Stack Overflow and Discouraging Beginners • Hacker News Board

Re: Stack Overflow and Discouraging Beginners

#121

Post by edem » Mon, Jun 13, 2016, 11:09 PM UTC

reitanqild wrote: post #30

Veedrac wrote: post #26

> Maybe the original asker and I should have done ctrl + f for r% — but that didn’t occur to me, so I assume it didn’t occur to them either. Great, so you've learnt something for next time. > Beginners need guidance. They’re dumb and they flail around and they get stuck on “easy” problems. That’s why resources like Learn Python the Hard Way and Stack Overflow exist in the first place. Sorry, but no. "Stack Overflow i…

Then maybe just maybe add a rule that you must lurk before asking questions? When the site clearly looks like as a place for noobs to get questions answered for free then maybe don't complain that you get just that.

Again. Read the FAQ. It is there. The site has numerous points where they tell you to read it and the guidelines. Your lack of attention is a poor excuse.

Re: Stack Overflow and Discouraging Beginners

#122

Post by reitanqild » Tue, Jun 14, 2016, 2:31 PM UTC

edem wrote: post #121

reitanqild wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then maybe just maybe add a rule that you must lurk before asking questions? When the site clearly looks like as a place for noobs to get questions answered for free then maybe don't complain that you get just that.

Again. Read the FAQ. It is there. The site has numerous points where they tell you to read it and the guidelines. Your lack of attention is a poor excuse.

We're not talking about my lack off attention. I've already mostly stopped asking on SO a while and when I do I only do after I have either found the answer or exhausted all other relevant options that I know off (and prepared mentally to be told that it is not relevant because of what I think is [0] or not a good question because it is primarily opinion based etc.

IMO we are talking about every newbie that find SO every day and those who don't like dealing with them.

[0]: ok, that last one was on networking stackexchange or something.

Re: Stack Overflow and Discouraging Beginners

#123

Post by clover_leaf » Tue, Jun 14, 2016, 3:13 PM UTC

reitanqild wrote: post #31

droope wrote: post #28

Welcome to the programming community! People are generally kind and willing to help, but there is one caveat: there is frequently little patience for questions which you could have resolved yourself. With time you'll both learn to identify these and to write your questions in a way that it reflects that you've "done your research."

Problem is when you are stumped with some small detail you have missed. I must admit I have come to the point were I unconsciously just don't ask questions on SO and instead try another hour on my own instead of even trying to ask.

I have never asked a question on SO for this very reason. I will do hours of extra research and testing and searching because I do not want to be on the receiving end of some of the comments I've seen like "you should really get some training in that".

And yes, the extra work in forming a quality question does indeed often help me answer my own question.

However, I have often benefited from someone else's stupid question; so, I'm glad they asked even though I wouldn't have. I also benefit from the opinion questions even though they are always shut down as "not relevant" or "off topic".

It's getting to the point where it is difficult to even read some of the answers because you have to sift through all the hateful snarky comments. I have actually started deliberately avoiding SO and trying out the 2nd or 3rd search result sites.

It's easy to say RTFM but sometimes what people need is context. Unless you've programmed in C and used printf and scanf then format strings in whatever language are pretty opaque.