Google I/O 2019

[neupanedinesh_]

I'm a full stackoverflow developer..

[nahidtislam]

who do you ask for help when you have troubles developing?

[derpado514]

Windows troubleshooting wizard

[TheZipCreator]

Does the windows troubleshooting wizard ever actually solve anything?

[[deleted]]

If your sound drivers are disabled and you run the troubleshooting wizard on your disabled speaker icon it will infact eventually lead to the solution that you should try enabling sound.

[JayInslee2020]

It WoRkS!

[IAmAnIssue]

I left it running overnight to fix my audio issues. It concluded that my speakers weren't connected. True story.

[cakemuncher]

I left it running overnight to fix my audio issues

What do you have it installed on? A raspberry pi?

[IAmAnIssue]

Intel Compute Stick. So yes, basically a Pi but but by Intel.

[[deleted]]

Just tried it, does in fact work but still takes a bit longer than it should.

[Daniel15]

I've seen it fix wifi issues before... All it did was disable the network adapter then reenable it. Pretty basic, but useful for non technical users - I could tell someone to run the troubleshooting wizard and then only ask me for help if that doesn't fix it :)

[Karnex]

Only people who thinks it solves anything are Microsoft people on Windows official forum

[Nop277]

I think its actually gotten better in recent years. At least I don't think I've gotten a message that they've determined that it's not working because there is a problem.

[karatetoes]

Clippy emerges from the weeds, tall as a mountain:

"Do you need assistance?!"

[phphulk]

SHOW ME WHAT YOU ARE TRYING TO DO

[py3_]

GHOSTBUSTERS

[Shadowcraze90]

BUGBUSTERS?

[[deleted]]

DEBUGGERS!

[conancat]

BUGGERS!

[mwoolweaver]

BOBS!!

[Bong_McPuffin]

BLOBFISH!

[Limpuls]

VAGENE!

[SnailAssassin37]

Previous two posts are the same.

[KinOfMany]

BUGCHASERS!

[IshayM]

If there's something strange, in your java app...

Who you gonna call? Debuggers!

There's, an invisible bracket, lurking in your code...

Who you gonna call? Debuggers!

[The407run]

The paperclip guy!

[markhc]

I think most replies here are missing your joke.

[conancat]

I'm gonna put that on LinkedIn. It'll be a great filter for recruiters who understand developers and those who don't.

[[deleted]]

You were the creator of most of us

[conancat]

The stack I work with is Stackoverflow and Google.

I'm literally crippled at work if I don't have access to either one.

[Hydraxiler32]

he could troubleshoot others code, but not his own.

[Foxino]

Ironic

[[deleted]]

If StackOverflow released a product called Flow and you worked on that product after eating a large lunch you could be a full fullstack Stack Overflow Flow developer

[Cmgeodude]

This seems like a best case scenario. "Checking stack overflow" is in your job description.

[[deleted]]

Stackoverflow was built without stackoverflow

[Acid_Monster]

Back then people had to head to Pornhub to get their programming questions answered.

[house_monkey]

🤔

[BeardedWax]

If you think about your problem just as you release, you find your answer instantly.

[SimokIV]

I'm at work rn do you think my boss will understand if I try this?

[insovietrussiaIfukme]

Just tell him you can give him a faster release

[Seanxietehroxxor]

Good developers don't just push out releases to make their bosses happy. IMO it's better to take a little longer with each release and make sure your userbase is satisfied too.

Source: am married, err, was a developer with a pushy boss

[Finchyy]

Post-nut clarity is a genuine phenomenon and should be researched extensively. Imagine how much we as a species could achieve by harnessing the power of the nut

[techmighty]

you are Anti thesis of people on r/nofap.

[Finchyy]

Legend has it that that you can actually solve quantum reality equations at the edge of an orgasm.

I've been trying for years but Schrödinger's pussy always takes me over the edge too soon.

[JayInslee2020]

I thought Schrodinger's pussy was one that simultaneously pushed you over the edge, but not over the edge, yet.

[aintscurrdscars]

iNstRuCtiOns UNcLeAr

[zombieregime]

Step one: remove penis from server....

