I want one of these sites for this flow-destroying scenario:
Bob: Hi
Me: hey Bob. What can I do for you?
(Five minutes later)
Bob: how are you?
Me: I’m ok Bob. What do you need?
(Five minutes later)
Bob: Do you know much about the daily Foo sync task?
That “how are you” gets me because its meant to be polite but it has the exact opposite effect. It’s funny because developers are often characterised as lacking social skills, but it’s usually the non-developers (analyst, PM etc) who do this.
Maybe also one for good old:
Bob: <screenshot of blank page, address bar omitted>
That reminds me of the time someone sent me a screenshot of the homepage of the website, and the email just said "please fix". I will get right on that.
This is a related but slightly different phenomenon. Frustrating the recipient, but probably not detrimental to the sender. Asking to ask in an IRC channel is definitely detrimental to the sender, though.
>I really prefer people to warn me before dropping a bomb
Why? These "hi" or "are you there" or "can I ask a question" are useless to me. Also in the reverse role I find it useful to just type up my whole problem. Sometimes in the middle of typing it all up I will figure out a good solution and then just not send the message. Even if the person is not there to help you, you can always copy paste your message to someone else.
It depends, I mean in times of remote work it's good when the routine doesn't degrade to a purely mechanical exchange. Also it can be actually useful if people chit-chat about what they are doing which can lead to discussions and save time by cutting useless work. It's not ideal when people repeatedly ask me about a certain class of problems - terse or not - it's a disruption to my work.
(With dropping a bomb I also mean something like a larger/tedious amount of work)
While it's polite, IMO, to include some form of greeting or other pleasantries, in any kind of asynchronous communication medium, I do not want to wake up to (or come back from lunch to, or whatever) someone saying "Hey" or "Can I ask you something?" Chances are, by the time I've said "sure, go ahead", the person won't be there anymore, and then both of us just have to wait frustratingly.
This feels like one of those internet rules that stems from a neurodiverse IRC-type crowd
Neurotypical people use this sort of social foreplay as a way to handshake a conversation[1], where the tech types want an input/output process devoid of mood and feeling
It is silly and quite time wasting online too, but it's what they need to feel comfortable asking you questions. I figure if they need to adapt to some of my quirks I'll do likewise for theirs
> Neurotypical people use this sort of social foreplay as a way to handshake a conversation[1], where the tech types want an input/output process devoid of mood and feeling
Majority of "tech types" are neurotypical. Neurodiverse are minority in tech. There is more of them in tech then among teachers or something like that, but still.
And even neuroatypical use elaborate rituals before they ask question. Even autists in tech.
I understand the point you're making but I think you're focusing on the precise wording of my comment rather than the meaning
I am not a psychologist or therapist or anything, lets just assume I'm using the words wrong and grouping people inaccurately. I'm talking about the people who make internet rules like don't ask to ask vs the people that don't do that
You can still have your small talk. Just put it in the same message. Getting pinged for "hey" and then they spend several minutes typing was a waste of pining me when they could have just prepended "hey" to the full message.
Exactly. I'm far from "neurotypical" but I definitely use small talk in real life when appropriate. It's just not appropriate for IRC or other media like letters, email etc.
For me it's not because I want an input/output type conversation, it's because I want to maintain asynchronous conversation.
If I reply "I'm fine thanks how are you" then you know I'm here and looking, you've forced me to into a synchronous conversation and now I will appear rude if I don't immediately answer your "I just have a quick question"
If you just post your question upfront, I can read it and prioritize it myself based on what I am currently doing.
Yup. And for the sender you don't need to wait around to know you have the go-ahead for a response, if you ask it well enough you should be good to go the next time you look. The key is to say everything you wanted to say as clearly as possible. Save everyone time and get the answers you want with the most efficiency.
I'm the 'engineer' side of the equation. But often I need async interaction with various others. So I just combine it all in one message:
Hey, Jo! I just have a quick question for when you have a moment: <question for Jo>
And leave it. I'll ping Jo again at a time interval depending on urgency - sometime this sprint? I'll remind about the message in a couple days. Need it today? I indicate that when I ask, and about 4hrs later I'll poke a bit to see where we are.
Expectation setting is the missing key in a lot of these conversations. Asking to ask is about not being rude. There are better ways to do this in an asynchronous conversation. It's right up there with "we need to talk" in texts. The anxiety it causes is completely unnecessary, and easily avoided with a little detail and priority.
There are countless socially defined, implicit hammers looking for nails. Most can be improved upon or swapped out for different tools.
This is my pet peeve. You don't have a quick question. If you did, you'd just ask it. By asking to ask, you've doubled my required response effort.
Please just ask questions. Pinging someone about a mysterious question that you'll reveal later is annoying. It certainly doesn't go on my list of things to do re: "Sometime later this sprint be sure to get back to that person who won't tell me what they want from me". It goes on the list "Ignore this person"
Because the method is indeed async, you can say "I'm fine thanks how are you" with no future expectation of immediate reply. It's okay. If they wanted sync, they would've asked for a phone call.
