Questions are some of the most powerful words ever. Questions about the unknown have led to some of the greatest inventions and discoveries in mankind’s history. Questions don’t have to be overly complicated either. Sometimes, a simple “what if” is all it takes to make the impossible possible.
Another powerful aspect of questions are that they are tools to help us seek information about a problem from people who possess this information. This is especially important to Software Engineers as we will continuously run into problems throughout our entire career. However, a question is only as powerful as the amount of thought and effort put into it. You could have an amazing question. But, if you put little thought and effort into conveying that question to others in a meaningful way, you will most likely receive little to no help.
As Eric Raymond puts it simply, there are good questions and bad questions. One method to spot the difference between the two lies in where you ask and how you ask the question. For example, as a Software Engineer you wouldn’t ask a question about Javascript on a forum dedicated to computer hardware problems. As another example, say you have a problem with your homework assignment and you need help. Don’t just outright ask for the solution. You have to explain your attempt at the problem, what you think the error is, and ask for pointers towards the right solution.
Another method to spot the difference is the quality of detail you provide about your problem. You could provide a lot of details about your problem. But, if the quality of those details are bad, then no one will be able to help you as they can’t understand what you are saying.
One last method to spot the difference is in how technical the question is. If you ask a question that can easily be solved with a simple google search, this shows that you lack even the most basic understanding of that particular subject. Unfortunately for you, this will lead to others ignoring your question and may sometimes lead to others openly mocking you.
Searching for bad questions on StackOverflow was an easy task. I have found two questions that exemplify perfectly how to not ask a question. In this first question the poster is asking how to use a conditional statement in Python to determine if the eight numbers a user has inputted is between 1 and 100. This poster made three big mistakes. First, learning how to write a conditional statement requires nothing more than a simple google search. Secondly, the question is worded in a way where the person is outright asking for the answer. Lastly, it is never shown or even stated in the question if the poster ever attempted to solve their problem, and what output or errors they currently have.
In this second question the poster is asking what is wrong with their function. The function is supposed to return true if the function receives a certain set of characters and false otherwise. The reason this is a bad question was that their error stemmed from not having a basic understanding of C++. First, in their if statement they used the actual word “or” instead of the C++ or operator. Also, they had to compare the input to each character instead of all the characters.
While searching StackOverflow I found this question that is the perfect example of how a question should be asked. The poster wants to compute a similarity metric between two images and wants to know if there is a function that exists that can compare two 3-D images or transform the 3-D images into 1-D images while preserving the information of the image. The poster attempted the problem, posted their attempt, showed that their function outputted an error, provided an explanation on their thoughts on how to solve the problem, and only asked if a type of function existed. The poster never asked for someone to complete the program for him. Another plus is that a user provided links for the poster to read. Instead of the poster just asking for the answer, they actually thanked the person who provided the links and read them.
The line between a good question and a bad question can sometimes be as simple as not conveying information properly or not conveying enough information. As Software Engineers, being able to properly ask a question is imperative if you wish to have a successful career. This skill will enable you to solve problems more efficiently, be able to convey information to others more effectively, and will allow you to teach others how to ask questions correctly.