a favor by letting them post there, when they're doing you a favor by giving you interesting content in the first place.
- Manishearth 13y ago
  B) "Someone is gifting free interesting content to the site". That's the attitude that caused Yahoo! Answers. SE has a higher quality bar, so that there are good, answerable questions. If a question seems unanswerable to many (not due to incompetence but due to incompleteness/clarity/broadness/etc), then it is put on hold. It can be reopened if it gets fixed; putting it on hold lets it get fixed, whilst preventing answers (which might use the wrong interpretation, etc) while it is getting fixed. Saves time for all.
- insteadof 13y ago
  The community, not moderators, closed the question. The community also had an answer based on "Pure speculation" which means they can't replicate what the OP asked. A user can gift all the free interesting content they want. But if it's not scoped or on topic, then it's not scoped for the site or on topic and would be closed and/or deleted. Just because Rodney Dangerfield turns up to your bedroom and starts making jokes doesn't mean it's the time or place.
  - sanderjd 13y ago
    Your analogy is bad because it would be very hard to ignore Rodney Dangerfield in your bedroom, but it is very easy to ignore these sorts of questions. At worst it sits there and nobody comes up with an answer. We aren't running out of bits.
    - dionidium 13y ago
      Real-world analogies don't always work on virtual problems, even when they seem to on the surface. Unfortunately, this seems to be the standard way to respond [0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4273324 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4273324
    - euank 13y ago
      We aren't "running out of bits", but we have a highly limited amount of time and screen real-estate. The reason it was marked as such was so that other people didn't waste time on an unreproducible problem until it was fixed to be reproducible. At worst, it sits there and wastes many people's time, thus getting in the way of actually reproducible questions getting seen and answered. Note, that this is not regarding this one question, but thousands - certainly there are a large number of items selected for moderator action.
      - jules 13y ago
        And yet...the answer was found without this "required information".
    - 13y ago
- vehementi 13y ago
  Sibling poster Manishearth, you appear to be hellbanned and are being secretly censored (nobody sees your posts unless they view dead posts).
- stonemetal 13y ago
  The question asker didn't gift free interesting content to the site. The question asker emptied their chamber pot on the front lawn. The answerer left interesting content and got rewarded for it.
anigbrowl 13y ago
The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. What good is a programming problem if no one else can reproduce it? Disagree. OP failed to exclude some possibilities by doing multiple randomized trials and so on (or at least stating whether he had done so), but he supplied the source code and a description of the behavior that was perfectly adequate to understand the issue. Nothing personal, but your post above is the epitome of deflecting a question instead of engaging with it.
- rgovind 13y ago
  It would be very nice if we could share or clone our development environment and let contributors on Stackoverflow play with it, rather than try to reproduce on their computers. Of course it has its dangers, but once solved, it would be an awesome addition to SO.
  - davyjones 13y ago
    This is the exact goal of vagrant. The toolset is already in place. I just wish more people use it while filing issues.
  - peeters 13y ago
    I agree it would be cool, and occasionally useful, but I think overall such a tool would be a negative. The goal of boiling down code to the smallest, most portable example which demonstrates the problem isn't just to get more effective help. It's a vital step in isolating the issue, and when duly used, often results in the problem being found without help. Furthermore, it gives answers the quality of being more useful to those who find the question later. That's because while two actual pieces of code that have the same bug will appear almost unrelated, their simplest reductions will bear similarity to each other. I think adoption of a tool that just lets one share their dev environment would discourage this sort of due diligence, and encourage the useless "here's a dump of my code please fix it"-type questions.
  - jader201 13y ago
    At first, I thought you were being flippant, but then I realized in horror that you were serious. While I know you were coming from a good place -- I'm all about automating a testable problem (i.e. TDD, write failing tests first), and I think in the right hands, this would be a nice tool -- I could only see SO using this to further enforce strict requirements in what they consider a "valid" question. "You must set up a lab environment that fully replicates the issue in question." Maybe they wouldn't let it go that far (I would hope), but I think it would head in that direction.
pmelendez 13y ago
>" What good is a programming problem if no one else can reproduce it?" Well in real life, those are the tough ones and where help is more appreciated. The only bugs that I remember are the ones that were random or that nobody else could reproduce and yet were there.
est 13y ago
> The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. Why close other's question because of your own incompetence? Why the fuck prevent a question from been answered because only five retards can't get it? Isn't the solemn purpose of the site is to wait until someone who is capable of reproducing it and solve it?
moomin 13y ago
Hard to see how the OP could have tracked this down, being unaware of the feature.
talmand 13y ago
I would say if a member with a high reputation has moderation powers then that member is a moderator. They may not have the full powers of an elected moderator, but that would just make them a lower level moderator. It seems the comment can be considered accurate.

by gortok 13y ago

RogerL 13y ago

And yet the community did find the answer.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

overgard 13y ago

A) The community did find the answer, regardless. B) Someone is gifting free interesting content to the site; even if it's imperfect does the reaction have to be so harsh? This is, personally, exactly why I never post on stack overflow. You're acting like you're doing them a favor by letting them post there, when they're doing you a favor by giving you interesting content in the first place.