But, suppose you switch to sync. They ask a question. It indeed isn't important to you right now. Tell them you're busy with other tasks, and you'll reply later. It isn't rude, we all frequently work with others that have a lot on their plate.
I agree with you, but if you find yourself feeling burdened, perhaps there's a genuine opportunity for introspection: why are you feeling burdened? You don't owe them anything, they're asking you for your time. You're doing them the favor; you're under no obligation. Feeling burdened seems self-imposed.
It can be sometimes easier to shift your own perspective than it is to change the behavior of others.
Because humans have not adapted to online, emotionless, body language-less chat, and it's cumbersome and unnecessary to emulate this behavior. It's burdening the same way I have to smile and say thanks to the pizza delivery guy instead of slamming the door in his face.
> For me it's not because I want an input/output type conversation, it's because I want to maintain asynchronous conversation.
In the context of an IRC chat room, isn’t all conversation assumed to be synchronous? (Forgive me if this has an obvious answer, as I’m not too familiar with IRC culture.)
Depends if it's a busy room with a lot of actively chatting users, or a quiet room with only a few people active at once.
In either case, skipping the chitchat is beneficial. In a busy room, ask the question and if someone catches it they can respond right away. Any attempt at a "hello how are you" will likely be lost in the noise.
A buddy of mine does this via text message. He'll ask, "hey are you working tomorrow?", and it's 50:50 whether his next question is going to be
"can you pick me up from the airport?" (forcing me to quickly reply yes even if I might not want to, because he already knows I'm not working and I don't want to seem rude—why can't he just take the train?),
or "im in town, wanna hang out tonight? (sure, sounds like fun).
Wish he'd skip the leading question and not put me in a corner.
I recommend you to read this old post about guess vs ask culture. You don't have to reply yes if you don't want to. Even if you are not working, you may have other reasons.
I think that is part of it, and part is also copying a pattern that is appropriate in some situations into situations where it isn't.
Meaning: I totally agree with the article that asking to ask is a complete waste of time on Internet forums, especially technical ones. Those intro questions usually go unanswered, as they should IMO.
OTOH, what I thought the article might be about before I read it, is when people in RL say something like, "May I you ask a question?" before asking a potentially sensitive question. There are valid psychology reasons to do that in certain situations.
It's common for people to mimic conversation patterns, mostly unconsciously. They can get copied into situations where it is just a waste of time.
it’s also a law of power, by asking a small question first it forces them to either be rude and ignore you or be gracious and engage, and once engaged you ask a larger question (when it's even ruder to ignore you). Political donation drives, for example, start you off with a $5 donation. obviously the social rules are different in async modes.
Yeah, I don’t think it’s just lazy or social habit that causes people to do this. Particularly when it’s an outsider (eg a sales person in an engineering team’s chat room) in a situation where some response is expected (eg a work environment), it can seem presumptuous to dump a question that will require a bunch of time to engage with. Asking to ask expresses “I realize I’m asking for a bunch of your time here and it’s okay if you don’t want to help [even if you could]” and it gives the room a chance to decline the question before getting far enough into it that it would appear rude to bail out.
I’m guessing a bit here from what I’ve seen. I don’t think this stuff is conscious. But I don’t feel like the authors of stuff like this are even trying to have empathy for why people do this.
> It is silly and quite time wasting online too, but it's what they need to feel comfortable asking you questions...
No necessarily. Asking "Any Java experts around?" takes little effort, while formulating a question for a Java expert could take significant effort. A "no" response for the first question could save everyone from wasting their time with the second.
This might be the rationale, but it's fundamentally very wrong. In the vast majority of "programming/tech discussion/help" spaces I frequent, the response to this is almost always going to be: "Maybe, ask your question."
It turns out that, a significant percentage of the time, the "preconditions" for the question are either:
- Way too specific (i.e. yes, even a non java expert knows what "nullpointerexception" means)
- Not nearly specific enough (i.e. no, I know Java but your issue is from a specific library with 1 page of documentation from the 90's)
This, in my opinion, is exactly what makes the 'asking to ask' so frustrating. It's impossible to know if I can answer your question without actually knowing what the question is. And if I ask what the question is, now I'm the one uncomfortable with the situation when it turns out to be something I can't help with.
edit: I also feel like it's worth noting, I'm aware that formulating a good question takes time and effort; however, in the "asking for help" / "giving help" scenario, it's very much common courtesy to do the most you can to enable people to help you. We want to help! But please ask a good question. (I do totally understand that asking good questions is a hard thing to learn, though! I started out asking very poor questions and slowly learned over time.)
Or in a broader context someone does know about. Or maybe someone's just better at getting things out of google.
