The Whiteboard - 2015-11-08

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user55340

12:01 AM

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user55340

imdb.com/title/tt0708458/fullcredits?ref_=tt_cl_sm#cast

user55340

> Jonathan Goldsmith ... Unnamed Red Shirt (uncredited)

12:36 AM

@RobertHarvey I think spirit of my question has been lost in translation. I have a genuine problem and would love an answer ... But clearly the StackOverFlow Gods have deemed the Problem of Building Apps which are Accessible to people with Disabilities to be "Off Topic" ... so feel free to downvote & close it. I'll try Quora. Thanks. — nelsonic 40 mins ago

[sigh] So now we're mean to people with disabilities.

user55340

@RobertHarvey Should hunt up that bit on meta where the person ranted at me for closing a question about ergonomic keyboard solutions for programmers with carpel tunnel.

user55340

Pick one of the solutions provided by google and copy that if you are not going to figure out how to do it yourself. — MichaelT 23 secs ago

user55340

(hmm... would have to bug a mod for that... or dig about in the deleted questions searches on data.se that I haven't figured out yet)

For what it's worth, I'm not sure that 100% compliance with the w3C markup checker guarantees perfect accessibility, any more than having markup errors guarantees a broken website (it doesn't). — Robert Harvey ♦ 2 mins ago

That's the problem with faulty logic. You may end up failing to solve the problem, or worse, solving the wrong problem.

user55340

12:53 AM

Accessibility is a nightmare now days... if you are going for an accessible site, you've really got to pull back away from any significant amount of javascript.

user55340

The idea of screen readers and the like changing pitch and such for style sheet changes... thats great. Gee, you just changed that part of the page over there to bold... go render that with an aural stylesheet.

user55340

Its... non-trivial. You've got to really sit down and think about the requirements of the product and probably throw away any ideals of a single patch app.

yeah, it's almost like designing two UIs at the same time

user55340

And thats probably a better approach.

depending on the kind of web site

it's a problem I'd be interested in tackling someday, but I'm fairly sure there aren't any stock traders relying on screen readers to vocalize price changes for them, so not gonna hapen anytime soon

12:58 AM

accessibility is a very hard problem, "fortunately" there are all sorts of standards about there

user55340

If I was working on external facing apps, it would be a different story but all my things are internal. As such, the department guidance is "we will make accommodations as they are needed". Until they're needed though, its not something we spend time on.

user55340

When I've got to deal with a blind programmer or project manager who needs to use the REST apis that I'm working on... then I'll worry about updating the registration and front page for it. Until then... well. Not a worry.

You should post an answer to that SO question.

I tried installing and using a screen reader once, that was surreal

19 hours later…

7:58 PM

-3

Q: Why the output is different in c and java language?

In java this is my code. public class test1{ public static void main(String []args){ System.out.println("Hello World"); int t,i; i=5; t = (++i + ++i) + i--; System.out.println("i is " + i); System.out.println("j is " + t); } } Output is...

I'm mystified by questions like this. Code that is never, ever going to be used in a production scenario, yet every week or so someone asks a question about it on Stack Overflow. Even the C and C++ communities (who normally like language lawyer questions) have grown tired of them.

user55340

@RobertHarvey Its also well defined if you read the JLS. But no one ever does that.

I've tried reading language specifications. I fall asleep after the first paragraph.

8:17 PM

@RobertHarvey curiousity

When I write my first Scheme compiler, I'll have to read r7rs small. But that spec is only about eighty pages or so. The C# specification is over 500 pages long (the Java specification is of comparable size), and the C++ spec is over 1300 pages.

@enderland But not enough curiosity to do a search first, I guess.

