Asking questions on IRC...
The one thing I will respect esr for is his well-known document titled "How To Ask Questions The Smart Way".
It is quite possibly the one thing I wish that every person on IRC would read before asking questions. It covers almost every possible question you'd ask, what you should do before asking, and how to ask should you still have a question after doing what you're supposed to do before asking.
Okay, so I'll be honest. I hate assholes who are like the extreme version of the extremely to-the-point hackers esr mentions. You know, you've probably met a few. They're not just assholes to newbies, but they're also assholes to experienced and knowledgeable people who can't find an answer and thought they'd ask somewhere where other equally if not more experienced and knowledgeable people hang out. In fact, their assholery takes precedence over actually answering the question in any way (even to say STFW), which makes you wonder if they even know as much as they say they do. I equally hate the morons who come in asking questions others have asked a million times already that are answered with a simple google search. And there's a special level of hell for power tripping chanops and chanadmins who are never even in the channel but pop in occasionally to tell you to stop telling morons who aren't googling to fucking google it. Like what makes you think you know so much if you're never there and you got your +o a few years ago when you actually did pay attention to the channel.
So, enough of the rant. Here's the link if you've never read it (and honestly, it's a pretty good read):
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
It is quite possibly the one thing I wish that every person on IRC would read before asking questions. It covers almost every possible question you'd ask, what you should do before asking, and how to ask should you still have a question after doing what you're supposed to do before asking.
Okay, so I'll be honest. I hate assholes who are like the extreme version of the extremely to-the-point hackers esr mentions. You know, you've probably met a few. They're not just assholes to newbies, but they're also assholes to experienced and knowledgeable people who can't find an answer and thought they'd ask somewhere where other equally if not more experienced and knowledgeable people hang out. In fact, their assholery takes precedence over actually answering the question in any way (even to say STFW), which makes you wonder if they even know as much as they say they do. I equally hate the morons who come in asking questions others have asked a million times already that are answered with a simple google search. And there's a special level of hell for power tripping chanops and chanadmins who are never even in the channel but pop in occasionally to tell you to stop telling morons who aren't googling to fucking google it. Like what makes you think you know so much if you're never there and you got your +o a few years ago when you actually did pay attention to the channel.
So, enough of the rant. Here's the link if you've never read it (and honestly, it's a pretty good read):
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html