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Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 6:44 pm
by John Cartwright
a94060 wrote:allright then,since i cannot abide by these guidlines,i guess i will just leave then. Just because you are a voulenteer doesnt mean you need to post in the thread i make. im pretty sure there is someone who may be able to give a more helpful answer or explain what i am asking for. There is no moderator rule that says,once you open a thread,you need to post.

Nice knowing who ever i knew
I'm sorry you feel this way.

Posted: Sun Dec 17, 2006 7:00 pm
by volka
a94060 wrote:well,i mean,if 99% the answers are going to RTFM or google it,why wouldnt devnetwork just have a nice html page saying "Please Read the Fine Manual or Google it,Thanks"
maybe, if it were 99%, but it's far from that.

Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 12:37 pm
by RobertGonzalez
a94060 wrote:look man,i know,you know,the rest of the community knows that GOOGLE has the answer. If we all know,then WHY IS THIS FORUM MADE? It is made for those who are not as godly users at google as you are.
Uh, no. This forum was made to help people that have at least tried something that doesn't work no matter what they try. We are not here to be a personal developer to anyone. We are here to help people learn.
a94060 wrote:I am just asking for a simple example, and your saying it as if i am asking YOU personally to help me.
When you come to the community with 'I haven't searched yet, I haven't tried yet and even though you supplied lots of links to the answers I need, I am not willing to try to learn something on my own' you are essentially asking the community to do something for you. At least this is how most of the common contributors see things.
a94060 wrote:I have lately been relizing that only the moderators end up giving answers like RTFM or google it,why is this?
Because we, as moderators, have a vested interest in making sure this community serves the people that are using it. It is our job to make sure the forums are moderated, and as such, we are here more than a lot of other regular contributors.
a94060 wrote:I am starting something new,i know there is google,i can reinvent the wheel if i want to. Heck,i bet everything in this forum is probably somewhere on the internet. This is just my view,i have been seeing that now people are starting to play god and taking time to post remarks such as just google it,or read the manual.
Playing God? Hardly. If you were here reading 60 to 100 posts a day on 'Why am I getting this header already sent error' or 'Why doesn't my file upload work' when the answers are already out there (even on these forums as you have already said) you'd start telling people to search too.

Can you imagine how helpful we could be to everyone if all the people that post questions that have already been answered tried to actually find the answer for themselves instead of relying on someone to answer their question as though it were the first time it had ever been asked? And how is someone supposed to know if their question has been asked/answered before? They search. They try stuff. They actually do something for themselves before asking someone to do it for them.

And that is all we are asking of anyone that posts here. Try something on your own before asking someone to do it for you.

Posted: Mon Dec 18, 2006 12:41 pm
by RobertGonzalez
a94060 wrote:well,i mean,if 99% the answers are going to RTFM or google it,why wouldnt devnetwork just have a nice html page saying "Please Read the Fine Manual or Google it,Thanks" That would probably cut off like 9000 posts out of the forums. Whatever,i dont want to argue with gurus,so i will just leave it.
Oh yeah, I know someone has already posted the link to the general Posting Guidelines, but here is a reprinted copy. Take a look at number 1.
twigletmac wrote:I'm posting these as general guidelines for users to refer to when posting on the devnet forums. These are not rules, you will not get banned for not following them but you will probably be pointed towards them on a regular basis if you totally ignore them.

GUIDELINES FOR ASKING QUESTIONS
Start Here: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

In a nutshell:
  1. Try a search first - Google, the PHP manual, the MySQL manual, Phuse and this forum are all good resources.
  2. Read the tutorials - they're not there for nothing and cover some frequently asked questions.
  3. If you're looking for a script to do something in particular and have no wish to write your own please either go to hotscripts.com or advertise the job in the Job Hunt forum.
  4. Read the forum descriptions carefully, you want to post your question in the most relevant one.
  5. Do not hijack other people's threads, post your own topic and reference (i.e. link to) the other thread in it.
  6. Write your question carefully, think about what you need to achieve and exactly what help you are looking for.
  7. Write a clear subject line, it'll help people deciding whether to look at your post or not - 'help, PHP noob' is probably going to be ignored by some.
  8. Don't just post - 'This doesn't work' - tell us exactly what doesn't work and make sure to include any error messages you're getting.
  9. Use the bbcode tags for code blocks - for PHP code use the tags to enclose it, for all other code use the tags - this will make it much easier for people to read your code (especially if you've taken the time to indent it properly).
  10. Don't cross-post, once you've chosen the most relevant forum there is no need to post the same question in any of the others.
  11. Remember all the people here answering questions are volunteers, be polite to them, thank them for their help and if you aren't getting the answers you want refine your question don't have a go at the people trying to help you.
  12. If you work out the answer yourself post the solution - it'll help the next person who comes along with a similar question.
  13. If the solution someone else gives you works, post back and say so - it's always nice to know that a problem's fixed.
GUIDELINES FOR ANSWERING QUESTIONS
It's always good to remember that it's not just how you ask a question that is important - how you answer a question should be thought out too.
  1. Don't just post RTFM - try and give a link to the section of the manual that is relevant.
  2. Read the question carefully, if you don't understand what's being asked, say so.
  3. Read the other answers in the thread, don't just read the first and last posts - you could be missing a lot inbetween if you do and it could make the help you give irrelevant. It may also be frustrating for those already involved in the thread to see that you've ignored their input.
  4. Try and help people help themselves, if someone has posted an link to the relevant area of the manual (or a tutorial or other example page) don't just post a cut-and-paste code snippet, yes you know the answer but give the poster a chance to try and sort it themselves.
  5. Respect other posters - if you are elaborating or disagreeing with what's been said be constructive.
  6. Explain your answer - don't just post a bunch of code with no clue as to what it fixes/replaces.
  7. Remember that just because you always do something one way does not mean it is the right way, neither is someone else's code immediately wrong because you don't recognise the functions they're using - use the manual to make sure you know what you're talking about.
  8. register_globals is off by default, unless you're helping those with older PHP versions (4.0.6 or below) please use the superglobal arrays when dealing with user input.
  9. Check your code - if you can just run it to check for parse errors.
  10. Telling someone to turn down their error reporting is not a valid solution.
I DISAGREE/THINK THERE'S SOMETHING MISSING
This is the first draft of forum guidelines, if you disagree with them, think my wording's a bit off or have any other comments, please PM me (twigletmac) and I'll take a view on it. Likewise if you think I've missed something off.

Mac