Saving Face, Ask With Grace
25 Jan 2018
We’ve All Been There
It’s late. You’ve been up all night working on your project that’s due in two days, but you have no idea how to fix this bug that’s been haunting you for the past 5 hours now. Your colleagues have no idea what’s wrong with your code, you can’t see any errors with your code, and you’ve completely lost hope. What do you do now? Quit? Give up? You can’t let it end this way, so you make your way back to Stack OverFlow and.. You’ve found someone with your exact same problem! Amazing! However, once you click on the link you’re greeted with “Nvm fixed it lol.”
The Do’s and Don’ts
Don’t panic. You’ve still got time and there’s bound to be someone out there that can help you. However, whether or not someone will help you is up to how much effort you are willing to put into your question. There are thousands of questions everyday, both good and bad, so what will make yours stand out? The first thing that you should do is to check once more if anyone else has experienced the same issues that you are currently facing or if it has been resolved already. If you still cannot find a solution then perhaps it is time to brave a new frontier and be the first to ask about it on your favorite programming forum. When you ask your question, be specific and provide enough details so other will be able to help you. Don’t be like this person whose post was too vague for others to help them. When they come back to check on it, they’ll need to update their post and wait for even longer till they receive help. Secondly, this is something they could’ve easily solved themself by reading through other posts. Why should a reader help them if they’re not even willing to put in the effort to help themself? You’re on a deadline and don’t have time to waste, so be concise and specific. Do be like this person and reference your previous attempts to solve the problem. You want to describe your issues, your thought process, and your attempts at solving the problem. You want to convince the reader that you’ve exhausted your options and are actively seeking for a solution. Only then will someone be able to correct you or provide you with the way to go.
Someone Replied!
They answered your question and the code looks good. Time to rock and roll! Not quite… When you have received a satisfactory answer to your question you need to take the time to fully comprehend their answer and come up with your own solution. You cannot just copy their code because that is plagiarism. However, if the answer is a method to do something simple(like iterating through an array) you will have to use their code because it is a building block of the language you’re coding in(though I’m sure you’d have found answers to that type of question already). Congratulations on solving your problem. In the future perhaps you too can help others like these kind folks have helped you and if you did manage to solve the problem on your own, be sure to leave your solution there for others that will inevitably come across it in the future!
