Table of contents
Using these instructions and doing well in the course
About this site
This site very much a side project. I am also a student, I have work, class and other responsibilities. While I am being paid to make them, I am not required to put anything here; please do not expect to have everything you need exactly on time. While I will try my best to get everything done before it is used, this is a large work in progress. If you have a question, I highly recommend that you use the search function on this site, you may find the answers that you seek. To find any guides or info, please use the sidebar. Everything that follows is notes about the section, which I highly recommend that you read.
How to get help in this class
I am creating this website as a resource to you. A lot of the purpose of this class is to be able to use your resources to become a better programmer. This includes using the internet, documentation, and sometimes your peers to get help. This means that I expect you to use your resources (including and especially this site) to find help before you ask course staff anything.
If you ever find yourself wanting to ask a question, please do the following:
If you don’t follow these instructions, course staff may get annoyed. We’re not mean, I promise!
- Read the error message Read the full error message again
- If the error message suggests you try something, try to figure out what that thing does, and try doing it
- Check for typos in any code or commands you ran (try retyping it)
- Read the manual/man pages/assignment instructions
- Use Piazza’s Lovely search function, try searching for a few things that pulled it up (note: if you have the same issue as somebody else and there is a solution, try it Do not just post “I have the same issue”)
- Check discord too, there might be an answer there
- Google it
- Go to section or office hours if you can! its a lot easier to get help there. If tutors or TA’s get the same question a few times we’ll try to make a piazza post about it
- Check piazza and discord again
- Ask a question on discord, piazza, or email
- Make sure you include helpful details in your post, like your setup, things you tried, and the exact commands that caused the error
- if you ever find a solution, please post that solution for other people to see too! they might have the same issue!
- If your default reaction to getting an error message is “ask on discord” there will come a day (very shortly) where this will not work. A lot of computer science is learning how to solve problems and fix bugs and if you can’t do that, you will not succeed in industry.
I am not posting this to be rude. I am posting this because it is a skill that some of you need to learn. If you ask helpful or insightful questions, I would be glad to answer them. If you try to use course staff to do your work for you, we will get annoyed.
When you include an image when you ask for help, don’t just take a picture with your phone, take a screenshot
Credits
This site uses the Just the docs template