Google search for "I++ + ++I"

@RobertHarvey well, C/C++ guys would see that as a blatant duplicate; there's no way we don't have questions about i++ + ++i by now

but I agree that wanting to ask about such obviously unreadable/unintuitive code is mystifying

user55340

The thing is, its really a debugging question.

user55340

14

Q: How to ask "how to understand some code" questions

Often we find questions along the lines of Help me understand this C program #include<stdio.h> main() { printf("Hello World"); } Well, that one may be a bit simplified - but its not an uncommon form for a question that is asked here. How should one prepare and ask a "what does this c...

discussion closed-questions asking-questions

yep

what we really need is a minimal effort close reason; "you need to at least try using a debugger on your code before it's appropriate to ask strangers on the internet to spend their free time helping you"

user55340

8:26 PM

49

Q: Philosophy behind Undefined Behavior

C\C++ specifications leave out a large number of behaviors open for compilers to implement in their own way. There are a number of questions that always keep getting asked here about the same and we have some excellent posts about it: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/367633/what-are-all-the-c...

c++ c philosophy c++11 undefined-behavior

user55340

Could dup it to that one.

there should be a "read the on topic page this isn't even close enough to warrant a specific reason it's off topic"

nah, we're far too tenuous with dupe targets as it is

@enderland I find that's actually not very common on this site, most of the bad questions we get at least have something to do with programming

I've gotten to where I just vote to close with comments like "This isn't a software design question, as described by the [help/on-topic]."

but I agree we should have one

user55340

8:28 PM

I've got a variation that rolls off my fingers for that.

it's weird that SFF.SE has "Blatantly off-topic (this question has nothing to do with science fiction or fantasy)" while we don't have an equivalent of that

you are very generous with "something to do with"

maybe you guys keep deleting them before I get to review queues

user55340

@Ixrec Thats the flag text when you can't close and write a custom close reason.

the stuff I VTC is normally about programming, but waaaaaay too vague/underspecified/opinion-based/tech support/discussion-y to be answerable

@MichaelT oh that's unique to flagging? ok then

8:29 PM

Shog thinks custom close reasons are a slippery slope that doesn't work. Most closures fit neatly under "Unclear," "Too Broad," or simply off-topic.

weird, if anything we could use more specific standard close reasons so it's easier to tell the asker what they actually did wrong

only us SE people understand the extremely broad definitions we give to those close reasons

user55340

@RobertHarvey I'd be happy to have a standardized "this question is one of implementation or debugging." unless he thinks we should categorically migrate all those to SO.

that one we definitely get often enough to warrant a standard reason

Yes, I think we need that one.

user55340

16

Q: close reason (and associated expand the close reason count) request

I really don't like migrating crappy questions to SO. This is really the only place where its an issue because of the migration path (no, taking away the migration path would mean more suggestions to repost - there are enough of those for the workplace). The past 90 days, we did 206 migrations ...

discussion feature-request close-reasons

8:32 PM

sometimes I write the custom reason "this is a debugging issue which is off-topic but it's not good enough to migrate", but these days I'm too afraid of backlash from the asker to copy-paste that every single time

user55340

Whee, August 7th, 2013.

whee, broken https links

Oh, so he wants us to give up one of our close reason slots to put that one in.

user55340

@RobertHarvey Yep.

user55340

Though SO and a few other sites have more.

8:33 PM

to be fair, "What project you should take up" is not a very common one anymore

I wouldn't mind swapping that for a debugging issue close reason

I've never quite understood the notion that the number of close reasons needs to be "metered." Sure, you can limit it to four or so (I think that's the max any site should have), but why limit it further?

user55340

Its common enough that its useful to have that as a predefined one.

@RobertHarvey SE has this idealistic idea that people will only ask questions that are mostly related to the site content, or a few off topic types

user55340

When its predefined it gives some additional "this is site policy, arguing about it is pointless"

@MichaelT YES

we've been getting way too many comment arguments with first time askers lately

8:35 PM

We could potentially mash together the educational and "what project/language" close reasons. One is really a subset of the other.

user55340

The "this is implementation or debugging" isn't controversial beyond the "won't you please help me?"

Questions asking us to recommend a tool, library, language, book, favorite off-site resource or ideas for your new project are off-topic for Programmers as they tend to attract opinionated answers and spam.

user55340

@RobertHarvey Might be a reasonable merge.

