Thread: Asking questions

Well I wasn't actually sure where this was supposed to go, it is directly about programming, but not about a specific language. It's more a general question about you guys.

Ok, I just started university on a degree called BSc (Hons) Computing. This involves a lot of programming. I have looked over the general outlines of what each module is supposed to achieve and know that most of it should be generally fine, but if I don't understand it, I'll have a tutor right there telling me how to do it.

However, if I do have some homework, and I do get stuck, can't find anything in books or it just confuses me, I'm allowed to ask questions as long as I structure it in a way that you guys get to answer as close as a yes or no. Is this correct and acceptable? At no point do I actually want to scream out 'DO MY HMWRK PLZKTHX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!' but having help would be greatly appreciated if I could get it, you know.

So, are there rules in place already for this kind of situation? Is what I have mentioned an acceptable situation?

Sure, you can ask questions. Don't have to be "yes or no" either - as long as you show that you are making an effort to work on the solution, any specific question should be fine to ask.

What is much harder is the "open ended" or "unspecific question", because it's very difficult to answer. Say for example you ask "how do I write a device driver". It is a pretty clear question in one way, but in many others it's not clear. The way you write a device driver for a small embedded Real-time OS is quite different from how you go about it in a large OS like Windows or Linux. It is just "impossible" to answer that question within the realms of this forum - it is a book, rather than a few posts to answer it - and that is just for one OS. Of course, you could ask "How do I write a driver for X under OS Y", and you'd be closer to getting some generic answers - or even a link to an existing driver.

Here's a link to the Homework Policy with further links to explain details: http://cboard.cprogramming.com/annou...t.php?f=4&a=39

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Mats

Ok cool! Just as I thought. I am one of those people that hates to assume, so I always ask to pin it down for sure. Now I just have to find out what books to get (if I haven't aready got them), and then bug you guys (kidding!).

Also, questions that are not about a language go into the General Discussion forum. (I've moved this thread.)

Questions that are specific to Win32 or Linux programming more than they are about the implementation language belong into the two platform-specific forums.

Questions that are about hardware go into Technical Discussion, as should questions about computer setup. (With general software questions, the border between GD and TD is quite fuzzy.)