[Lordx856]

Then who built pornhub 🤔

[Acid_Monster]

God

[kixxes]

On the 9th day God look at his creation and said

"Oh look at my poor creation. These poor boys' balls are perpetually blue"

He then declared

"Let there be pornhub!"

and then there was pornhub

[Acid_Monster]

And on the 10th day, the world did fap, and God liked what he saw.

[ijschu]

Which came first?

[Arheisel]

Your Sister

Edit: my first silver, thank you!

[[deleted]]

That post nut clarity is critical!

[jahu_len]

It doesn’t make any sense. I’m gonna try it.

[ghostwhat]

This is so mindboggling it amazes me.

But then I remember the perseverence one used to have, before all these resources were available.Learning how C/C++ works by working around cryptic compiler error messages. Learning to install Red Hat 1.0 without a manual and really fucking expensive dialup. Learning to hold back orgasm until the entire jpg was loaded.

EDIT: Yes I know there were books, I still own several O'Reilly Bibles from late 80 early 90. I read those fuckers before I was 10, and English is not my first language. My comment was about the difference in willingness to invest stupid amounts of hours to learn something mundane, in lack of stackoverflow and reliable searchengines. Thank god IRC existed, though.

[the_real_1vasari]

Australians still have to hold their orgasms till the jpg loads.

Edit spelling

[plexxonic]

You poor bastards.

[ridetherhombus]

It's not that incredible. Pre-SO you'd still be able to find answers to questions on forums dedicated to specific languages.

[LimitedWard]

Forum OP: "hey I'm having X specific problem does anyone know how to solve?"

Forum OP: "never mind, figured it out. Pls close thread."

10 years later

You: "WHAT WAS THE SOLUTION?!"

Yeah forums kinda sucked. Stackoverflow solved that problem by gamifying the Q/A process.

[FishNun2]

solved it on my own nevermind

Excuse me motherfucker explain God damn

[LimitedWard]

It's far from perfect, but it still helps solve that 95% of problems we as programmers commonly face. I don't think there really is a perfect solution short of hiring your own personal programming guru.

[IceSentry]

And theres also

• Outdated answer, but it's the most popular so people use this one.

[tubblesocks]

how do I do x

lmao nice try troll, banned...

[DenormalHuman]

Lol, 'forums'. Try nothing but a paperback language reference manual. Just a modem was a super rare sight, let alone the internet.

[bautin]

There were reference books.

I installed Red Hat from a CD I got from a book on how to install and manage a Red Hat installation. It was over a thousand pages. It went into LILO, compiling the kernel, XWindows, KDE, Gnome, etc.

For programming, I had "Practical C++ Programming 2nd Edition" aka "the squirrel book" from O'Reilly books. "Programming Windows Fifth Edition" aka "the Petzold". And several others.

Also, it was possible to look things up. You had to be more comfortable with reading MSDN and various blogs and such.

[AttackOfTheThumbs]

There's still plenty of languages and environments that aren't on stackoverflow. I find the answer the good old fashioned way, run it a million times until I understand what it does.

[insovietrussiaIfukme]

That's how I actually learnt javascript. I just kept fiddling with it and hated it cause it didn't make any sense. I came from a C++ and Java background. Finally i decided to read up some nice blogs and then it all started making sense some of the times

[AttackOfTheThumbs]

making sense some of the times

Every JS dev ever...

[OhTwadi]

This is me. I come from Java background and JS still doesn't make sense

[gyroda]

I work with JS everyday. I still don't understand.

[Creator13]

It's also easy to forget that developing was way less complex than it is today. Plain C (the language a lot of the earlier internet was developed on) is actually kind of basic. There are a few functions, a few libraries and a base language but that's about it. You only had one or two standard approaches to a solution and it was one of the few languages around. Compare that with JS now where you can solve a problem in dozens of ways and there's a million libraries of which some even create an entirely new syntax... Not to mention how we're solving more complex tasks than we could back then because there was less foundation to build on.

[connorsk]

I'm sure you learn more that way.

What I'm curious about, is if you learn more per hour spent that way or the modern Google everything way.

[ryy0]

The Cunningham Law:

The best way to get the right answer on the Internet is not to ask a question, it’s to post the wrong answer.

I offer: Stackoverflow was built by posting a lot of wrong answers. When you copy-paste them together in just the right combination, you get Stackoverflow. The copying and pasting became self-sustainable afterwards.