I'd be cool with that

In addition, since some users have been abusing the "opinionated answers and spam clause," I'd be in favor of just removing that. There's plenty of explanations about the close reasons on Meta.

8:42 PM

what kind of abuse?

user55340

17

Q: Can the number of custom close reasons on Programmers be expanded?

Right now, we are limited to three custom "off-topic" close reasons. I wrote a fourth this morning to address a number of recent closures, but it's not possible to even turn it on without turning off one of the other three. This new reason reads: Questions must demonstrate a minimal understa...

support feature-request close-reasons vote-to-close

user55340

6

Q: Add a new close reason for implementation and troubleshooting questions

Code troubleshooting and code implementation questions are not in Programmers' site scope. Although there is an option to migrate such questions to Stack Overflow, the vast majority of them are not of sufficient quality to migrate there. Thus ensues a long-winded explanation of how we don't acc...

support close-reasons off-topic

@Ixrec "If I make my off-topic poll question unopinionated, I can still ask it."

oh, those users

So here's how this works: software recommendation questions are categorically off-topic. That's it. There isn't anything you can do to a software recommendation question to make it not a software recommendation question, including making it less opinionated. That the close reason says "because they tend to attract opinionated answers and spam" only explains, in part, why they are categorically off-topic, not how you can dress them up to make them on-topic. — Robert Harvey ♦ 21 hours ago

Nobody reads the explanations anyway, unless they're looking for a loophole. If they need to know more, they can ask in the comments, come in here, or go to Meta.

So the clearer and terser you can make the close reasons, the better.

8:46 PM

I'm aware nobody reads, that's why we get so many terrible and off-topic questions in the first place; I still think it's important to have close reason text with at least some tenuous connection to what's wrong with the question, or else the few askers that do read will be correct in asserting that we're being overbearing

user55340

Working on the meta post.

Awesome.

cool

but agreed on clearer/terser, that's the only way to combat the users that read just enough to be dangerous and no more (like the one you were describing in that comment)

@Ixrec It got better.

@RobertHarvey I think spirit of my question has been lost in translation. I have a genuine problem and would love an answer ... But clearly the StackOverFlow Gods have deemed the Problem of Building Apps which are Accessible to people with Disabilities to be "Off Topic" ... so feel free to downvote & close it. I'll try Quora. Thanks. — nelsonic 21 hours ago

That's almost as bad as playing the race card.

oh you meant better as in worse

8:51 PM

Yeah.

They don't realize that they can't get any traction from an old redneck like me with tactics like that. Fortunately, I've learned to disengage from such people and not get embroiled in their politics.

looking at the top of that comment chain, I think you're right that removing the "as they tend to..." part is the only real way that could've been prevented

the moment they find a hook for plausible-soundin counterarguments they won't let you live it down

"Oh, that will never happen with my question."

especially when it is a question worth answering...just not one that can be answered with anything less than a several hundred page book

perhaps these users think those books are all padding and someone can give them the 10-paragraph summary of what they actually need to know

user55340

@Ixrec follow the fun in comments in this one...

user55340

-4

Q: Read in text file with a variable amount of columns

I have a text file with varying amount of columns. See the example of an input file attached. I want to grab each integer in a row and do arithmetic on them, then move to the next line in the file. If there was a known amount of columns then I think I'd have a handle on it, but I'm not sure a go...

8:55 PM

I think I've damaged my sanity enough for one day

if I read too many comments from less than constructive users I might end up as jaded as you guys

user55340

$Mathematics$

@Ixrec That would be bad.

user55340

Or better yet...

user55340

took me a minute to stop laughing

8:58 PM

> If my post breaches your idea of an acceptable question, simply ignore it.

Yeah. Heard that argument before.

I didn't get 10k rep to just ignore bad questions

@RobertHarvey out of curiosity, were you aware the racism card had been played today when you said this?