For example, I once helped a co-worker who was having trouble with a toy webserver written in Go as a learning exercise. It wasn't recognizing url paths that it should have. I don't know Go, but did recognize the problem from our apache/wsgi django setup - path prefixes being stripped. Knowing the right keywords to search for, I was able to find the fix for a config file and we got it working.
> Asking "Any Java experts around?" takes little effort
which is precisely why this is annoying: it's asking for a social commitment without putting any effort in. It also reaches for the top shelf for no reason. Does the person's question really need a Java "expert"? Probably not.
> A "no" response for the first question could save you from wasting your time with the second.
Arguably if they were to find help _anywhere_ they would benefit from articulating their question in a clear and concise way. Let alone the high probability that through writing the question they might answer their own question, because we're all humans.
> A "no" response for the first question could save everyone from wasting their time with the second.
That “no” is never going to happen though. Every individual might know that they aren’t a Java expert, but they don’t know that every other individual is also not an expert. So there is nobody in a position to answer “no”.
> That “no” is never going to happen though. Every individual might know that they aren’t a Java expert, but they don’t know that every other individual is also not an expert. So there is nobody in a position to answer “no”.
A lack of response is equivalent to a "no." I suppose I could have phrased it more clearly, but my though is the asker would wait for an affirmative response to proceed with investing more into asking the question.
How long are they going to wait? On low traffic asynchronous chats it's not unusual to get an answer 12 hours later, especially when the chat spans timezones.
It’s not though. I routinely ignore questions like this for questions where I am one of the experts, but I would quite often reply to a real question in the same situation.
> A "no" response for the first question could save everyone from wasting their time with the second.
If I have a question that takes time to write up, I'll need to spend that time either way. Better to write the question up front so I can copy/paste it wherever I need until I get the help I need than to ask "any Java experts around" and proceed to waste anyone who responds' time while they wait for me to actually compose the question.
Why would a neurodiverse person want a conversation devoid of mood and feeling? Maybe their feelings just work differently and you can't understand them.
Polling people with non-informative questions is a good way to distract them for no reason if they can't help you. I think that's impolite. As someone with ADHD, that can be disruptive and at times gets extremely frustrating because I can easily lose half an hour to a 1 minute distraction if it demands my attention. Give me some initial information to work with and I will be able to respond without losing my focus.
It’s good to remember that many of the people on here are not normal.
I had spent several weeks on an extremely technical problem when I realized Mother’s Day was coming up.
Saw a giant oversized Winnie the Pooh bear that I knew she would like.
So in my extreme logical state I was thinking I would just slice off the arms legs and heads put them in separate boxes and mail them to her for reassembly. Very elegant solution.
A bit later when my mind wasn’t so analytical I realized my mistake. Clearly her house didn’t have room for a giant bear.
So I sent her a Winnie the Pooh lamp instead. She was happy, and I didn’t need to disassemble her beloved childhood icon.
Personally it’s because I find conversations full of mood and feeling kinda boring, usually very light in substance and often gossip based
Also ADHD (inattentive) for what it’s worth. I understand the problem, I’m saying this solution is ineffective and just comes off a bit bellendary
You’re just gonna come off as some Big Bang Theory Sheldon-type asshat by giving people a massive document to read before they can besmirch your presence. Do they also have to read the XY problem article first or do you wait for them to ask a question before springing that trap card?
It’s not good optics for nerd kind and it’s way more hassle on both parties than is needed
To me conversations with substance are full of mood and feeling. I love it when I can talk about something and get actual understanding in response, or when a person talks to me and I can relate to what they're trying to express. I don't know where the "mood and feeling" is in random pleasantries and small talk; they feel empty to me.
As for prompts, it's not like you need to write a novel about what you want to discuss, just include something.
For example, when asking for help:
Bad: "Hi" -- This demands my attention because I don't know what it's about, forcing me to respond and wait for the other person. Distraction and annoyance are practically guaranteed if I ignore it. I consider this kind of opener extremely rude, because to my brain it can be functionally equivalent to screaming "GIVE ME YOUR ATTENTION NOW".
Better: "Hi! I need help with X, can you help?" -- This is a request for attention, but I can at least decide if I'm interested and if I'm too busy I can respond with "No" or "Probably, but not right now.", which is satisfactory for my brain and doesn't distract me.
Best: "Hi! X is doing A when I try to do Y and I need B, can you help?" -- I may be able to solve the problem right away, which is the best outcome.
It's quite an assumption that people who dislike this kind of meaningless introductions are neuroatypical. I for one would more likely "ask to ask" in an offline situation, but wouldn't do it when sending a text message, because only the former makes any sense.
Is it wrong? I’ve only got my experiences to go by and I absolutely hate this social foreplay bollocks
ADHD inattentive for context, I just know you’re gonna come off looking like an ass if you force this sort of thing on anyone outside of a 2004 IRC channel
I don't think it's necessarily a neurotypical vs -diverse thing. It's more about social awareness that certain forms of online communication work differently from offline communication and as a consequence, different rules of etiquette apply. Remember "netiquette"?
