[NEW USERS] - How to post a question.

Here are some general guidelines to keep in mind when posting a question on these forums.

USE SEARCH FIRST

There is a pretty good chance that unless you have some
really odd or unique problem that it has been addressed on this
forum before (or even hundreds of times before for some issues).

Use the forum's search feature first to see if there are already some good threads on the subject. It's easy to search - just click the "Search" button at the top right of the page.

BE DESCRIPTIVE

I cannot stress this enough. We cannot possibly help you if you simply post a thread, copy and paste your whole script and say "it has errors what's wrong with it?". Keep this in mind:

1. Explain to us what your script does (or what it's supposed to do).

2. Explain to us what exactly the error is. Is it a PHP error? Your own error reporting? MySQL error? Or is it just not doing what you want?

3. Remember that you know a lot more about your script than we do. Don't assume we know just what it does.

DON'T USE STUPID TOPIC NAMES

Post a descriptive topic name! Give a short summary of your problem in the subject. Don't use attention getting subjects, they're not fair to other users! Things like "PLEASE HELP!" or "URGENT" make your post unfairly look like a priority over other users post who need help just as much as you. Posting non-descriptive leading in topic names just to get more reads will not be tolerated.

Here's a great list of topic subjects YOU SHOULD NOT POST by freebsd:

1) Help me
2) Hello
3) You must know the answer
4) Please help this female newbie
5) Something wrong
6) Come on PHP gurus
7) This one for you
8) Just wondering
9) This is too complicated for me
10) possible?
11) Very urgent
12) I have a question
13) Stupid question
14) Newbie needs help
15) pulling my hair out
16) this is driving me nuts
17) WHAT THE?!?!

Generally anything similar to those is unacceptable. Just post your problem.

Here is a good example of a way to post a question about ereg() and regular expressions / validating emails

"Need ereg regular expression help"

or even better:

"validating emails w/ ereg() regular expressions"

These are bad examples:

"I can't figure this out!"
"Stupid question..."
"Female newbie needs regex help"
"Help me! Urgent!"

ONLY POST THE PART OF YOUR SCRIPT THAT HAS PROBLEMS

Please do not post your entire script in a message. To get help faster, post only the code most related to the problem you are experiencing - really try to single it out. If you have to use 2 or more posts just to fit your code in, that is probably a good clue that you are posting way too much of it and it's not going to be easy for anyone to help you pinpoint the problem, especially not having run the script themselves.

PUT YOUR CODE IN IN PHP VB CODE

Very often we see people post a huge ugly script right into the message. There's a problem with that - tabs and spacing don't show up properly, and there's no syntax highlighting. That makes it difficult to read!

There's a really neat vB code built in that will format and syntax highlight your PHP code when you post it. You can use that easy PHP button right above the box where you type your message. The result will look like this:



IF YOU GET AN ERROR ON A CERTAIN LINE, TELL US WHAT'S ON THAT LINE AND THE LINES ABOVE AND BELOW IT

It's not too helpful when you mention an error on a certain line but don't tell us what code is on that line. Because errors can sometimes be caused by lines of code above or below the one the error is mentioned on, please post those lines as well.

ONLY YOU KNOW WHAT "DOESN'T WORK" MEANS

Please tell us what your script is supposed to do and why it "doesn't work". Or if you don't feel like explaining what the whole script is, at least tell us what the offending code is supposed to do. When you come in and say "it doesn't work" or just "it has errors", that means nothing. There could be a million things wrong and no one will know where to look.

IF YOU ARE NOT GOING TO TAKE ADVICE, DON'T ASK FOR HELP

Often times, people post questions about their script with the wrong mindset from the very beginning. Soon they are receiving replies, and silently debugging their code, making no effort to even acknowledge the people helping them! It becomes one sided, and the poster isn't aware that many of the people helping them hope to learn something as well! Letting people know of your progress and how their suggestions apply (or do not apply) will not only help you figure out your problem quicker, but you'll be returning the favor to those of us who learn more by helping.

In even worse scenarios, sometimes the poster will argue back even when they don't know what they're talking about. Hey - if you know it all, don't ask for help.

When people give you free code that may solve your problem, by all means, try it out! And if it's not what you need, at least thank them.

And if people post code that is over your head, ask them for an explanation. Too many times I see great solutions posted, then the original poster doesn't understand it and goes hunting around the PHP manual and finds some function they think will solve their problem but really has Nothing to do with their problem! The solution you are given may not always be something you are totally familiar with, so just ask for a better explanation!

REMEMBER THAT WHEN PEOPLE HELP YOU, THEY ARE DOING YOU A FAVOR

Regardless of how big your ego is, it is not someone else's privilege to debug Your code. It is not their privilege to have them help you. It is yours. Remember that when people help you they are doing you a favor. You are not doing them a favor by letting them see your incredible application. Be patient, help people out by posting good descriptions of what you need help with, and not snapping at people with garbage such as "if you aren't going to help don't waste my time replying".