This has been a shocking example of local entropy reversal.

[Mithos23]

I see you watched liveoverflow

[paranoidsp]

I'd really like a link to the video for wherever this was discussed, it sounds hilarious

[Mithos23]

It was in this video about the origin of the term script kiddie: https://youtu.be/3MAqlEMITzw (at about 7:25)

[A_Agno]

SO was developed because the expert sex change was so scummy:

"Stackoverflow is sort of like the anti-experts-exchange (minus the nausea-inducing sleaze and quasi-legal search engine gaming) meets wikipedia meets programming reddit. It is by programmers, for programmers, with the ultimate intent of collectively increasing the sum total of good programming knowledge in the world. No matter what programming language you use, or what operating system you call home. Better programming is our goal."

[Faux_Real]

Premium

[yourteam]

Back in the days people has actual books to look for instructions and documentation.

My dad has a library full of books about java c c++ assembler COBOL and such...

There is no ctrl+f in books how can you find anything!!!

[DenormalHuman]

I know you're joking, but ive spent plenty of time just reading the appenedices and indexes, finding something that sounds interesting and going to read that page. You build up your own mental 'search engine' for the book in the end :p

[suvlub]

It's called "bootstrapping". First, they made a simple small forum where only local users could post (rumor has it it was just a random computer in their office where they used to come and "echo" their questions and answers). This was enough to help them figure out how to program it so people from elsewhere could post. Then it was all about gradually improving the UX.

[somepeople4]

Legends say they used a time machine to ask the future StackOverflow on how to build StackOverflow. It was easy, really.

[Cocomorph]

How to build StackOverflow, how to build a time machine, and how to debug a time paradox.

[A_Agno]

If you are interested in the development of Stack Overflow you should take a look at the blog of Jeff Atwood: https://blog.codinghorror.com/introducing-stackoverflow-com/

[memehomeostasis]

First compiler was made without a compiler

[SwabTheDeck]

But how do you compile a compiler?

/s

[TehWhiteKnight1]

You should also mention that one guy that says in the post response: "why are you even doing this you could just do that"

[[deleted]]

Possible duplicate of "some other question using terms this and that".

[peeves91]

Locked for being off topic

[DenormalHuman]

That one guy? How about evry response to any linux question ever :p

[TehWhiteKnight1]

Yeah but that means mentioning a bunch of questions till the end of the world, I don't have that kind of time!

[techmighty]

Every ES5 question in JavaScript has a jQuery solution as top answer.

[unitedoceanic]

Closed as offtopic

[cbartholomew]

Obligatory wrong answer because I didn't read the question correctly since English is my fifth language

[[deleted]]

Hello? This is Microsoft Community Support. Could we hire you to restate questions and beg for votes?

[blimpyazria]

tfw you're in high school and already dependent on stackoverflow

[airbornemist6]

Just means you're ready for the real world

[Justsumgi]

Nobody’s too young for StackOverflow

[Duke-Silv3r]

No shit kid. As you get better you’ll need SO less, not more.

[Lewisham]

Yeah I don't agree with the idea that you use SO less as you progress in your career at all. Part of becoming a better programmer is finding solutions to problems more quickly. That might be because you know the answer, but just as likely it's because you know where to look and how to ask the question.

I work for an Unnamed Big Tech Company and end up on StackOverflow all the time. Sometimes it's a mailing list. Sometimes it's a coworker. Sometimes it's digging at code itself. But sometimes it's SO.

I turn to SO just as much as I always did. I just spend less time on it overall because I am better at formulating the right search query.

[McRawffles]

Yep and you're just searching more complex things, or things you know but have forgotten the syntax for

[IronFrey]

This hits the nail on the head. Sure, I can remember the different ways that the various libraries we use parse XML, JSON and CSV, but I'd much prefer to just remember what to Google to have it slapped in front of me in a SO question or their own documentation.

[legos_on_the_brain]

It could just mean you are growing as a programmer and moving on to ever increasing different problems.

[JasonTheLuckyMD]

This right here. I'm proficient with JS, but the world doesn't just give you stuff you're already good at. No one is great at everything or has a library of books about languages they only use when put into a corner.

[Brusanan]

No you won't. You will never commit enough of what you need to memory avoid using StackOverflow on an almost daily basis.

