Rick said:
Another example, when I posted my first thing I was using C for 2
weeks. So, no wonder that I have some dumb questions then, pointers
and stuff are not easy if you're used to do Delphi or something!
Anyway, I placed a simple question and then I get a dozen of
answers. Most of them are good but there are also a few people who had
to add that I should know this and are explaining the problem in
Techno Language. Then there's also some wiseguy who tries to prove I
didn't copy paste my code snippet from the internet. Who cares?! Does
it really matter if it's copy pasted or not? I typed it over so there
was a tiny error inside. That's no big deal but the guy keeps pooping
( "did not!", "did too!" etc. etc. "STOP!" ).
At least some of the repetition is caused by the fact that this is an
asynchronous medium. It takes time for articles to propagate.
Someone asks a question with a more or less obvious answer. Multiple
people reply before seeing that everyone else is doing it. (And I,
for one, have a big enough ego that I'm not always willing to sit back
and wait for someone else's answer, especially if I think I have some
insight that someone else might miss.)
Another factor is a general unwillingless to let misinformation,
deliberate or otherwise, go unanswered.
As for the copy-and-paste issue, a lot of the questions asked here are
about subtle errors in source code. We take a look at the posted code
and find errors in it; how are we supposed to know whether those
errors are in your original code or were introduced when you re-typed
it?
For example, if you post something like
if (x = 0) {
printf("x is zero\n");
}
and ask why x is never zero, I'll tell you that it's because you used
"=" instead of "==". If you reply that of course you had "==" in your
original program, you just mis-typed it, I'll remind you to
cut-and-paste the exact code next time so we can tell you what the
real problem is.
Cut-and-paste is easier than re-typing anyway.
The dynamics of this newsgroup are such that it's easy to keep a
discussion going, but very difficult to stop one. There are oodles of
regular readers, and dozens who post regularly. Stopping a discussion
requires all of them to agree to stop posting about it. It does
happen sometimes, but probably not as often as it should. Threaded
newsreaders help.
Rick, I'm not saying you don't have some valid points, I'm just trying
to help you understand why things are the way they are.
Let's contineu C.