Hi, in my case, it's not for the reasons you imply. I'm perfectly comfortable with and appreciate the importance of the "small-talk handshake", which is more critical in person.
That said, avoiding "naked pings"[1] online is a matter of reducing the amount of mental drain for me. This is especially important for your sanity if you're actively helping out folks on a chat channel (community, or internal). As noted in my comment[1], I don't insist on this, as it doesn't help being dogmatic about it.
So I had to click through a link to find out you’re ok with, but prefer not to get, naked pings. Naked pings I had to click through a further link to find the full definition assuming I didn’t know what you were talking about
And I’m not even trying to ask you a question! See how much faff this sort of thing is?
If people doing that is non-facetiously testing your sanity, don’t set yourself on fire to keep someone else warm, stop helping people!
Please don't be needlessly upset. First, the "link" is referring to a comment in this thread, and the fuller "definition" in the linked comment is a URL to a long email. This is how we link to things to keep messages relatively short, and avoid walls of text.
Second, I don't know what's your experience dealing with community IRC. I've been doing this open source thing for ~13 years now. In real-life IRC, it's no more of a "faff" than a 2-second gentle reminder—that too only when someone repeats the egregious behaviour. (Even this "reminder", I let it slide most of the times.)
Also, don't worry, I have a high threshold for frustration (critical to stay sane in this industry). I'm happy to help (and learn from) people; that's one the joys of working with open source communities!
No one is complaining about pleasantries, it's the fact that you're presenting nothing to start with. Just say "Hey, good morning. <Question>?"
I'm going to ignore a greeting with nothing following if I'm doing something else but if you say "Hi, we're unable to connect to the network shares, can you help?" You now have my attention.
I've seen a lot of this in internal Slack channels. There's 0 probability that I'll engage someone who is looking for an "expert in $x" even if I think that I could help. The worst is when a 3rd party tags you in with a comment like "oh hey, you know about this, can you possibly help?".
I think it very much relates to the sentiment of Nardwuar's TEDx talk: [0].
He's an interviewer. He's interviewed practically everyone alive with music, from Nicky Minaj to Kurt Cobain and back! almost every genre !
And you know what the message is from his talk ? Just ask.
You wanna do an interview with X person ? Just ask, do it!
He doesn't wait for anyone to push him, he wants to do something, he does it.
He interviewed Billie Eilish and even interviewed Cobain before the 2000s !
It probably goes back to the Usenet days where the group on C++ was absolutely horrific to developers because they were only there to discuss the language specification and you asked a question about implementation or whatever the hell their tribal rules were.
I think many of us are still scared shitless we are going to be verbally abused for asking for help in the wrong room so we hide behind conversational formality- like asking for permission to be heard.
This doesn't bother me so much as I would just not reply until the question comes. What pisses me off is when someone asks: "Can someone just quickly do x for me?". It trivializes the amount of work you are asking me to commit to doing. It's a task that only someone skilled in that particular technology can do. Why don't YOU quickly do it? Oh, because you can't.
This advice applies best in business settings. Business is transactional and it's very rare that someone wants to "get to know you". Those who do, will let you know by getting more involved or talking to you outside of these types of requests, not just out of the blue.
I'm a huge fan of no hello & "just ask" in our future world of async work.
The opposite applies in interpersonal relationships. There you should ask to ask every time:
“Hey John can I ask you about your ex Gina? If now is not a good time, let me know when.”
John might not want to talk about Gina. Or he might not want to talk about an emotional issue before a big meeting at work. Or he might want to know what exactly you want to know and establish parameters of the conversation before diving into it.
> I'm a huge fan of no hello & "just ask" in our future world of async work.
That is just a conflict between people who prefer async and who prefer sync communication. For sync communication, "hello" and "bye" are just markers for begin and end of a session, with implicit expectation that people focus on the session in between.
I like these type of articles where someone tries to understand why they feel a certain way about something. As a long-time IRC user I definitely feel that asking to ask is wrong, but never really thought about why I feel that way. This seems to sum it up well.
It's complaining for the sake of complaining. Sometimes you need to test the water first. Some online communities are rather hostile after all. As shown by this silly website.
Hostile? What, are they going to break down your door and beat you? If they say mean words when you ask a question just close the channel and try somewhere else. I'm well aware you might think I'm proving your point with this response.
> Do you think the word "hostile" only applies when you meet people physically?
Not literally, no. But if someone is mean to you in a chat channel you just close it and poof it's gone. It's as hostile as someone just not liking you. That's what I meant. In a busy chat channel asking to ask or testing the waters is just spammy and most people will just ignore a vague, pointless question like "is anyone around?"
Just ask your question. Worst case scenario people say mean stuff and you just leave and try somewhere else. I've done that when people just ignore my question or give glib replies. Then I go ask somewhere else.
