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New user accounts asking their first question are presented with the following prompt:

Screenshot of new user dialog
[click to embiggen]

This guidance is … not a great fit for our community. It's great guidance for asking for help with homework, where there is a well-defined problem statement and it is normal to plug along for a while and get stuck. But our community has spent several years rejecting "homework" and "homework-like" questions in favor of "conceptual" questions. Since this modal dialog is only shown to very new users, and may have been added to the system after many long-time users joined, these new users are getting conflicting and sometimes condescending advice in comments and on Meta when they come to ask why their reasonable-seeming questions are closed.

The fatal flaw to me seems to be the phrase "what you've tried," which is much more like having run up against a wall and gotten stuck than it is like trying to wrap your head around some conceptual issue.

Let's suppose, for the sake of argument, that this dialog is per-site customizable. (It might be, or it might take six to eight weeks of complaining.) What would a more helpful introductory dialog say?

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  • $\begingroup$ Tangentially related but I don't think that the dialog is an effective way to deter homework dumps as most of them simply want their immediate question answered ASAP after which they won't return. It is unlikely that they will think or care about the community, i.e. they are the "help vampires". In summary they simply don't care. I may be wrong but this is just my opinion. $\endgroup$
    – Vincent Thacker
    Commented Jul 24 at 23:06
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    $\begingroup$ I have seen a number of users posting on Meta that they "followed our rules" by showing their partial working of a problem. I am not suggesting that any one step will eliminate all homework questions. But folks who are making an effort to follow our community's norms shouldn't be presented with guidance that is actively different from what we want. $\endgroup$
    – rob Mod
    Commented Jul 25 at 3:06
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    $\begingroup$ There are on meta a few posts about good questions, such as this one, and this one. They could be merged and then linked to as examples. $\endgroup$
    – ZeroTheHero
    Commented Jul 26 at 12:19
  • $\begingroup$ @rob time to move to a decision and implement I would think. $\endgroup$
    – ZeroTheHero
    Commented Aug 11 at 12:52

2 Answers 2

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How about:

  1. The site's format does not lend itself to long questions or answers, so please be brief and clear and focus on one issue at a time. Aim for just one clear question per post, not multiple questions.

  2. Please search for an existing answer that is close to what you need and refine your question to just what the other answers do not explain. Linking to a related question or questions is often useful.

  3. Identify the conceptual problem you are having and ask about that. Ask about one conceptual issue per post where practical.

  4. If a mathematical step is not understood, say that clearly.

  5. Remember we do not generally do "check my work" or homework-like questions. "Work this out for me" question, even if for self study, are likely to be closed as homework-like.

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  • $\begingroup$ Might I suggest amending #1 to indicate a multitude of questions per post is also problematic. Something like, "The site's format does not lend itself to long/multiple questions..." $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Commented Jul 24 at 21:01
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    $\begingroup$ I might suggest changing #2 to "Search for existing answers that are close to what you need. If you find any, link to them and refine your question..." There's a lot of stuff on our site but there are even more possible questions out there. $\endgroup$
    – Michael Seifert
    Commented Jul 25 at 13:10
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What would a more helpful introductory dialog say?

In general I think the dialog box should have as little text as possible. It's already clear that no one reads it...

The bold "Asking a good question" should be removed.

The paragraph starting "You're ready to ask your first question and the community is here to help!" should be removed.

The dialog box should start with:

  • Don't ask yet! First search the site to see if your question has already been answered.

Then just three rules should follow:

  1. Ask one question per post.
  2. Clearly and carefully describe your conceptual problem.
  3. Don't post your homework, we will not do your homework for you!
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  • $\begingroup$ there’s this nice list of tips for searching that is also useful. $\endgroup$
    – ZeroTheHero
    Commented Jul 26 at 12:23
  • $\begingroup$ Actually I would trade the 2nd part of item 2. for “don’t ask for others to check your work, do the work for you, or answer specific homework questions.”. I think it captures better the sentiment of the community on these issues. $\endgroup$
    – ZeroTheHero
    Commented Aug 10 at 11:59

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