I have 30 days to answer questions on the Stack Overflow quiz website.

The budding of ideas

If I had to summarize how I used stack overflow over the years, my answer was: Open the Web, search for questions, view the results of the stack Overflow, refer to the answer, and then close the page.

I can't live without stack overflow. But I never gave any feedback on the useful answers, let alone ask questions and answer questions.

But I finally realized that the success of Stack overflow was built on the generosity of its many users. I've learned a lot from this site, but never paid for it, because there's no one, no rules. Every question, every answer, or every helpful comment appears just because someone has written it out generously. It is true that Stack overflow also has a set of incentives to help its development, and how much the user gets badges and prestige is also unknown and is usually determined by other users. For example, if you ask a question or answer a question, no one is obliged to agree or oppose you.

I have been benefiting from it for years, but I have not done anything to make it a humble force. I found a dozen helpful answers on the website, but I didn't even give them a thumbs up.

It's time to return the stack overflow!

Goal

One day when I was browsing the badge list, I found that I could get a silver medal by visiting the website for 30 consecutive days. So I decided to take this as my goal, through 30 days uninterrupted to browse the website and reach 1000 prestige value. But I will only answer questions without asking questions.

Complete situation

As shown in the table below, I am barely able to accomplish my goal.

Although I found that there were 100 prestige benefits in return for 200 of the traffic, I still have a bottleneck that has not been achieved for a whole week. To understand and answer the question is undoubtedly a slow and necessary way to achieve my goal, at least a daily 30 o'clock of the prestige value to be able to.

Experience

Stack overflow looks like a purely quiz site, but after I spent 30 days in the process of answering questions, I found some subtle features of the site itself and the communities it formed. Here are some of the things I've learned:

"Cherry Picking"

It wasn't long before I found out how fast users were asking questions on the website. And all I have to do every day is to spend a few minutes each hour refreshing the problem page, randomly eliminating a few simple, not perfect answers. In addition, some of the friendly (and sometimes not very friendly) competitive conditions on the site are obvious.

I learned a lot from the merit-based process.

First, make sure you understand the problem. Read the whole question and clear the answer the questioner wants. If you don't understand it, ask politely in the comments. Reading labels is just as important. More than once I answered a question wrongly because I myself assumed the circumstances of the questioner, and obviously this could be avoided by reading the tags.

Second, don't sacrifice the quality of the answers in order to answer questions quickly. Typos and grammatical errors are not helpful to anyone, and they can be avoided by slowing down the answer and checking it out before submitting an answer. In other words: having a good writing format and a complete answer is much easier to praise, and the incomplete answer is natural. Don't write a quick but incomplete answer just to answer a question, and then have to be busy adding to the forgotten points. I've seen too many of these answers, and this will only invite more explanations from other users and even operators. This behavior is obviously detrimental to the development of user questions and answers.

Finally, if you are writing an answer, be sure to look at the answers that already exist. If your answer is almost the same as someone else's, then you just have to praise someone else's answer. If there is something missing in their answer, then you just need to add it to the comments in the answer.

Help Vampires.

On Stack Overflow is a group of people called "help vampires". These users are known for "never miss the chance to get help from others". This has always been the case, but I never knew they even had an exclusive word, until one day a user scolded a question questioner as "asking for vampires".

I've been answering questions for a couple of users who look like "help vampires," and then they get out of hand. They usually take my answer and then leave a message in the answer to ask new and unrelated questions.

The way I handle it is (it is recommended for other users to do the same): write a comment that tells the user what he did is wrong and what to do. At that time, I suggested that he go to Google this new problem, if you can't find the answer to the stack overflow ask a new question, rather than a user's answer to keep asking some unrelated questions.

The Meta Stack Exchange links given above provide a lot of useful responses when encountering this vampire. What I would like to say is that when the universally accepted answer is questioned, the first thing to do is to comment on the question, explaining that the questioner can fix the problem by himself. Give the user a chance to correct their mistakes. This way, users may be able to learn something new from this site, and you can even save time for site reviewers!

Showing off the werewolf.

Show off the werewolf, I specifically for the "Help the Vampire" made of the term. For vampires, those who might have been good intentions are simply avatars of demons.

When I found that the phenomenon of asking for vampires was getting worse, some users used a rude and useless way to stop them. Showing off the wolves. People usually say, "This is obviously a question of homework level," "Don't you try Google a little bit," "Don't ask the repetitive question!" ”。 When I finished my 30-day goal, I was more annoyed with the werewolf than the vampire.

I would like to say to these people: please answer the more constructive and useful point. Provide a more general answer to the questioner. My suggestions also apply to those who ask! If you meet a werewolf you just need to ignore them, set a good example, do not in the comments inside!

About the negative

During these 30 days, I have tried my best to make a good and detailed answer to the questioner. But sometimes there is the phenomenon that one of my accepted answers is not a single person, but rather an objection.

These negatives have hurt me deeply. The users who disagree with me do not explain why, even after I have asked the question. My answer was accepted, and obviously it was a good answer for the questioner, but I still don't understand why there was a negative vote, and even I lost two points of prestige.

The Stack overflow does not force you to explain why in opposition to an answer, so after a long period of depression, I think the site should have such a mechanism. To explain in a negative vote is the human side of the website.

How human nature in the negative vote under the message? I think of two ways:

1. If someone already has a comment in the negative that explains why they voted against it, then you just need to endorse the comment to get the attention of the respondents.
2. If no one is explaining why you voted against it, write a question in the comments or a place where the answer needs to be improved.

Summarize

If you are a developer or user of a stack overflow (or any related person), create a user and stay online. Now that you can find something useful from this site, why not use some of its built-in feedback mechanisms to improve the level of your site?

The next time you come across a useful answer, just a little! Your manners will help the respondents gain prestige, and it is this encouragement of stack overflow that keeps the site alive. If the wording of the question is not very good, also be kind to negate, or provide some details in the comments to help other users.

If you keep on going, someday you'll find yourself able to write a good answer!

I have 30 days to answer questions on the Stack Overflow quiz website.