FWIW I didn't think I was being aggressive, but thought it might be interpreted that way since disagreement online often is. Maybe I'm showing my hand here but I really can't tell what was mean about it.
I don't mind a little chitchat if the person is responsive. I had one guy say "hi, can I ask you a question?" I responded within 30 seconds. The guy disappears and isn't heard from for 14+ hours. Kinda annoying.
Don't answer the question, provide the information the asker needs.
This is a vital design and engineering skill. Clients come to you with solutions they themselves came up with, but you're supposed to query their underlying problem and offer a better solution.
> ..which is just lazy. If you're not willing to do the work to solve your problem, why should we?
Eh, don't think I agree here. The initial ask is low-effort but so is the initial response expected ("I could help, what's up?"). It seems fair to want to aim for something like:
A: low effort ask
B: low effort response
A: high effort ask now that you know someone's listening
B: high effort response
to avoid things like:
A: high effort ask
(no one's around, effort wasted)
From experience, this is never wasted. At the contrary, stating a problem clearly very often helps finding the solution, without bothering anybody else :)
In an asynchronous medium like Slack or IRC, the effort _isn't_ wasted, because the question will stay there, allowing people to see it later who weren't even around when the question was first asked.
Just like you don't email someone saying "Hey" waiting for a reply before you ask your question.
I disagree with a "high effort ask" being a wasted effort if no-one's around.
Just because no-one's around now doesn't mean someone won't be around later. And writing down your thoughts can often be enough to crystalise your thinking to the point of having a new idea about a solution. So, you've either solved your problem for yourself, or you can share it with the person that does help in the end.
If you're asking for help it's useful to show where you're up to in your thinking and giving details on what you've tried already.
Yep, this is what I do! If I have a complicated issue and Google won't solve it, I'll write up a clear, context-inclusive explanation of the issue and what I'm looking for, then paste it into a couple different groups. Usually, if Google can't help, it's too specific of a problem for it to be likely that a tech help group can solve it also - but sometimes it works, or people have other ideas.
Sometimes you have to adjust the amount of information you are allowed to disclose depending on who you are talking to. And you don't want to exclude people based on this as any amount help can move you forward.
If you really want a question answered, the best way to get your answer is to write a blog post confidently giving the incorrect answer and post it on HN and Reddit.
In the replies, you will find many answers to your question.
I agree strongly with the advice on the page. But more interesting is the fact that the author seems to have registered a domain for just this one piece of advice. I know there are other examples (some are linked) but this wouldn’t scale for me. I have so much crucial wisdom to share that the registration fees would kill me.
This is a completely normal day-to-day conversation topic I have with my buddies via text.
> Friend: What're you getting into tomorrow?
> Me: Not much man, doing some chores around the house. Got a pork butt I need to butcher. Typical Saturday.
> Me: What about you?
At which point my friend will either directly ask or otherwise mention that he is moving. At this point I may volunteer all, some, or none of my time depending on what life has.
It is even worse when it comes from an inept salesperson. Asking to ask is just bigger annoyance. Worse yet, it is a terrible sales method because you'll never get to your pitch.
Intro, yes. Asking permission, no.
Use the set up to frame the discussion. Only ask questions you know the answer to. Make them answer in the affirmative repeatedly. Why give an opening for rejection at all?
Being interrupted by a sales call is bad enough. Being interrupted by someone who botches the pitch on a product I would never want and will never hear about due to ineptitude is a face palm. Humans never cease to amaze me. Not only will I marvel at the fail, but I'll write useless comments about it later.
One step further, don't start a conversation with "X is broken, can you help me fix it?"
Tell me what you did so far, actual behavior and expected behavior. Pragmatically speaking, I get a lot of coworkers asking questions (like several per day) so if your question is formulated poorly, it has a very high chance of slipping through the cracks simply because the easier to answer questions will take priority.
<Bob> Alice: Ping
<Alice> Bob: Pong?
<Bob> Alice: Can I talk to you now? I have a question.
[LONG SILENCE...]
<Alice> Bob: Sure. (Inside Alice's head: "Sigh, please ask the question, already!")
[Again, in some cases, this is followed by a LONG SILENCE...]
<Bob> Alice: A vague question with not much details.
Now, imagine what a test of sanity it becomes if it happens several times throughout the day, week, month.
Note, though: I don't mind "naked pings" myself; they don't bother me much. But I of course appreciate "fully dressed up pings".
I agree such meta-questions are annoying. However, I saw many times a situation when a new guy joins some Telegram chat and asks a question, only to get an avalanche of angry and overreacting "go read nometa.xyz a hundred times" replies. Of course the guy never writes to this hostile chat again: he did noting bad but was treated like a piece of shit. And it's always the same people complaining, most of chat members just don't care.
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[ 0.24 ms ] story [ 283 ms ] threadBob: Hi
Me: hey Bob. What can I do for you?
(Five minutes later)
Bob: how are you?
