103
votes
squeezing for further information once an answer is given
No you are not required to follow up in comments.
At the same time I feel it is not unexpected and rather normal that an asker tries to engage somebody that answered in case something is open.
I ...
quidMod
- 41.8k
85
votes
How to ask a good question.
Avoid "no clue" questions
Too many questions begin or end with "I don't even know how to begin with this problem". While this may be true (you may genuinely have no idea how to ...
53
votes
Accepted
Why image cannot be used for explaining my maths problem?
This is largely an accessibility issue.
Images are not searchable. Whatever you think of the quality of the built-in search engine, or external tools such as approach0, and their ability to find ...
- 27.2k
48
votes
I am a student and have reached my limit of 50 questions per month what do I do?
I think the answer here is to be more selective in your questions. The site has to protect itself against getting bombed by low-grade questions from any particular user, hence the limit. (I'm not ...
- 63k
47
votes
Accepted
What qualify questions to be in mathoverflow and not in math.stackexchange?
How can I choose the preferred website to put my questions?
I once read something along the lines "If you have to ask whether to ask on MO or math.se, likely you should ask it on math.se." I think ...
quidMod
- 41.8k
46
votes
Accepted
Can I post a 'homework' question without any MathJax/Latex.
Please do your best to write this up using MathJax. This makes your post much more readable, searchable, and accessible. If you're worried about the process of formatting it in MathJax taking too much ...
- 60.9k
41
votes
Is it a "rule" of Math Stack Exchange that when asking a question, it's **never** good just to state the question?
In my opinion it is virtually always better to have some context provided for the question. In the cases you mentioned, a reasonable form of context can be a short explanation why the question is ...
quidMod
- 41.8k
41
votes
Accepted
Is there a shorter and more opinionated version of "How to ask a good question?" that we can direct new users to?
Because
solving your immediate mathematical problem is secondary to this website's goal of being a repository of high-quality, useful, searchable mathematical Q&A,
and because
you want to help ...
- 33.9k
38
votes
Accepted
Statistically, how does question length relate to community response?
TL;DR: the longer, the better.
Based on the current data, longer questions tend to get a higher ratio of upvotes than shorter questions. There is not enough data to determine an 'optimal' question ...
- 3,955
37
votes
Is it a "rule" of Math Stack Exchange that when asking a question, it's **never** good just to state the question?
This is a controversial topic in the math.SE internal politics, and on the meta site many words were minced on the subject of "context" or "problem statement questions" (PSQs) in ...
- 388k
32
votes
Accepted
How to avoid downvotes for beginner's questions?
Added a present the problem bullet point that includes an Edit-Images section.
Added an Edit-Tools paragraph.
In my opinion, the best way to have your query upvoted rather than downvoted is by first ...
- 32.7k
30
votes
Accepted
What is a "PSQ"?
To answer the first question, the acronym (or some might prefer initialism) PSQ, is derived from Problem Statement Question.
In its purest form it is a question post that only contains the statement ...
quidMod
- 41.8k
29
votes
Can I post a 'homework' question without any MathJax/Latex.
I want to amplify, perhaps a little more kindly, on @TonyK's "you're just being lazy" answer.
Everyone answering your questions is volunteering their time, in trade for silly internet "...
- 91.4k
28
votes
Why does the criterion for a good question change with reputation?
Context is everything.
When one of my students asks me "How can I solve question 1", I know what they are asking, I know what they were taught and what tools they have accessible to solving the ...
- 388k
28
votes
Accepted
Why does the criterion for a good question change with reputation?
I do agree that sometimes higher reputation users are given greater leeway than lower reputation users. This is not just true with questions, but also "answers". This is unfortunate, but also somewhat ...
- 51.6k
28
votes
Is Math Stackexchange only for experts?
Yes, I think it is harder to ask appropriate questions at a high-school level. But I don't think it's because of the subject matter - I've answered several questions about how percentages work, and ...
- 9,178
27
votes
How to ask a good question.
Pare question to its basics
Pare your problem down to the minimum core problem. Instead of asking for
$$\frac{\sin 2 k \sqrt{3 + q^3}}{b! (b-2)!} \int\limits_{x=0}^{\infty} \frac{e^{-x^2/(2 \sigma^2)}...
- 29.1k
27
votes
Accepted
Am I in danger of being banned?
You're not; your account triggered a warning for a ban that is no longer in effect (it has been superseded by rolling rate limits) - the ban itself was turned off but not the warning.
There's ...
- 101
27
votes
Are questions necessarily "static"?
In general, it is considered poor practice to change a question drastically enough after an answer has been given. The person could have spent quite some time writing up a good answer, and if an edit ...
- 2,354
27
votes
Accepted
How can I avoid immediate down-voting and how should I go about requesting feedback?
Disclaimer: I hadn't seen your question before following the link in this meta question. I'm basing this answer on the first revision of the question.
The title is the title, not the first sentence ...
- 13.3k
26
votes
Why does the criterion for a good question change with reputation?
I answer questions on math.se for several reasons. In roughly decreasing order of priority:
To help researchers with problems they run into (especially those from fields outside pure math, whose ...
- 48.6k
26
votes
Accepted
Posting 'Solved' Questions
The FAQ on Meta Stack Exchange is pretty clear on this.
Yes!
There are already numerous posts that answer their own questions.
There's nothing wrong with it. It's even been encouraged since the very ...
- 3,002
26
votes
Accepted
Is it okay to ask an already solved problem?
From my understanding, your question is "where did I go wrong?" The other question asks "how to solve this?" Since these two are conceptually different, it is ok to ask your ...
- 1,270
25
votes
A criterion for distinguishing between two kinds of questions
Let's call a spade a spade and admit that "show your work"/"what have you tried?" in the context of this site are primarily intended to be a less accusatory way to say "no, we will not do your ...
25
votes
Accepted
Registration to ask a question – has it made a difference?
The registration requirement had a big impact on the issues related to users losing access to their unregistered account (points 3,4,5 in the feature request).
It is now a rare exception that a user ...
- 204k
25
votes
Is it a good idea to include source from where a question is taken?
YES.
Posting a question from elsewhere${}^1$ without reference could be considered plagiarism. While not illegal, it is considered to be very bad in academics.
${}^1$In particular, posting your ...
- 107k
24
votes
Accepted
Is it okay to re-ask a deleted question?
I have on occasion re-asked someone's deleted question, trying to ask it in such a way as to engage with the criticisms levelled at the deleted version, and being sure to state explicitly that I was ...
- 177k
23
votes
Accepted
Is double posting allowed if a question is not answered after some time?
Posting the same question anew just to get more attention is not acceptable behavior. Please do not do this.
If it is noticed your questions will be swiftly closed as a duplicate, likely it will also ...
quidMod
- 41.8k
22
votes
How to ask a good question.
If the question you want to ask appeared in a
Math contest (or contest training), then
You should make it clear that the question is from a contest. Adding the contest-math tag is a good way of ...
- 130k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible