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The Stack Overflow Age

joelonsoftware.com

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Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#41

Post by jpindar »

maxxxxx wrote: post #23
baud147258 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps in the first case the question you asked was too broad compared to the standard expected for SO questions? Or too precise to be of use to anyone else?

The question was pretty broad but I think discussing it would have been very valuable for quite a few people. What bothered me were the snide responses. At minimum they should have stayed quiet or explained that SO doesn't deal with this kind of question.

Closed for using the D word! Stack Overflow is not for discussion!

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#42

Post by teh_klev »

zwieback wrote: post #34

It's interesting to see all the negative comments about the SO culture here. I just hadn't really noticed it but maybe it is a problem for beginners. I generally find what I'm looking for and when I post a question I try to research first to avoid spam. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

> when I post a question I try to research first to avoid spam. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

That's exactly how it's supposed to work. Demonstrating some effort to solve your problem goes a heck of a long way.

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#43

Post by zwieback »

Someone1234 wrote: post #39
zwieback wrote: post #34

It's interesting to see all the negative comments about the SO culture here. I just hadn't really noticed it but maybe it is a problem for beginners. I generally find what I'm looking for and when I post a question I try to research first to avoid spam. Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

I cannot help but read "beginners" in a derogatory tone. Or at the very least a way to hand-wave away the unhealthy atmosphere that has formed at SO. It is definitely a problem for people with low SO Reputation since others can come along and edit their posts completely changing the context and meaning, and seem more brave to bully low rep users (e.g. delete/dup their posts). I have fairly high SO Rep from way-back-w…

Beginner was not meant derogatory, I just meant that as the phase of starting to learn something. The types of questions are different at that stage. Also, after learning a few different languages or libraries it's probably easier to ask questions that don't get moderated out even if someone is a beginner in that new language. I don't know much Java but a lot of C# and C++ so I can probably ask a Java question that doesn't displease attention of overzealous moderators.

Your point about how SO has changed is good, the early days definitely felt different but making the huge amount of questions usable does call for a slightly different approach.

Glad to hear some high-rep users are trying to balance out the modding behavior, thanks for that.

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#44

Post by Someone1234 »

teh_klev wrote: post #38
nmstoker wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The perception of a culture problem on SO seems quite strong with a few people here. I'm sure bad things happen but it always seemed a) fairly rare and b) a price worth paying.... Without it, it would be like the Qlikview forums in no time! ;-)

This is the thing. The vast majority of (sane) users likely get on just fine without complaint. It's usually a noisy minority of folks who vocalise their grievances, especially when the rules of the site won't fit their world view of how they think the site should work. I've been a user on the site (and once upon a time a diamond mod) since the closed beta (userid < 500). Sure I've had my ups and downs and haven't al…

It is more an issue of who people think the site is for.

There's two big camps, those who feel that SO is for everyone, and those who think they're creating a reference encyclopedia. The encyclopedia crowd won the war, and those of us who just wanted SO as a place anyone and everyone could go and ask a question without getting bludgeoned to death by high karma users have moved on.

This has resulted in a lot of questions going unasked and SO is gradually getting stale, and a general toxic element gaining more and more power within the community. It used to be that you had to take part in SO to understand how unhealthy it was, now that is leaking onto Google results.

"No question is silly" on SO is "All questions are silly."

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#45

Post by vehementi »

simias wrote: post #33
ProAm wrote: post #9

It's too bad the culture of SO turned out the way it did. I was eager and happy to use it early on but was quickly disillusioned and it's my last resort to turn to if I have questions these days.

From a "lurker" perspective who often stumbles on SO after a web search it's really a great resource. On the other hand I never actually contributed anything to the website... because it won't let me. One day I stumbled upon a question regarding some problem I had, the accepted answer had a C code snippet that contained an error. I thought I'd be a good netizen and decided to create an account to submit a correction.…

This has been an exact summary of my experience with SO. Extremely useful when searching for things. Difficult to get started contributing to.

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#46

Post by ProAm »

payne92 wrote: post #19

SO is definitely a force, but I feel its usefulness has faded from inattention to the user experience and use cases. For example: #1. There's a huge "homework problem" (narrow, specific questions that aren't broadly useful). Consider flagging homework as homework (and excluding it from searches), trying to divert questioners to other resources before their question is posted ("this looks like homework..."), and more…

Questions should never be closed on a site that has a voting system. Completely defeats the purpose of both options. There is nothing wrong with asking a similar question to another or posting answers that are similar to others. People learn in different manners, sometimes it might take a person to read the same question (but a little different) a few different times before they can grasp the concept. It's meant to be a forum to help people, not rewrite the manual on a programming language. If there was only one way people should literally just RTM.

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#47

Post by 0xfeba »

maxxxxx wrote: post #14
booleandilemma wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think so. They try to keep it a question and answer site, not a question and opinion site.

I have tried to ask questions two times in the last few months and the responses were pretty much "if you don't know what you are doing you should hire an expert" or "why would would anyone do such a thing?". I definitely didn't feel very welcome and will stop posting there. It seems most questions that get answers are very simple and straightforward ones. Difficult stuff doesn't get discussed.

I've had mixed results. 75% of the time I get good responses, 25% I get berated. I really, really try to form good, formatted questions though.

But the site has been flooded by newbies and ESL people who just will not or cannot format and state their posts correctly. Or people that really shouldn't be programming in the first place, or at least--should learn how to use other documentation first. So there's a lot of chaff, in their defense.

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#48

Post by aembleton »

chipperyman573 wrote: post #29
rconti wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know a lot of people who subscribe to stackoverflow either. Use it? yes. Subscribe? no.

In order to view an answer on Experts Exchange, you had to subscribe.

I used to change my user agent to be that of a Google Bot

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#49

Post by Someone1234 »

aw3c2 wrote: post #37
maxxxxx wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question was pretty broad but I think discussing it would have been very valuable for quite a few people. What bothered me were the snide responses. At minimum they should have stayed quiet or explained that SO doesn't deal with this kind of question.

> discussing SO is not for discussion!

Until it is.

Ironically most of the more helpful SO google results are helpful exactly because of the discussion/updates that took place in the comment chain under an answer from ten years earlier.

> Guys how do I filter an array in JavaScript?!

>> Use XYZ

>>> XYZ works, but it doesn't work in IE5

>>>> If you're on IE10 or above you can use ABC instead of XYZ, it is cleaner!

>>>>> Hey guys, change this {} to this {}, makes it faster on mobile!

Re: The Stack Overflow Age

#50

Post by shagie »

Someone1234 wrote: post #49
aw3c2 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> discussing SO is not for discussion!

Until it is. Ironically most of the more helpful SO google results are helpful exactly because of the discussion/updates that took place in the comment chain under an answer from ten years earlier. > Guys how do I filter an array in JavaScript?! >> Use XYZ >>> XYZ works, but it doesn't work in IE5 >>>> If you're on IE10 or above you can use ABC instead of XYZ, it is cleaner! >>>>> Hey guys, change this {} to this {},…

The indents there suggest a threaded discussion that looks more like a 1 on 1 chat or threaded discussion board.

Wouldn’t one of those resources be a better place to hold such a discussion?

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