Hacker News Reader

Comment by conductr | Hacker News Reader

My response is usually “need context”. No shame in making them fill in the gaps they created in the first place

Nothing against screenshots unless they are lacking context

Agreed. Sometimes context comes from more screen, not less. I receive a lot of cropped screenshots that show the “problem” but hide the surrounding context, and they often exclude things that would make a solution immediately clear from a shot of the full application window.

Definitely true although my motive is more based on a principle of “don’t let people send me on a fishing trip”. I’m glad to help but people need to learn the proper way of asking without completely inconveniencing the other person

That's an obtuse and semi-rude response in itself. It's not hard to actually communicate.

"Thanks for sending this over to me, can you please send me a link to the code segment from source control?"

It's not hard to be polite and firm.

If I don’t know you, sure. The source of this usually comes from a teammate via a chat app (slack, teams) or email. In that context, I’m telling them concisely “I don’t have enough information to help you”. Tell me more. Figure out how to ask for help in a better way. Conciseness shouldn’t be assumed as rude when you have a working relationship with the other person and it’s obtuse precisely because they need to fill in the gaps, not me.

Me and my teammates regularly get by on one word responses. Nobody interprets it as rude, we’re all busy and don’t get our feathers in a bunch over this kind of stuff. If someone did, they’d need coaching not the other way around.

We were taught manners as children and they go a long way. You can still be concise while being polite, and friendliness is still appreciated by people you work with regularly and know well.

Your example: “I don’t have enough information to help you.”

8 words in length, it gives the impression of closure. There isn’t enough information, therefore I can’t help.

“Can you send the code link so I can help more?”

11 words in length, it not only adds actionable instructions to help rectify the lack of information, it also signals your intention to be a good collaborator and provide some kind of path forward.

Two more words gets you all that. That’s amazingly efficient (I.e., concise).

“We’re all too busy to be nice” is how you end up with everyone

You’re still the one choosing to be offended (or whatever) by my conciseness and trying to force me to appeal to your preferences in terms of communication and I simply have no interest in participating in those kinds of gymnastics.

There’s no rudeness. There’s nothing unfriendly. That’s your fantasy. It’s in your head.

Some people may feel the same as you, and I’m ok with it. They will quickly learn I mean no harm by it. I’m glad to help. They need to give me all the information to do so. Once that’s happened, we get from Q to A in a shorter amount of time and with less total communication. Less words, fewer messages, reduced time to resolution.

If they’ve given me a concerted effort to frame their question with support, giving me an actual shot of helping them without making it more of a burden to understand what they’re even asking, I’m more likely to engage and be specific on a follow up question. I think you’re forgetting the linked article is talking about absolute half assed attempts for asking for help. Is that not itself rude? Unfriendly?

Let’s set the issue of my judgement of tone aside. Can you recognize the difference in logic between your statement and my modified version?

I am suggesting that a completely different instruction be offered to the person making this request.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com