How to Ask a Question on a Forum

If you want to illicit the most useful responses, the way you ask a question matters. Avoid the following:

• TYPING IN ALL CAPITAL LETTERS AND OR WRITING WITHOUT PUNCTUATION
• Mispeling evr othr word (misspelling every other word) or writing in txtspk (textspeak)
• Posting your question in a text color or font that is difficult to read

In addition to simply making your question readable, make sure you give enough information about your problem. For example, if all you say is “My computer crashes when I try to save my file,” or “I can’t get GIMP's eraser tool to work,” the people reading your question probably aren’t going to have enough information to respond. Generally, you should try to give enough information about the problem that another user of the software could replicate the problem that you’re having on their computer.

In some cases (like when you’re encountering a technical problem with the software) you might also want to give information about the hardware you’re running the software on, such as the type of processor you are using, the size of your hard drive, or how much RAM your computer has. If you’re running software that can be run on multiple operating systems (which is the case with most free and open source software), specifying the operating system you’re running the software on is also likely to be helpful.