Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

nohello.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 134 posts

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#111

Post by smeej »

d1sxeyes wrote: post #66
smeej wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Person sharing the screen is 100% responsible for making sure such notifications are turned off, not the other person sending the message.

While that is true, nevertheless it’s nice to consider that people are human and make mistakes. It can be quite difficult to ‘correct’ that mistake once made, as in order to disable notifications, you often need to open up the chat app itself, which makes all of your conversations flash up on the screen. Yes, of course you can always just stop sharing, disable notifications, and re-enable, but nevertheless, I always…

If you spend your time trying to account for every mistake someone might make, you're going to waste an awful lot of your life.

Most people spend only a tiny amount of time sharing their screen on a call. The people who do a lot of it are well-practiced in managing their notifications.

There's no good reason to make your normal communication worse for the sake of avoiding such a rare problem.

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#112

Post by Al-Khwarizmi »

jpl56 wrote: post #97
d1sxeyes wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While that is true, nevertheless it’s nice to consider that people are human and make mistakes. It can be quite difficult to ‘correct’ that mistake once made, as in order to disable notifications, you often need to open up the chat app itself, which makes all of your conversations flash up on the screen. Yes, of course you can always just stop sharing, disable notifications, and re-enable, but nevertheless, I always…

I hate Teams for that. There's no simple way to temporary hide notifications but going deep into the menus. I would need a "hide notifications for the next 5, 10 ou 15 minutes" you can activate without having to think.

Not only that, but if you set it to run on startup, it will pop in front of all the rest of the windows and show not something neutral like the team list, but your last chat.

So if you teach with a laptop, its awfully sluggish startup is timed just right so that you have enough time to turn on the laptop, turn on the projector, open the presentation, connect the HDMI cable, wait for the presentation to show up and check that it works, start talking, and just then... BAM, there goes your last private chat in front of all the students.

Of course, it can be fixed by just not setting it to autostart - but why should I have to do that? Why is that program so chock full of obviously bad design decisions?

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#113

Post by Chris2048 »

smeej wrote: post #109
Chris2048 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gather by the responses that there are a lot of HNers that feel strongly a certain way, but I do not confuse HN, or the participants of a pile-on, with "everyone"; nor am I fond of promoting this reddit style group-think. I'm not asking for a poll, but reasoning (which is the explicitly stated purpose for this forum). If a thousand (apparently annoyed) HNers agreed on something but could not reason why, I wouldn't…

People are replying to you explaining why your reasons don't support your arguments, and explaining what the real reasons for using it differently are. There's no opportunity for discourse, but it's apparently because your idea of "reason" is also different from everybody else's.

> explaining why your reasons don't support your arguments, and explaining what the real reasons

Their opinion differs to mine, and I also disagree with some of the counter-arguments.

Describing their responses as "real" versus mine is evidence that you've made up your mind, and are no longer objective about the topic.

> your idea of "reason" is also different from everybody else's

reasoning can be flawed or incorrect, but you are implying mine isn't reasoning at all. Care to back that claim up?

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#114

Post by ryandrake »

kevincox wrote: post #99
brisketbbq wrote: post #96

This annoys me, along with people asking about a jira but just sending the number. That means I'll need to copy it and go to my browser to type in the URL and the jira number. Chances are the colleague was just looking at the jira in their browser, so why wouldn't they copy/paste the link...

I think this is in part people's memory. People will often just mention a ticket by ID and lots of in the people in the room seem to know what they are talking about. I find it nearly impossible to remember associations between "random" numbers so I will always need to build that into a URL and look it up. But yes, when written please, please, please just use the URL. It is at worst the same if people recognize the n…

I think some people might just not know what a URL is or how it works. Browsers keep trying to downplay URLs and hide them (or parts of them), and I guess people are slowly forgetting they represent an "address" to a web page. I see this sometimes with younger people who didn't grow up when the web was emerging and everyone simply knew a URL was how you got to a web site. I've on more than one occasion had people send me a screenshot of a web page instead of just sending the URL. To me (late 40s) this seems bonkers, but to them maybe it's just how they do it.

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#115

Post by Chris2048 »

addicted wrote: post #24
Chris2048 wrote: post #7

The other person isn't necessarily waiting for the response. At the least, its a communication that you are about to ask them something, i.e. check back here in the next minute or so while I type out my question. Also, "Hi" is a good way of finding out if a person is present, sometimes you might ask to call them instead of typing your question. It also might be the case there are multiple people who can answer the qu…

That is such a ridiculously inconsiderate approach. Why can’t you just say “hey, are you available for a call now?” Instead?

