Quite often I'll see someone new to a concept or API (mainly in OpenGL where I lurk) is having a problem and is asking for help. Now I go in to try and offer some of my experience and help this poor soul out who has drummed up the courage to ask people for help. One thing I find eternally infuriating is when people simply post a link to the FAQ, to Google, or simply a message saying "Google". I find these kinds of comments extremely irritating. If people are asking a question, it's because they're stuck, and I'm sure they would've tried searching Google or whatever. What they are after is informed people who have made the same mistake to help out. I'm not asking for much, just simply something like: "The problem you're having is called Z-Fighting, there a number of solutions. The FAQ describes some of them: Here's a link...[Link]" Was that so difficult? Rather than scaring the person, or trying to be elite and know-it-all, you're imparting knowledge to this person to better help them solve the issue themselves. This is a community that is desperately trying to be recognised in the industry as a fantastic resource for new and existing game developers alike. Comments like these that I have seen all across these forums are unhelpful and rude. Personally, I think, if you're going to take the time to bother searching in Google, copying the link, writing a post about; a few more lines of text just describing what it is isn't going to hurt. Is it? Prime Example: http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=547171

Quote: Original post by AndyEsser
I'm sure they would've tried searching Google or whatever.

You...haven't been here long, have you. Besides, Google links are passe -- it's all about this now.

I have found this to be the only technical forum on the Internet where the OP's complaint does not generally hold. Sure, there are jerks, but this is actually a solid, helpful technical community.

I'm the kind of guy, who usually links or says google only.
I don't know, it's just annoying for me to see, when people are refusing to take the most minimal efforts to solve their problems themselves. I don't know why, I maybe spending too much time here (it's hard to stay focused on my current task, which is learning Finnish, so I have to come here every 10 minutes).
And I see 3 or 4 threads following each other with almost the same questions ("wat is dot product?"). I'm too sensitive I think.

Questions of API's, that's another story, I usually try to explain the thing myself there.

Quote: Original post by Promit
You...haven't been here long, have you. Besides, Google links are passe -- it's all about this now.

I've been here a good few years actually

Quote: Original post by szecs
And I see 3 or 4 threads following each other with almost the same questions ("wat is dot product?").

I would agree, it's irritating. But simply replying "Please see this post....[link to post] is all that is required. If you're going to make the effort to reply, that's all that is required, if you're not going to make the effor then so be it.

From my own personal experience on this board and many others:

Looking at this from the other side of things, if I get answer such as "Google Z-Buffer", in my mind I still win something. After all, now I know the term related to what my question is about, and can carry on with my research. Even a question of just "Google is your friend", while may be construed as rude, can still be a nugget of helpful info: it means that at least one person thinks it should be easy enough to find. Maybe I'm still missing the correct terminology, but you'd better believe I'm going to try that google thing again (and probably be embarrassed this time when I find my answer there).

The best part of all this: it's free. If my customer support that I'm paying for (or entitled to through a purchase) gives me the Google-it, that's a whole 'nother story...

Although I suppose there could always be improvement, all in all I've found this place to be much more helpful and tolerable than most other forums I've seen.

Quote: I'm not asking for much, just simply something like:

"The problem you're having is called Z-Fighting, there a number of solutions. The FAQ describes some of them: Here's a link...[Link]"

Prime Example:
http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=547171

I'm not sure how this is a prime example (of answering 'badly' -- maybe I've misunderstood and this is an example of someone following what you've asked?)

Quote: Original post by Dunge
There's no transparency in a BMP file, so of course you are missing something :).

Click me

"The problem you're having is that BMPs do not contain transparency information. There are a number of ways to load PNGs (which do contain transparency information) directly into OpenGL: The FAQ lists many of them, here's a link."

The FAQ happens to be google, and a little bit of the answer is implied from the contents of the link (i.e. that you can directly load PNGs), but it contains an accurate description of the problem, and points fairly directly at possible solutions.

This hasn't ever seemed like a significant problem to me. I can only speak for myself, but here are some of the reasons I sometimes respond with 'try Google' or 'try a forum search':

1. The OP doesn't know (or doesn't seem to know) the right terms, so a suggestion of 'try searching for XYZ' is probably enough to get them on the right track.

2. I know for a fact that the same question has been answered previously on the forum; therefore, suggesting a forum search seems like a reasonable way to direct the OP towards the answer.

3. I know for a fact that I myself have answered the same question previously on the forum; therefore, suggesting a forum search seems like a reasonable way to direct the OP towards the answer.

4. For whatever reason, I'm not prepared to take the time to type a detailed answer or explanation; however, if I know that 'the answers are out there', and if I can make a reasonable suggestion as to what terms one might search for, I feel that a 'try searching for XYZ' reply can be more helpful than no reply at all.

5. I, personally, would rather receive a 'try searching for XYZ' reply than no reply at all, so I suppose that motivates me to do the same.

6. Research is a (practically) unavoidable part of software development, so I don't necessarily think you're doing someone a diservice by pushing them in that direction.

7. You suggested that if someone posts to the forum, they've probably already tried searching. I'm not sure this is true in general. Searching is both a habit one must get into, and a skill one must develop, and I think quite often people do post to the forums without searching first (or at least without searching well).

As to the question of why I don't just search the forums myself and post a link to a relevant thread, I figure that the poster can probably do that just as easily as I can. If for whatever reason they can't find what they're looking for, they can always post back.

I do occasionally see people suggesting Google or whatever when it's obvious they haven't read the thread carefully and don't really understand what the OP is asking, and that is a little annoying, IMO. My own feeling though is that responding with a suggestion to search isn't necessarily a bad thing.

That's just my own view though :)

Quote: Original post by MaulingMonkey
I'm not sure how this is a prime example (of answering 'badly' -- maybe I've misunderstood and this is an example of someone following what you've asked?)

I was also wondering. The reply was short and to the point, and absolutely acceptable - in principle.

Of course it was also incorrect. BMPs do in fact support transparency. The problem is probably the app the OP used to convert from PNG to BMP, which would drop alpha. However, this is secondary to this thread here. Assuming for a second that the reply was technically correct, then it would have been perfectly adequate, IMO.

Ahh, point. I remembered alpha being an 'unofficial' hack -- but apparently there's no 'official' to base this off of (except Microsoft documentation somewhere? Some versions of which would apparently actually support alpha?).

Basically the only time I answer with ONLY google is when the first result or two seem to completely answer the question. Here's that thought process: "uhh, he didn't google this, did he? Is there even anything I can add to these first couple of results? Quite honestly they describe it better than I could. No, I should avoid muddling things with my own hack of an explanation -- no doubt about it, google has me beat here. Worst case scenario, this will hopefully prompt them towards asking their actual question if google really manages to somehow not help them here."