Ask HN: Do you use your brain or Google to solve your problems? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Do you use your brain or Google to solve your problems?

6 pointssiong198711 comments

I know I had this habit that whenever I found a bug or error in my code, I would head to Google. Copied paste the error message into Google and hoped that Google would find the answer for me.

But, after several times of hoping Google to get me the answer, I found that Google didn't actually give me the best answer. And, sometimes, even wrong answer.

So, slowly, I developed this skill that I can now solve problem independently. I admit that I still need help from Google. But, Instead of copy paste the help from Google, I can actually analyse the solution myself and modify it to suit my problem.

My question is: Do you use your brain or Google to solve your problem?

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Yes. ;)

This is what programmers are paid for. To decide on a case-by-case, moment-by-moment basis whether to use Google (and, more importantly, which phrases to Google and which results you should try to use) or whether to work through something on your own, or phone a friend, or surrender and just do something else.

There is no general rule.

I expect that within another generation nobody will distinguish between "thinking" and "using Google", just as I don't distinguish between "solving a problem on my own" and "solving a problem on my own by remembering something I read a month ago".

There's a macro question of how to use all resources at your dispoal to address coding questions: maybe look at pragmatics' wetware book.

the micro skill you have to develop: scour delicious, IRC, stackoverflow, Yahoo search, forums for your language/framework. Also krugle, koders.com, gotapi.com, (can't tell if anybody's maintain codase.com for java/C++)

Google custom search engines are great, too, carefully choose 20-40 domains to include.

Do you have any google custom search engine to share?

Google shines when you must deal with a problem that occurs due to third-party code (particularly proprietary code). When things _should_ be working in your code, Google can help sort out an obscure issue much more quickly than trying to search through the source for a third-party library.

Your brain works best to debug your own code, but isn't as efficient to discover flaws quickly in unfamiliar source.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." -- Isaac Newton

Shoulder = Google

Google is a tool, to be used like any other tool.

I'm very good at solving most problems that come up in whatever I'm working on, but Google can also be a massive "accelerator".

Often times I've thrown at error message at Google just to get an idea about where the general problem may lie (is it me, is it the system, is it even fixable?), etc.

Before Google you'd have to weed through manuals (if you owned all the right ones) or ask a question on something like FidoNET. Getting answers took much longer, sometimes that allowed you to solve the problem on your own by giving you lots of time to think about it. Other times it just delayed your progress.

I first try to understand the problem. If the problem is going to take more than a few minutes to solve, I try to google about it, and if I found nothing, I put my brain into it. I do this because 98% of the times is a problem about libraries or programs maintained by someone else.

There are those of us who remember the Internet before Google...

Personally, I use lifelines. First I eliminate 50% of the wrong answers... If that doesn't work, I ask the audience. When all else fails, I call Bill Gates. :)

google shines when there's a lot of data point (say ubuntu)

man pages shine when the info is very specific (say openbsd)

first time it's better to use google (to see whether it's an issue -- where people encountered the same problem ... or non-issue -- only ME? having this problem? it could be something else)

but after facing it multiple times, man pages (and brain) are my friends

both. brain, google, brain, in that order.

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