March 06, 2003
Forum Faux-pas
Posted by Matt in
Tech Talk
Anyone who posts in technical forums has seen it, and those of us that usually offer help don't want to deal with it. I am talking about the people who pop in from time to time and either:
1. Ask homework questions
2. Ask us to write some code for them
3. Ask for answers to certification questions
4. Recruit
5. Post in "LEET" Speak
I admit, when I first started posting at Tek-Tips, I was eager to help anyone with anything. I wrote up parsers, in-depth algorithms, and various other code related answers. Heck, I even had someone send me their code, which I reviewed and emailed back to them when I fixed it.
Over time, I began to notice patterns... the boards would be moving along at a regular pace and all of a sudden, they are inundated by 15 URGENT posts. The posts are very similar and are asking college or high school quesitons about "How do I create a linked list?", "Can someone write some code to output pre,post and infix expressions?", or very simply "My project is due tomorrow, will someone write it for me if I pay you?". That last one is my favorite... I post some exhorbitant amount of money and never hear back cause it gets RED FLAGGED and deleted before the have a chance to respond. I still look at these posts because sometimes, they actually post their code and ask for help. I have no problem with that as long as it is not a copy and paste of an entire file and you are expected to find the one line that is wrong. I have better things to do then compile your code in my head and say "OH! you didn't initialize a variable".
Well, that pretty much covers topics 1 & 2. As for 3, if you think I am going to answer your questions so you can earn more then me and impress some chick... KEEP DREAMING! And number 4, at least at tek-tips, it specifically states "NO RECRUITING" ( it also says no homework questions as well but I cut those High School kids a break since I was the same way). If you can't read the bold red text below the submit button and you come in to recruit, I will submit your email to porn sites and spam-o-grams galore!
Number 5 has no place in technical forums. For those of you who don't know what "Leet Speak" is, it is basically a language that originated in games like Quake, and Half-Life as well as in BBS and IRC. It was "kewl" to find new ways to type words and there is a time and place for everything. When you play on a quake server, expect someone to "0\/\/z3d" (own) you cause they "r0x0r" (rock). Same in IRC, but KEEP IT THERE. I can understand it, but I am not going to take the time to decipher "YOUR WAY" of typing leet speak when you post in a forum. If I am playing Quake, I have no issues with it. There IS something we can do though for the weiners who try to act cool and post like this... all we need to do is go to one of many online Leet Speak Generators (I chose this site because the guy acutally took time to make a real web page and not some shoddy cheese site ), paste our answer in there and generate the "Leet speak". Let them decipher it back! Just my 2 cents :-)
Matt
P.S. That leet speak at the end of my last post was a play off of "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-a-Lot
Stand Up,
Shout it Out
Even white boys got to shout <--- this was in leet speak
Baby got Back
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