No.

(this should be interesting)

last comment under programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/302069/…

not that it's interesting, just citing my sources

Wow, just wow. That makes about as much sense as fhqwhgads.

on the plus side, today we had a question that struck me as a leigitimately good one

that is a lot rarer than it should be

user55340

9:06 PM

0

Q: Merge and replace custom close reason

We've been fairly consistently getting poor quality implementation and debugging questions. A previous suggestion (related: 1 2) to increase the count hasn't been acted upon and the suggestion for us was to merge the close reasons that we have. The two that are likely the best to merge are the ...

support close-reasons

user55340

I'll certainly welcome additional wordsmithing.

this falls squarely in the category of stuff I would help with if I was convinced there was actually a snowball's chance of the gods making it a reality

is the list of close reasons controllable by our mods?

@MichaelT Do you want the wordsmithing in a new answer, or in the existing one.

user55340

We (the mods here) have complete control of the close reasons.

cool

user55340

9:09 PM

@RobertHarvey If its a minor tweak to mine, tweak mine. If you have one that suggests a different direction of wording, I'd suggest a new answer.

whyyyyyy does every meta link today give me a Cloudflare SSL error

it didn't do that yesterday

user55340

6

A: Meta.space.stackexchange.com gives 403 forbidden from cloudflare-nginx

CloudFlare seems to have repaired its nginx. Closing as "probably fixed". Will reopen if the bug recurs. Repro'ed by Gilles: Still failing for me with all meta.*.stackexchange.com over HTTPS. I guess only some of their infrastructure is broken and we're hitting different entry points. - Gill...

@MichaelT Defer more to the Help Center and Meta for explanations; make them simpler. Questions asking for writing or debugging code are off topic on Programmers.SE. You might get help on Stack Overflow, if you can make your question more specific. See How to create a Minimal, Complete, and Verifiable example.

Add Books to the other one.

user55340

Book added. Still thinking on that "its a crap question, we're not migrating it to SO" one.

"tutorial" and "examples" are also really common

I feel unsure about having a close reason that says "hey there's this other site you can dump on"

we all know nobody's going to read the link about how to dump properly

9:14 PM

Note that the "you might get help on [site]" wording is already used on Stack Overflow.

well, that explains a lot

You mean crossposting?

yup

and bad migrations and whatnot

"but read their [help/on-topic] first."

user55340

@Ixrec we're not mentioned in the SO help center at all.

9:15 PM

Because too many bad migrations.

user55340

stackoverflow.com/help/on-topic

Ah, well if you're going to bring up that little gem, you should know that I wrote a good portion of it.

user55340

I know... I recall some of our discussions about off topic reasons in the help center.

user55340

IIRC, your rewrite was shortly after I did the "why was my question closed or down voted" meta novel.

The main feature: the close reasons were added. So they've already seen them once, or they see them again when they're referred to the On-Topic article.

@MichaelT Note that you can point to meta posts in the close reasons.

user55340

9:20 PM

@RobertHarvey Yep.. (and I should so stick a refer id in there to get a publistist meta gold badge... joking)

Questions asking for recommendations for a tool, language, book, library, off site resource (including tutorials or examples), or project to undertake are off topic. See here for more information.

I like the "[link] for details" approach

The shorter the better.

user55340

Linking to the meta post is helpful if they're willing to learn... but if they are, the close reason itself is often enough.

Yes, but you don't have to explain anything to them in the close reason.

user55340

9:23 PM

If they aren't, then I just get notifications from people complaining in the comments.

Because you wrote the meta posts?

user55340

Yep.