I found this to be really really good.

http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

Everyone should read this so as to get best of out open source community.

JD

My biggest pet peeve is just outrageous gramatical errors. The worst or the ones where the write so "complex" (sarcastic) that they can write 7 lines of information in only one sentence. Maybe people should read over what they write because I do not know how someone could write like that. Even when I do figure out what they are saying and know the answer, I still don't answer because of the terrible grammar. It's just appaling to me. Plus when someone writes improperly, you sometimes can't even understand what they are asking.

Most people consider programmers to be the most intelligent people, but half of us don't even show it because they can't even write properly.

Let me add another thing. JeffCT suggest putting code in php VB code because it makes it easier to read and I totally agree. But what some people fail to realize is that it doesn't word wrap. So if you have an extremely long line of code it streches the window very wide and makes it difficult (or just a lot of trouble) to read. I won't lie, I've done it before. I think it's because in our editors, we have it set to word wrap, so we don't realize how long it is really. And when you writing the thread, it word wraps in the <textarea> field too. So I recommend just throwing in some returns to break it up into several lines. It makes it easier on all of us. And if you forget to do that and see it's long when you are shown how it looks, go back and edit it. It's worth the "trouble."

It would be very courteous of posters to give some kind of notice of the content of the sites they refer to if it is potentially offensive. E.g.,



Admittedly, domains that descriptive don't really need much clarification, but please remember that there are minors and people of widely ranging sensibilities on the forum. Even if you consider wet-bikini desktops wholesome family entertainment, others may not.

Your consideration would be appreciated by at least one regular.

-wg <><

Should that not be, "My biggest pet peeve ARE just outrageous gramatical errors.." as you are using the plural of "error"

;-)

No, it shouldn't. He had it right the way he had it. Take off the object at the end of the sentence, and you just have "My biggest pet peeve".... now, which sounds correct

"My biggest pet peeve is..."
or
"My biggest pet peeve are..."

The only way it should be "are" is if he had more than one peeve, ie...

"My biggest pet peeves are ..."

It doesnt matter what his peeve is, cause he's only got one of them. There may be a plural amount of this one peeve all over the board here, but he still only has one.

That we know of : )

Of course, what I find amusing is that he's sitting there ranting about correct grammar and whatnot, but in the very same breath he says...

Maybe its just me, but that sound just as bad as you can get...

I guess we can have tutorial on Grammer in English !!!

JD

Let me make yet another suggestion:

If you're new to the subject you are thinking of posting on, go here first:

http://www.devshed.com

I came to this site by mistake at work one day while trying to discover why my script hung in a browser. The script was JavaScript so, you guessed it, I wound up directly in the Client-Side JavaScript forum. I didn't know for the longest time that there was so much more to DevShed than just the forums. There is a TON of useful information just waiting to be found. If you need some help with the basics, try the tutorial for your language on Developer Shed FIRST.

From the DevShed article "An Object Lesson In JavaScript":


Don't worry, it's not just the forums.

Hi

how about a spell checker, for people like me, who never look at what they type, when they are pressing them buttons!


I always seem to make mistakes....



F!

I apologise if I offended anyone - I am always grateful for any help - one day maybe I will be able to help others BUT until then I guess I will just plod along

Thank you anyway

personally i think common since....sense.....sence....cents *grins* is all we need when writting stuff dont you i mean if we make it understandable then everything is A ok and noone will have to guess at what is being said its not like we cant figure things out we do have brains dont we sometimes i thin people dont want to use thier brains but hey that is just me and i am a newbie to the forum but i am finding it very informative and very helpful and also the people here seem to be generally friendly and polite even when they are telling other people to straighten up! Oh! I am sorry was that sentance to long?

fair do's

I have to say mine's spelling, not grammar. Please notice the two "m's" in grammar. That would logically cause "grammatical" to have two "m's", not one.

Here's the link to Merrim-Webster's online dictionary/thesaurus. It's a valuable link to have if you have difficulty spelling or aren't sure exactly what some words actually mean. I'd recommend you bookmark it.

http://www.m-w.com/netdict.htm

While the ability to articulate isn't universal, the interpretation of the art of being well-spoken is very much in the mind of each reader. Translated, I can say something two different ways. If the first is comprised of small syllable words, simply written, it is universally translatable. (If it's simply written, everyone will understand it) If it is concisely written, it will contain fewer but larger, more complex words and have a richer, more elegant interpretation. By it's very nature, it will not be universally comprehensible. Such is the nature of human speech.

To further complicate the issue, part of the art of elegant speech is organization, just as good programming requires organization, something each of us strives for.

<hopping off soapbox>