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This stuff is pretty amazing

Asking Good Questions 04/03/15

There have been times when I am just stuck on something and I don't know where to begin. I don't have enough information or expertise to even ask the right questions. Hopefully I will gain enough background information from phase 0 so that this won't be the case. I hope I can analyze a problem enough to ask a decent question that someone else can understand how to answer in the best way possible.

There are some criteria that make questions asked better than others. Although I still believe it is true that there are no dumb questions. I now understand how you ask the question is just as important as someone saying "That's a very good question!"

There have been times during peer programming where I have to ask a question to my peer. One example is a syntax question while I am driving. During a JavaScript challenge I ask: Is this correct?

function myFunction(input) { return input + 1; };

This is just a simple question verifying that my syntax was correct because I wasn't sure whether or not I was defining a JavaScript function with proper syntax. I now realize that there are several ways I could improve posing this question to my peer.

1. I could pose the question much more specifically than "Is this correct?" If I don't provide specifics about what I am actually asking it will be up to my peer to further question me and that may really be too much effort when he has thoughts about the problem himself. He may not be able to turn his focus to my question because it is unspecific.

2. I could summarize the situation and question In a question statement that serves as the overview of the problem so that my peer knows the scope of the problem and then I can get into the details later.

3. I could show my due diligence in doing research on the problem myself so that I know the proper next questions to ask so that I could reach a path to solve the problem. This will show my pair that I an sincerely trying to solve the problem and I'm putting in an equal effort rather than merely looking for an easy answer.

These concepts will definitely help me at DBC during any problem solving session and even beyond DBC. As a Programmer in a community you continually rely on your peers to solve problems. Whether they be strangers or close work colleagues, asking questions in the best helps to get the best answer returned.

In on-line communities helping others also shows you are contributing back to the community and contributes to having a reputation of being helpful. This also helps because the community tries to return the favor.