Then omit that part. Seriously, these folks don't need any explanation at all. They're not interested in one anyway.

user55340

This is always a fun one:

user55340

75

Q: What goes on Programmers.SE? A guide for Stack Overflow

You're on Stack Overflow and you've found a question that isn't about coding. It's about design or something squishy like that. You are trying to be helpful, and you put a comment in the question: You should try asking on Programmers.SE instead. --YourName 2 minutes ago ... and suddenly, ou...

discussion faq migration scope site-rec

user55340

9:25 PM

To me, 30-40 questions per day compared to thousands at SO is surprising. It seems it would be better to broaden the scope of SO, which would also limit the options of those who like to vote down or close interesting questions at SO. — Erik Alapää Oct 27 at 19:58

user55340

@ErikAlapää I would suggest posting such a proposal on meta.stackoverflow and see how well it goes. We (the community of Programmers.SE) have very little control over the scopes of other Stack Exchange sites. — MichaelT Oct 27 at 20:00

would be funny to change help center wording, from "conceptual questions about software development" to "questions about design or something squishy like that" :) — gnat Feb 18 at 20:18

user55340

Don't tempt me @gnat... — Yannis ♦ Feb 19 at 15:41

user55340

(my writing style is one where I try to hook them in with something at the start... I want them to read it, so I start off with something slightly light hearted)

actually, I think all of the comments under there are useful

Part of me thinks there should be an answer here (to the question in the title, rather than to any of the four questions in the body) saying, "To a zeroth-order approximation, nothing goes on Programmers.SE" — AakashM Feb 27 at 15:25

The fact that this is a FAQ that requires a 1500-word essay to answer IME clearly demonstrates that the split between Stack Overflow and Programmers is totally arbitrary and was a bad idea in the first place. — Mark Seemann Jun 30 at 11:12

to be fair it's more a 1500-word list of examples than it is a 1500-word answer

9:31 PM

A cautionary tale...

89

A: "What have you tried" epidemic

I'm the author of the original "What Have You Tried?" article, and it was also me who flippantly registered the domain and pointed it to the specific article on my blog. The intention of the article was to talk about the need to make an honest effort to solve problems. It was my hope that it wou...

9:49 PM

> We already tried supporting those questions, we even gave them their own site. Sadly, it didn't work out. C'est la vie.

My favorite phrase on any SE site, ever.

I dislike this being universal. On the vba I see the "what have you tried?" type comment (or some variant) used quite effectively when people come and post a question which indicates some research or code might have taken place (but is not shown in the question) or there is blatantly no effort on part of the asker. Banning this unilaterally seems to be the nuclear option to stop some people from being jerks. There is no reason to post "what have you tried" many times. Ban those people, or warn them, or something. But don't nuke the entire ability to do this. — enderland Mar 21 '13 at 2:31

SHog9's reply seems well-reasoned.

@enderland: you can still post these, if you take a few seconds longer to put something in them beyond "what have you tried?" If that's too much work, then... Well, probably not a good time to be lecturing anyone else on their lack of effort. — Shog9 ♦ Mar 21 '13 at 2:36

user55340

So beyond the acknowledgement that reading in a fixed number of columns doesn't work, what have you tried? I don't know if an array is the best answer, or a vector, or if some other more complex data structure, or if its just a simple finite state automata that chugs along until the end of the line. You need to describe the problem that you are having better along with what you have tried and discounted. Until you describe these things in the post, we can't say what the proper solution to your problem is. — MichaelT 2 days ago

@RobertHarvey the thing is its easer to just VtC and DV

which is as it should be

10:02 PM

Yep.

if the close reasons are good enough that they're usually as good as a comment would be

hint

Keep in mind that most people who get their question closed don't want an explanation, so writing comments about your close vote is a waste of time, really.

I wonder if there's an MSE post about adding a "Migrate to Quora" option

ol

20

Q: Could good deleted questions find a new home on Quora?

Should Stack Exchange cooperate with Quora, migrating SO questions that were deleted as off-topic or subjective, but are much loved and useful, to their site in a concerted effort? Along with the answers and maybe even comments and votes, if feasible. I mean both popular fun content as found on ...

feature-request deleted-questions quora

not quite the same thing

10:25 PM

What have you tried? — MetaFight 10 secs ago

heheheheh

that's almost a knapsack problem, isn't it?

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