Kevin Lee
Dan Port
ICS 314
09/11/2025
Reflect on Smart Questions
There are many ways to ask and answer questions. The importance of asking a “smart question” is explored by Eric Steven Raymond in his essay, “How To Ask Questions The Smart Way.” He goes into detail of becoming informed as much as possible by scouring the internet and proposing the question in a particular way that evokes thought. Choosing a proper and acceptable medium to post your question is also important. Furthermore, Raymond also details an “unsmart question.” Just having volume in your question does not make it “smart.” You must be precise while also being informative. Explain the goal of your question, not the steps.
From Stack Overflow, I came upon an example of a “smart question.” This user asks how to set a checkbox system to uncheck one option when the other one is checked in Libre Office Calc. This way both options aren’t selected at the same time. The link to their question is stated here. This follows Eric Steven Raymond’s guidelines on what is an appropriate “smart question” as it is both precise and not concise. The user simply states their goal of having one option be unchecked when checking the other option.
Scouring through Stack Overflow, I came upon an example of a “not smart way question.” The user simply asks what is the problem with their binary tree level order traversal code. Although a concise and short question, he dumps his code and does not give much else information. He just asks what is wrong with it. The question can be found here.
From my brief adventure into Stack Overflow and the plethora of questions there, I found that although a good source of information, the website has various degrees of question qualities. From my examples, just having a quick question could be expanded upon so that people can answer the question with proper detail. As software engineers, we are provided with a wealth of information that is available on the internet. I believe it is our responsibility to be efficient and ask smart questions and also answer in a proper way, as also described by Raymond. This will lead to more reliable information and create a better environment for any software engineer to continue their learning.