Stupid Questions… Stupid People???
To hear the cliché, “There is no such thing as a stupid question.”, one cannot help but to wonder… If this is indeed true, could it be because while the question is not stupid, the person asking it might be? Let us first discuss the phrase. One could argue that this statement is true. If you have a question, it would be wrong not to ask it. By asking the question that one has, one is only attempting to increase one’s own person knowledge. The question itself and the desire to obtain the answer must be considered a good thing. But here lies the issue, while the question itself and the desire to ask it is pure and good, the individual asking it can complicate things.
A good read that expand upon this issue can be found online at, “Article on Smart Questions”. We can apply this article to the sample question regarding “how to Building 90 days Alarm Android .?” What is initially a glaring problem is the lack of proper English, grammar, punctuation, capitalization and spacing. It is even more concerning that this all is quite noticeable within the subject line. It can be seen from this example that before anyone even attempted to answer this question, a moderator went in and fixed many of these errors. This means that someone felt that it was more worth their time fixing the question than answering it. Additionally, we find that while the person asking the question did search the web for a possible answer to their question, they lacked the skills to modify a piece of code from using hours to days. From that, it is most likely that this person is asking a question that is significantly above their ability to understand and implement. They appear to be seeking someone to write the full code for them. Finally, we see that this thread was closed because it was apparently a repeat of another question. The person asking the question did not appear to search the forum before posing their question. When users finally attempted to answer this question they basically sad to use that the questioner found for hours and just convert days to hours. Not a single person attempted to answer the question posted about writing a program that dealt directly with days and not hours.
On the other hand, if one were to look at the article entitled, “Avoiding Null Statements” we would see a much better question being posed. In this final version of the question, the poster takes the time to attach their sample code that they are working with to provide a frame of reference to those who might attempt to answer the question. They have taken the time to come up with a solution, but are asking the group for help improving their code. We see that to get to this stage this question went through a variety of modifications to ensure that they question was fully understood. We see that because this question is not edited and well phrased with sample code snippets and such, there are many people who have attempt to answer this question in a variety of ways and that this question also has a ton of people who have view the question, showing that the question is interesting to many people.
In summary, while there are no stupid questions and it is not nice to say there are stupid people, it can be seen that people can ask (and answer) questions in a manner that is considered stupid. When this happens, it can be seen that the asking of the question does not easily lead to an appropriate answer and will frustrated many people. Learning to ask a question in a way that understandable, contains a complete picture, and is polite is crucial especially when posting to a public forum. When this happens and when the other members of the forum respond in the same manner, then indeed it will be seen to increase the knowledge of both the individual and of the greater good.
Sample of a bad question
Sample of a good question
Article on Smart Questions