Me: I’m ok Bob. What do you need?
(Five minutes later)
Bob: Do you know much about the daily Foo sync task?
That “how are you” gets me because its meant to be polite but it has the exact opposite effect. It’s funny because developers are often characterised as lacking social skills, but it’s usually the non-developers (analyst, PM etc) who do this.
Maybe also one for good old:
Bob: <screenshot of blank page, address bar omitted>
Bob: Do you know what's going on here?
This makes a totally valid point in online communications.
Why? These "hi" or "are you there" or "can I ask a question" are useless to me. Also in the reverse role I find it useful to just type up my whole problem. Sometimes in the middle of typing it all up I will figure out a good solution and then just not send the message. Even if the person is not there to help you, you can always copy paste your message to someone else.
(With dropping a bomb I also mean something like a larger/tedious amount of work)
Neurotypical people use this sort of social foreplay as a way to handshake a conversation[1], where the tech types want an input/output process devoid of mood and feeling
It is silly and quite time wasting online too, but it's what they need to feel comfortable asking you questions. I figure if they need to adapt to some of my quirks I'll do likewise for theirs
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_talk#Purpose
Majority of "tech types" are neurotypical. Neurodiverse are minority in tech. There is more of them in tech then among teachers or something like that, but still.
And even neuroatypical use elaborate rituals before they ask question. Even autists in tech.
I am not a psychologist or therapist or anything, lets just assume I'm using the words wrong and grouping people inaccurately. I'm talking about the people who make internet rules like don't ask to ask vs the people that don't do that
In large channel, asking to ask just straight up spam the channel.
In small channel, the communication is mostly async. And by the time someone saw your “Can I ask something” message, you are probably offline.
If I reply "I'm fine thanks how are you" then you know I'm here and looking, you've forced me to into a synchronous conversation and now I will appear rude if I don't immediately answer your "I just have a quick question"
If you just post your question upfront, I can read it and prioritize it myself based on what I am currently doing.
Hey, Jo! I just have a quick question for when you have a moment: <question for Jo>
And leave it. I'll ping Jo again at a time interval depending on urgency - sometime this sprint? I'll remind about the message in a couple days. Need it today? I indicate that when I ask, and about 4hrs later I'll poke a bit to see where we are.
Expectation setting is the missing key in a lot of these conversations. Asking to ask is about not being rude. There are better ways to do this in an asynchronous conversation. It's right up there with "we need to talk" in texts. The anxiety it causes is completely unnecessary, and easily avoided with a little detail and priority.
There are countless socially defined, implicit hammers looking for nails. Most can be improved upon or swapped out for different tools.
Please just ask questions. Pinging someone about a mysterious question that you'll reveal later is annoying. It certainly doesn't go on my list of things to do re: "Sometime later this sprint be sure to get back to that person who won't tell me what they want from me". It goes on the list "Ignore this person"
But, suppose you switch to sync. They ask a question. It indeed isn't important to you right now. Tell them you're busy with other tasks, and you'll reply later. It isn't rude, we all frequently work with others that have a lot on their plate.
It can be sometimes easier to shift your own perspective than it is to change the behavior of others.
In the context of an IRC chat room, isn’t all conversation assumed to be synchronous? (Forgive me if this has an obvious answer, as I’m not too familiar with IRC culture.)
In either case, skipping the chitchat is beneficial. In a busy room, ask the question and if someone catches it they can respond right away. Any attempt at a "hello how are you" will likely be lost in the noise.
In slower rooms, treat it as asynchronous.
And in 1-1 chats, treat it as asynchronous.
"can you pick me up from the airport?" (forcing me to quickly reply yes even if I might not want to, because he already knows I'm not working and I don't want to seem rude—why can't he just take the train?),
or "im in town, wanna hang out tonight? (sure, sounds like fun).
Wish he'd skip the leading question and not put me in a corner.
https://ask.metafilter.com/55153/Whats-the-middle-ground-bet...
Meaning: I totally agree with the article that asking to ask is a complete waste of time on Internet forums, especially technical ones. Those intro questions usually go unanswered, as they should IMO.
OTOH, what I thought the article might be about before I read it, is when people in RL say something like, "May I you ask a question?" before asking a potentially sensitive question. There are valid psychology reasons to do that in certain situations.
It's common for people to mimic conversation patterns, mostly unconsciously. They can get copied into situations where it is just a waste of time.
http://mywiki.wooledge.org/NetEtiquette#Just_ask_the_questio...
Also famed for the “XY problem” that nerds always assume now wanting to look clever, often used incorrectly
http://mywiki.wooledge.org/XyProblem
I’m guessing a bit here from what I’ve seen. I don’t think this stuff is conscious. But I don’t feel like the authors of stuff like this are even trying to have empathy for why people do this.
No necessarily. Asking "Any Java experts around?" takes little effort, while formulating a question for a Java expert could take significant effort. A "no" response for the first question could save everyone from wasting their time with the second.