"Hi, are you free?" seems just as good to me, and mostly equivalent (without reference to a call).

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#116

Post by smeej »

Chris2048 wrote: post #113
smeej wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are replying to you explaining why your reasons don't support your arguments, and explaining what the real reasons for using it differently are. There's no opportunity for discourse, but it's apparently because your idea of "reason" is also different from everybody else's.

> explaining why your reasons don't support your arguments, and explaining what the real reasons Their opinion differs to mine, and I also disagree with some of the counter-arguments. Describing their responses as "real" versus mine is evidence that you've made up your mind, and are no longer objective about the topic. > your idea of "reason" is also different from everybody else's reasoning can be flawed or incorrec…

First, let's define "reason": a statement offered in explanation or justification [0]

> sometimes you might ask to call them instead of typing your question.

Does not explain or justify. Is not a reason. The possibility that you might ask to call has no bearing on whether or not you should start with "Hello," because if you are going to ask to call, you would be better served by just asking to call in the initial message, and if you are not going to ask to call, you would be better served by just asking your question in the initial message.

> It also might be the case there are multiple people who can answer the question, so you want [to] send out "hi" to a few of them to see who will respond right now.

Does not explain or justify. Is not a reason. Whether you are going to send the message to multiple people or only one has no bearing on whether or not you should start with "Hello," because if you are going to send the message to multiple people, you would be better served by sending your actual question. Even if you get more than one answer, you can just thank the people for their responses, if you don't manage to delete the extra messages from other people. If you are only going to send the question to one person, you would be better served by asking your actual question, so they can move the conversation forward when they reply.

> I would not send out multiple "Do you have time to hop on a call for 5 mins?" b/c then they might call me before I delete the message.

Does not explain or justify. Is not a reason. Whether more than one person might call you has no bearing on whether you should start with "Hello," because if more than one person does try to call you before you have a chance to delete the message, you are still better served by having them know why you wanted to talk, since they can better appreciate why you would have sent multiple messages and taken the soonest call, and if no more than one person tries to call you, you are still better served by having that person know why you want to talk to them before they call.

> I use IM as more informal, (AND/)OR conversations with likely back-and-forth, that may require the other person to be present to be of use.

Does not explain or justify. Is not a reason. Whether you need someone to be present to have a back-and-forth conversation has no bearing on whether you should start with "Hello," because if you do need someone to be present, you would be better served by having them already know what you might need them to be present to discuss, and if you do not need someone to be present, you would be better served by having them know as soon as possible what information you need from them.

None of your "reasons" explain or justify. None of them actually have any bearing on whether you should or should not start a conversation with "Hello." The answer is the same regardless of your "reasons." They're not even germane to the discussion, much less are they "reasons."

[0] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reason

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#117

Post by smeej »

Chris2048 wrote: post #115
addicted wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is such a ridiculously inconsiderate approach. Why can’t you just say “hey, are you available for a call now?” Instead?

"Hi, are you free?" seems just as good to me, and mostly equivalent (without reference to a call).

Maybe we need to approach this a different way to get through to you.

What is the advantage of asking, "Hi, are you free?" over asking, "Hi, are you free to talk for X number of minutes about Y?" Can you think of a single advantage?

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#118

Post by smeej »

Chris2048 wrote: post #94
nkrisc wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you message everyone “hello” if you’re not going to send the message? “Hello” “Yes?” “Nevermind.” What?

What is the implied delay between "Hello" and "Yes?"?

Does it matter? Whether it's instantaneous or happens over the course of hours, that type of communication contributes nothing to anything.

Re: Don't Just Say "Hello" in Chat

#119

Post by smeej »

Chris2048 wrote: post #93
CipherThrowaway wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's even worse. You're sending out rounds of "Hi's" to multiple people, distracting them to prepare them for a question you might not even ask? Candidly, you sound like an incredibly selfish communicator.

let's say you go up to a group of people working on desks. You ask "Is anyone free to help me with ?". Is this a "selfish communication"? What about messages posted in a group chat?

No, that is a reasonable way to ask for help.

What would be "selfish communication" would be to walk up to a group of people working at desks and just say, "Hello," and stand there awkwardly waiting for them to acknowledge you.

Same thing with a group chat. Asking, "Is anyone free to help me with X?" is a reasonable way to ask for help. Sending a whole group of people, "Hello," is a waste of everyone's time.

Post reply on HN