Hello, Undercover Moderator snail_ here.
I've noticed lately that the forum has been a bit... messy, and hard to navigate for information, especially Activity. This isn't about forum etiquette though, I shouldn't have to explain that. I wanted to explain how asking programming questions should work on our forum, so the information is clear and available for our Future Patrons.
I was really spurred on by this exchange I saw today:
Obviously, you should not make many new question threads per day, but I also want to say that making a super-thread for all your questions is the wrong thing to do as well. For information of this nature, having separate threads for good, clear questions makes it easier for future readers to discover. Our forum is set up for this with the Programming Questions thread.
The most important thing is that you do not ask the same question twice. The first thing to do is to search the site for what you need to know. You should first look in the FAQs category of the forum. This category contains good question threads selected by the staff because we think they're very useful information. (The threads here also serve as good models for questions you may want to ask.) Second, you should check the Programming Questions category for information. Finally, you should search the site with the search bar, or try exploring our Resource pages. Only if you do not find what you need to know should you go ahead and make a new question thread.
If you need to ask a question on the forum, first consider what you're asking and why. Follow this handy guide.
![](https://kland.smilebasicsource.com/i/emldo.png)
![](https://kland.smilebasicsource.com/i/kwnxe.png)
- Is it clear? The question you're asking should be clear and specific. There's nothing more frustrating than trying to answer a question with limited information.
- Do you understand it? You should also assure you at least somewhat understand what you're asking. Not knowing things is okay, but at least know what you're asking.
- Is it on topic? This is Programming Questions, so the question should be related to programming. It doesn't need to be explicitly related to writing code; sometimes, design questions are okay.
- Don't ask questions like "How do I make a platformer?" or "How do I make my player jump?" unless you really know what you're doing. These questions are extremely vague and often have many, many different answers. You're better off looking online for game design books or similar. If you have something basic designed but it isn't working, you may consider asking.
- Don't ask really short or simple questions if you can avoid it. There are many resources available to you for understanding the absolute basics of SmileBASIC. If you need to, use the chat.