Scratch

Well I've noticed being an interested forum reader for a long time, that quite a few people make forum posts that I can't always understand, or just looks likes somebody in a rush. So I'm here to give tips to making good forum posts like mine.

Rule #1. Never ever rush. This (as far as I know) happens most of the time when somebody is having trouble making one of their games, or wants to know how to make a certain type of game. I might sometimes rush, but you should always try your best to take your time to not do it. Sometimes I might take 10-20 minutes to make some long posts. Reason #1 not to do this is that by rushing, you usually make more mistakes, which sometimes means people won't understand what your asking. Reason #2 not to do this is also by rushing, you don't get to explain the problem as detailed, and even though you don't want to get long, you still want to not rush so people can understand the problem better, so more people can help you 

Paddle2See wrote:

It will get you results faster in the long run as you will probably get a good answer the first time instead of losing a day or two as people try to figure out what you want.

Rule #2. Make a good Subject Title. Within this, theres a couple things you can do to help. One is to not always capitalize. Only if its really SUPER important! Next, be informative. Don't just say "I need HELP!". Do say "I need help with scrolling and need some scripts to do it" or something decant like that. Even that is a bad example, as you should first search the forums to see if the question has already been answered (See rule 7). The second part ("and need some scripts to do it") is not completely neccecary, but I like doing it in some cases.

Rule #3. Revise and Re-edit. After completing your post, just quickly preview it and check if you did anything wrong, and also just take a quick second to see if anywhere you can re-word it and such. Note that I'm not the best at this rule, but thats because I'm not an ELA person 

big-bang wrote:

Make sure your grammar is okay or some people won't take you seriously.

Rule #4. Related to the previus rule, is Organization. One part of this is to learn when to skip paragraphs. Whenever the subject changes a bit, then you can skip a line. Another thing is, when your sharing a list of something, like multiple ways to improve something, or any kind of list, you might want to do something like this:

-Do a dash first
-And then make your point as not a full sentence

Rule #5 Don't use forum topics (or galleries or projects) as chatrooms. Read more about this

From herey:
Rule #6 If there's something that someone needs help with, for example, it is very helpful if they leave a link to the project or problem so other people can see exactly what's wrong and how to fix it. Or even if you're advertising your project, you should leave a link because no ones likes looking through "my stuff" pages to find just one project. So by leaving a link, you're raising your chances of people helping or looking at your project/galleries/stuff.

From archmage:
Rule #7 Don't ask a question if it can be answered by doing a quick search on google. This shows that you are lazy and it also wastes other people's time.

From zelda123 (and a little help from me):
Rule #8 Post in the correct forum. Because of people doing this, two terrible things happen: 1. Moderators have to move them to the other forum sections and most of all, 2. Its more difficult to find certain topics. For example, by putting a how do I" questions thats regularly Advanced topic in the Suggestions forum, somebody will tell you that its already in scratch, and that won't help you with your question. If you don't know where something should go, first read the descriptions of each forum, and if that doesn't help, just ask somebody.

Rule #9 (from zelda123) Be patient for replies. More than often when you ask a question you'll get a reply within 10 minutes to 5 hours to 1 day. If you don't get any after a while, try editing your post, and a bit more detailed to help the problem solver/replier. And if you have a project related to it and you haven't done this already, than post a link to it. Again, patience makes perfect (just like practice makes perfect).

Rule #10(from zelda123) Look in the forums for the same or similar question before asking. This way we can save space, and it will most likely help you more than waiting for an answer. Unless a all of the other similar questions in the forums don't help you, don't make another post!

So yeah. I hope this helps 

Last edited by Lucario621 (2009-08-15 08:23:12)