It turns out that, a significant percentage of the time, the "preconditions" for the question are either: - Way too specific (i.e. yes, even a non java expert knows what "nullpointerexception" means) - Not nearly specific enough (i.e. no, I know Java but your issue is from a specific library with 1 page of documentation from the 90's)
This, in my opinion, is exactly what makes the 'asking to ask' so frustrating. It's impossible to know if I can answer your question without actually knowing what the question is. And if I ask what the question is, now I'm the one uncomfortable with the situation when it turns out to be something I can't help with.
edit: I also feel like it's worth noting, I'm aware that formulating a good question takes time and effort; however, in the "asking for help" / "giving help" scenario, it's very much common courtesy to do the most you can to enable people to help you. We want to help! But please ask a good question. (I do totally understand that asking good questions is a hard thing to learn, though! I started out asking very poor questions and slowly learned over time.)
For example, I once helped a co-worker who was having trouble with a toy webserver written in Go as a learning exercise. It wasn't recognizing url paths that it should have. I don't know Go, but did recognize the problem from our apache/wsgi django setup - path prefixes being stripped. Knowing the right keywords to search for, I was able to find the fix for a config file and we got it working.
which is precisely why this is annoying: it's asking for a social commitment without putting any effort in. It also reaches for the top shelf for no reason. Does the person's question really need a Java "expert"? Probably not.
> A "no" response for the first question could save you from wasting your time with the second.
Arguably if they were to find help _anywhere_ they would benefit from articulating their question in a clear and concise way. Let alone the high probability that through writing the question they might answer their own question, because we're all humans.
That “no” is never going to happen though. Every individual might know that they aren’t a Java expert, but they don’t know that every other individual is also not an expert. So there is nobody in a position to answer “no”.
A lack of response is equivalent to a "no." I suppose I could have phrased it more clearly, but my though is the asker would wait for an affirmative response to proceed with investing more into asking the question.
It’s not though. I routinely ignore questions like this for questions where I am one of the experts, but I would quite often reply to a real question in the same situation.
If I have a question that takes time to write up, I'll need to spend that time either way. Better to write the question up front so I can copy/paste it wherever I need until I get the help I need than to ask "any Java experts around" and proceed to waste anyone who responds' time while they wait for me to actually compose the question.
Polling people with non-informative questions is a good way to distract them for no reason if they can't help you. I think that's impolite. As someone with ADHD, that can be disruptive and at times gets extremely frustrating because I can easily lose half an hour to a 1 minute distraction if it demands my attention. Give me some initial information to work with and I will be able to respond without losing my focus.
I had spent several weeks on an extremely technical problem when I realized Mother’s Day was coming up. Saw a giant oversized Winnie the Pooh bear that I knew she would like.
So in my extreme logical state I was thinking I would just slice off the arms legs and heads put them in separate boxes and mail them to her for reassembly. Very elegant solution.
A bit later when my mind wasn’t so analytical I realized my mistake. Clearly her house didn’t have room for a giant bear. So I sent her a Winnie the Pooh lamp instead. She was happy, and I didn’t need to disassemble her beloved childhood icon.
Also ADHD (inattentive) for what it’s worth. I understand the problem, I’m saying this solution is ineffective and just comes off a bit bellendary
You’re just gonna come off as some Big Bang Theory Sheldon-type asshat by giving people a massive document to read before they can besmirch your presence. Do they also have to read the XY problem article first or do you wait for them to ask a question before springing that trap card?
It’s not good optics for nerd kind and it’s way more hassle on both parties than is needed
As for prompts, it's not like you need to write a novel about what you want to discuss, just include something.
For example, when asking for help:
Bad: "Hi" -- This demands my attention because I don't know what it's about, forcing me to respond and wait for the other person. Distraction and annoyance are practically guaranteed if I ignore it. I consider this kind of opener extremely rude, because to my brain it can be functionally equivalent to screaming "GIVE ME YOUR ATTENTION NOW".
Better: "Hi! I need help with X, can you help?" -- This is a request for attention, but I can at least decide if I'm interested and if I'm too busy I can respond with "No" or "Probably, but not right now.", which is satisfactory for my brain and doesn't distract me.
Best: "Hi! X is doing A when I try to do Y and I need B, can you help?" -- I may be able to solve the problem right away, which is the best outcome.
What genre of classification is this?
Anecdotally, I started encountering this terminology about 5 years ago I think. The linked wikipedia says it was coined in 1999.
ADHD inattentive for context, I just know you’re gonna come off looking like an ass if you force this sort of thing on anyone outside of a 2004 IRC channel
That said, avoiding "naked pings"[1] online is a matter of reducing the amount of mental drain for me. This is especially important for your sanity if you're actively helping out folks on a chat channel (community, or internal). As noted in my comment[1], I don't insist on this, as it doesn't help being dogmatic about it.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30641083
And I’m not even trying to ask you a question! See how much faff this sort of thing is?
