Thread: Programmers new "elitist snobs"

OK, I haven't had (or got) time to read every post in this thread, but I've got the general gist of the topic and would like to make a comment or two.

I don't post often here but I do look around for answers, etc. from time to time.

I thoroughly agree that topic lines such as "Urgent help needed" are pretty useless and do nothing to indicate the nature of the question. In addition, I also agree that it's plain wrong to come here asking for homework help when it's clear that no effort has been made ahead of posting. Folk should research before they post to indicate that they understand what they're asking and will understand any decent answers posted (or at least find out how to understand them). Otherwise, nastiness and sarcasm is only to be expected.

As for homework, surely the first port of call should be to ask the teacher/lecturer? If the explanation given in class was not sufficient, would s/he not be the best person to help in the first instance?

And there is an awful lot of sense in articles such as this one.

However, where I strongly disagree is when anyone, and I mean ANYONE, feels justified in posting rubbish such as RTFM, STFW, GIYF, or any other form of GFAM on its own without justification. Some googling about on RTFM also turned up Tom Kyte's Oracle blog:

Tom Kyte on RTFM

I think he speaks a lot of sense when it comes to RTFM.

If anyone reading this ever feels justified in posting an unqualified RTFM (or similar), then you have to ask why you think it's justified to potentially waste someone else's time in the future who may find your post in a search. Put yourself in a newbie's shoes who does believe in searching around the manual and Googling for answers before posting, only to find that their question is so commonly asked on the Web and the only answer ever dished up is STFW. The STFW replies have spammed out the sensible replies that would have readily showed up had it not been for the STFW spammers.

By the way, I did an STFW on 'Foonly Flurbamatic'. You ought to try it sometime if you haven't already done so

Originally Posted by medievalelks

I always STFW first before telling someone else to Let Me Google That For You. I would be surprised if the instances of the case described were not in the overwhelming minority.

Ditto, as with LIUITFM (which is almost a fictional French androgenous subject radio station). Usually it is very obvious this has not happened yet...and if it has, I would hope the dumb lil' moron can get a sentence in edgewise, vis. "Okay, but in the FM it says..."