The way the askers write questions is a factor in determining how good the answers we get are.
Obviously, if you ask a clear, direct question it is easier for a someone to answer you. But, sometimes I've done that and my questions have still been overlooked. I've noticed some question-posting methods that aren't exactly obvious, but do help me get better answers.
Some tricks I've learned...
Even if my question is very complicated, I try to write a short question. People get turned off by longer questions, probably because they think its not worth their time (relative to other questions with equal reputation potential). After I get some traffic and votes on my question, and maybe some comments like "Can you post the code?" or "Clarify this..." I might post more, but by then I am already getting attention to my question. So, in summary, even if I know the answer requires a long question, I don't make it long until I've already gotten people to look at it.
I use more generic tags when possible. People are more likely to have
c#
andlinq
as a favorite tag, thanMethodCallExpression
, and I tend to get more views if I use at least one or two general purpose tags along with my more specific tags.I've noticed that if I give my question the performance tag, then SO heavy-weights like Marc Gravell, Jon Skeet and Eric Lippert are more likely to answer my question (especially if I use it in conjunction with a C# tag). Since having this realization, if I can think of a way to rephrase my question to sound like it is related to C# performance, I will word it as such and tag it accordingly.
"Be polite. SO Users HATE when people be impatient, rude or impolite." - Benny
So,
Does anyone else have any tips for getting better answers and question-recognition on SO? I think it would be really helpful if everyone contributed their own observations and techniques here.
P.S. This question is probably too long.