If people doing that is non-facetiously testing your sanity, don’t set yourself on fire to keep someone else warm, stop helping people!
Second, I don't know what's your experience dealing with community IRC. I've been doing this open source thing for ~13 years now. In real-life IRC, it's no more of a "faff" than a 2-second gentle reminder—that too only when someone repeats the egregious behaviour. (Even this "reminder", I let it slide most of the times.)
Also, don't worry, I have a high threshold for frustration (critical to stay sane in this industry). I'm happy to help (and learn from) people; that's one the joys of working with open source communities!
I'm going to ignore a greeting with nothing following if I'm doing something else but if you say "Hi, we're unable to connect to the network shares, can you help?" You now have my attention.
I think it very much relates to the sentiment of Nardwuar's TEDx talk: [0]. He's an interviewer. He's interviewed practically everyone alive with music, from Nicky Minaj to Kurt Cobain and back! almost every genre !
And you know what the message is from his talk ? Just ask.
You wanna do an interview with X person ? Just ask, do it!
He doesn't wait for anyone to push him, he wants to do something, he does it. He interviewed Billie Eilish and even interviewed Cobain before the 2000s !
refs
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkSUazeI2nM
I think many of us are still scared shitless we are going to be verbally abused for asking for help in the wrong room so we hide behind conversational formality- like asking for permission to be heard.
I'm a huge fan of no hello & "just ask" in our future world of async work.
https://sbmueller.github.io/nohello/
“Hey John can I ask you about your ex Gina? If now is not a good time, let me know when.”
John might not want to talk about Gina. Or he might not want to talk about an emotional issue before a big meeting at work. Or he might want to know what exactly you want to know and establish parameters of the conversation before diving into it.
That is just a conflict between people who prefer async and who prefer sync communication. For sync communication, "hello" and "bye" are just markers for begin and end of a session, with implicit expectation that people focus on the session in between.
You are correct. Your comment was mean. Not even sure why you responded aggressively.
Hostile is perfectly correct word to describe some online communities. Do you think the word "hostile" only applies when you meet people physically?
Not literally, no. But if someone is mean to you in a chat channel you just close it and poof it's gone. It's as hostile as someone just not liking you. That's what I meant. In a busy chat channel asking to ask or testing the waters is just spammy and most people will just ignore a vague, pointless question like "is anyone around?"
Just ask your question. Worst case scenario people say mean stuff and you just leave and try somewhere else. I've done that when people just ignore my question or give glib replies. Then I go ask somewhere else.
FWIW I didn't think I was being aggressive, but thought it might be interpreted that way since disagreement online often is. Maybe I'm showing my hand here but I really can't tell what was mean about it.
This is a vital design and engineering skill. Clients come to you with solutions they themselves came up with, but you're supposed to query their underlying problem and offer a better solution.
Eh, don't think I agree here. The initial ask is low-effort but so is the initial response expected ("I could help, what's up?"). It seems fair to want to aim for something like:
to avoid things like:Just like you don't email someone saying "Hey" waiting for a reply before you ask your question.
Just because no-one's around now doesn't mean someone won't be around later. And writing down your thoughts can often be enough to crystalise your thinking to the point of having a new idea about a solution. So, you've either solved your problem for yourself, or you can share it with the person that does help in the end.
If you're asking for help it's useful to show where you're up to in your thinking and giving details on what you've tried already.
In the replies, you will find many answers to your question.
Which is trap.
Because if you say "no" then you don't have a polite excuse to decline to help someone move houses, troubleshoot a fiber install, or go for a hike.
The polite way to ask is "hey, can you help me move on Saturday? I have a truck and 3 others already."
This is a completely normal day-to-day conversation topic I have with my buddies via text.
> Friend: What're you getting into tomorrow?
> Me: Not much man, doing some chores around the house. Got a pork butt I need to butcher. Typical Saturday.
> Me: What about you?
At which point my friend will either directly ask or otherwise mention that he is moving. At this point I may volunteer all, some, or none of my time depending on what life has.
Intro, yes. Asking permission, no.
Use the set up to frame the discussion. Only ask questions you know the answer to. Make them answer in the affirmative repeatedly. Why give an opening for rejection at all?
Being interrupted by a sales call is bad enough. Being interrupted by someone who botches the pitch on a product I would never want and will never hear about due to ineptitude is a face palm. Humans never cease to amaze me. Not only will I marvel at the fail, but I'll write useless comments about it later.
Tell me what you did so far, actual behavior and expected behavior. Pragmatically speaking, I get a lot of coworkers asking questions (like several per day) so if your question is formulated poorly, it has a very high chance of slipping through the cracks simply because the easier to answer questions will take priority.
Note, though: I don't mind "naked pings" myself; they don't bother me much. But I of course appreciate "fully dressed up pings".
[1] https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/No_naked_pings