Manishearth 13y ago
B) "Someone is gifting free interesting content to the site". That's the attitude that caused Yahoo! Answers. SE has a higher quality bar, so that there are good, answerable questions. If a question seems unanswerable to many (not due to incompetence but due to incompleteness/clarity/broadness/etc), then it is put on hold. It can be reopened if it gets fixed; putting it on hold lets it get fixed, whilst preventing answers (which might use the wrong interpretation, etc) while it is getting fixed. Saves time for all.
insteadof 13y ago
The community, not moderators, closed the question. The community also had an answer based on "Pure speculation" which means they can't replicate what the OP asked. A user can gift all the free interesting content they want. But if it's not scoped or on topic, then it's not scoped for the site or on topic and would be closed and/or deleted. Just because Rodney Dangerfield turns up to your bedroom and starts making jokes doesn't mean it's the time or place.
- sanderjd 13y ago
  Your analogy is bad because it would be very hard to ignore Rodney Dangerfield in your bedroom, but it is very easy to ignore these sorts of questions. At worst it sits there and nobody comes up with an answer. We aren't running out of bits.
  - dionidium 13y ago
    Real-world analogies don't always work on virtual problems, even when they seem to on the surface. Unfortunately, this seems to be the standard way to respond [0]. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4273324 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4273324
  - euank 13y ago
    We aren't "running out of bits", but we have a highly limited amount of time and screen real-estate. The reason it was marked as such was so that other people didn't waste time on an unreproducible problem until it was fixed to be reproducible. At worst, it sits there and wastes many people's time, thus getting in the way of actually reproducible questions getting seen and answered. Note, that this is not regarding this one question, but thousands - certainly there are a large number of items selected for moderator action.
    - jules 13y ago
      And yet...the answer was found without this "required information".
  - 13y ago
vehementi 13y ago
Sibling poster Manishearth, you appear to be hellbanned and are being secretly censored (nobody sees your posts unless they view dead posts).
stonemetal 13y ago
The question asker didn't gift free interesting content to the site. The question asker emptied their chamber pot on the front lawn. The answerer left interesting content and got rewarded for it.

anigbrowl 13y ago

The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. What good is a programming problem if no one else can reproduce it? Disagree. OP failed to exclude some possibilities by doing multiple randomized trials and so on (or at least stating whether he had done so), but he supplied the source code and a description of the behavior that was perfectly adequate to understand the issue. Nothing personal, but your post above is the epitome of deflecting a question instead of engaging with it.

rgovind 13y ago
It would be very nice if we could share or clone our development environment and let contributors on Stackoverflow play with it, rather than try to reproduce on their computers. Of course it has its dangers, but once solved, it would be an awesome addition to SO.
- davyjones 13y ago
  This is the exact goal of vagrant. The toolset is already in place. I just wish more people use it while filing issues.
- peeters 13y ago
  I agree it would be cool, and occasionally useful, but I think overall such a tool would be a negative. The goal of boiling down code to the smallest, most portable example which demonstrates the problem isn't just to get more effective help. It's a vital step in isolating the issue, and when duly used, often results in the problem being found without help. Furthermore, it gives answers the quality of being more useful to those who find the question later. That's because while two actual pieces of code that have the same bug will appear almost unrelated, their simplest reductions will bear similarity to each other. I think adoption of a tool that just lets one share their dev environment would discourage this sort of due diligence, and encourage the useless "here's a dump of my code please fix it"-type questions.
- jader201 13y ago
  At first, I thought you were being flippant, but then I realized in horror that you were serious. While I know you were coming from a good place -- I'm all about automating a testable problem (i.e. TDD, write failing tests first), and I think in the right hands, this would be a nice tool -- I could only see SO using this to further enforce strict requirements in what they consider a "valid" question. "You must set up a lab environment that fully replicates the issue in question." Maybe they wouldn't let it go that far (I would hope), but I think it would head in that direction.

pmelendez 13y ago

>" What good is a programming problem if no one else can reproduce it?" Well in real life, those are the tough ones and where help is more appreciated. The only bugs that I remember are the ones that were random or that nobody else could reproduce and yet were there.

est 13y ago

> The post was put on hold because the OP failed to provide the information the community would need to reproduce the issue. Why close other's question because of your own incompetence? Why the fuck prevent a question from been answered because only five retards can't get it? Isn't the solemn purpose of the site is to wait until someone who is capable of reproducing it and solve it?

moomin 13y ago

Hard to see how the OP could have tracked this down, being unaware of the feature.

talmand 13y ago

I would say if a member with a high reputation has moderation powers then that member is a moderator. They may not have the full powers of an elected moderator, but that would just make them a lower level moderator. It seems the comment can be considered accurate.