How to use the Code Project Forums

Introduction

The forums here at code project is often the only programming resource I use, it’s a great place to bounce ideas off other often experienced developers all over the world. If your stuck on a problem the chances are 99.99% that someone here at code project as an answer for you, be it code, an idea (or a “brain fart” as I like to call them) or a link to an article or some other website.

It’s a great community of people that will literally go out of their way to help you with your problem and they do it for free!

Background

The reason why I rely so much on the code project forums is I’m a junior developer(19 years old) with 6 months working experience and absolutely NO GUIDANCE in my work place. I’m the only programmer in my company and on top of that I’ve been given the huge task of rewriting our current in-house software application from the procedural language “clarion 6” to my favorite Object Oriented language, C#.

The reason for writing this is out of frustration, all of the people here who are constantly on this website are sick and tired of a lot of things new or ignorant people do or say on the forums. So in that light I decided to write a guide on how to get the most out of your code project forums experience…

Where To Start

The most obvious place to start is Chris’s guide “How To Get An Answer To Your Question”. This is the top most post in all the forums and I recommend you read it!

Your Subject Line

Make your subject something descriptive! Why do we do this? It’s quite simple really…

In my opinion no programmer can ever know everything, let’s say you’re stuck on a GDI+ related problem, not everyone has worked with GDI before so people who can’t help you with GDI won’t even bother reading your message which means you aren’t wasting their precious time. But on the other hand people who know GDI and feel comfortable with it will almost definitely read what you have asked and help if they can.

DO NOT use “help help help” or “urgent” or “some other stupid ambiguous sentence” in your subject line. The reason for this should be apparent now.

Your Message

When you get to the actual message put some thought into what you type, time and time again messages are so poorly constructed that no one understands your question so it will obviously not be answered.

Give as much detail as you can about the problem you have for instance.

• What your thought process was
• What you need the end result to be
• What you tried
• What happened when you tried it
• Any “brain farts” you might have but don’t know how to implement
• Any other relevant information

The more detail you can give the better your chances of an answer that will be correct.

DO NOT post “how do I draw line” after using a subject like “GDI”. You could have easily google’d that and gotten an answer.

Using code In Your Message

This subject often angers me the most. When you need to post code do it the right way!

There are pre and code tags for a reason, the code tags changes the font and color of the text in between them. The pre tags puts an arrange block behind the text in between them and keeps the formatting intact. If you just copy and paste code and don’t put the pre tags around it the formatting will be lost which means NO INDENTAION.

No one wants to read sometimes over 100 lines of non-indented code, most people will often see code in a post that isn’t inside pre tags and close the message there and then. I know I do!

If you don’t know how HTML tags work here is a crash course…

A HTML tag must be opened and closed, to open a tag we simply do the following

<someTag>

To close it you do this

Its as easy as that! Now the get the effect of the tag on your text you must put your text in the middle of the two tags. So if you want to post a line of code you would type this.

<code>someClass.someMethod(someVariable);</code>

The same goes for pre or any other HTML tag for that matter.

I recommend using code and pre tags even if its just one line of code, that way others on the forums can easily distinguish between your code and your message. To use two tags at once you would type…

<pre><code>someClass.someMethod(someVariable);</code></pre>

Truths And Facts About Developers Using These Forums

There are a few things you need to keep in mind while typing out your question.

We are not getting any money for helping you! So treat us as you would treat someone doing you a HUGE favor, because that’s exactly what we are doing.

We’re not here to do your work or homework for you! So ask a specific question on a specific topic or problem. Don’t ask us “How can I draw a moving 3D image, plz send me code”! Instead you could ask “I need to draw a moving 3D image, but I have no experience in this. Can anyone recommend a good tutorial or article for a beginner?”.

How To Get The Most Out Of The Forums

Some of us spend a lot of time here and there are a lot of good reasons why you should too.

In the first place, if you expect help from others you must be prepared to do the same. So often I see these “one hit wonder” programmers that ask a question (usually a stupid one), get replies and never post a message ever again. Not even a thank you or that worked or anything.

In my opinion this is rude. If you get an answer reply to it with an update like “thank you that worked” or “I’m a little closer to my desired end result but now I have this problem…”. We’d like to know if our help actually helped so let us know.

Stick around and see if you can’t help other people on these forums with problems you’ve overcome in the past. It’s like every other relationship you have with any other person, for it to work both parties must work together. Don’t just take take take, give something back once in a while.

If you don’t come across any questions you can help with that doesn’t matter, just by reading the questions and answers / suggestions of the other developers you actually get a a lot of insight on our craft of developing and further your experience. There is a lot you can learn from these developers to I suggest you take the time too read what they have to say.

Final Thought

Code project is a great place to get help and to share your knowledge with others, but with great power comes great responsibility… so use it wisely or suffer the consequences!

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)