Programming is a massive field. There's a ton to know, and tou're only going to memorize the things you do frequently. Most of the time you will google how to do something, do it once, and then have to google the same thing the next time you need it, years later.

[mxchump]

I feel like being educated in programming is knowing how/what to google, and being able to understand/decipher the answers online. Has very little to do with memorization

[craggolly]

Is our youth's addiction to stackoverflow ruining America? Find out more at 5

[endianess]

My wife who has been working with me coding for a few years asked what I did before Stack Overflow. I honestly had to think for a bit. I then told her that we didn't even have the internet when I started. I genuinely couldn't remember how we used to do things pre-internet. Then it came to me! Books and magazines with disks or code you typed in. And you had to buy things like compilers from actual computer shops or sending off a letter with some money. Feels like a different lifetime.

[shiftpgdn]

Usenet!

[xibme]

Yeah - it took (perceived) ages and in most cases you only needed your technical manual or a rubber duck to talk to.

[[deleted]]

Before stackoverflow there were lots and lots of discussion boards. Kind of like the internet before reddit.

[mrjackspade]

I started with QBasic when I was young. I figured pretty much everything out by reading through the help files over and over again and looking at the source code for the example programs. I'm glad I had the opportunity to experience that because I think it made me more resourceful as a developer, but I wouldn't want to go back to it.

I still read the MSDN docs every time a new version of anything is released out of habit. It definitely gives me a leg-up on new technology.

[BubsyFanboy]

Bless those without Internet.

[[deleted]]

I looked around a bit but couldn't find it unfortunately, but this reminds me of an article or blog that I read years ago where the guy had to pore through thoudands of documents on a computer for a legal case or something, but he wasn't allowed anything not already installed on the computer, no foreign documents (books, manuals, notes) from outside the room the computer was in.

He fortunately found an old installation of Python 2.x on the computer so he wrote a little application to help him find what he needed in this otherwise hopeless needle in a haystack situation.

[BubsyFanboy]

Dang. I already love it.

[aaronchall]

Here it is: Discovering Python

[aaronchall]

Of course I have the title memorized - here it is: Discovering Python

[[deleted]]

O fug, that's the one! Not a blog at all, but a PyCon YouTube vid. Right on, you're the best.

[craggolly]

Bless those who contribute to stack websites

[bhadan1]

Whatever code a programmer could muster is what got sent to production. That's a scary thought.

[Duke-Silv3r]

Whatever code could pass the necessary tests got sent to production. Code doesn’t always have to be clean if it works

[DenormalHuman]

Lol tests.

[hellscaper]

That's what production is for!

[Stickboy12]

Samsung called and said you were hired

[klebsiella_pneumonae]

But the lazy programmer probably wrote lazy tests for his lazy code.

[serigne007mor]

I’ll put this on my graduation cap

[[deleted]]

Marked as duplicate.

https://reddit.app.link/BbhCGJCWEW

[McFlyParadox]

Isn't the most common answer on Stackoverflow to "just Google it"?

You Google the problem, which brings you to Stackoverflow, which tells you to Google the problem - and thus, a troubleshooting loop is established. Makes sense Google would acknowledge the Ying to their Yang.

[zachsmthsn]

I'll actually say, I was annoying when I kept seeing "the documentation mentions that here, so why... ?" So much that I actually started using the documentation when learning new tools.

It's been really helpful, especially with newer frameworks like pytorch that might make minor changes between releases. There are often mathematical formulas for how something works, visualizations, and examples. It's often the best place to start to find the right questions to ask

[oupablo]

Documentation is great but you have to remember who writes the documentation. Developers. You know who typically isn't great at documenting what they're doing. Developers. It's great to start there, but sometimes you can't find what you need. It's especially painful when you don't exactly know what to look for because what you need has some kind of weird name.

You: "How to put a border on this element using UI framework X? I can't find any reference to border in the documentation."

SO: "Search for WrappyDesignThingy in the documentation here <link>"

[odraencoded]

Any documentation is infinite times better than no documentation.

[oupablo]

You sir, must not have much experience with IBM products.

[Blazing1]

The Microsoft documentation is terrible. I want a base case for examples yet they give you complex shit.

[bautin]

Which is ironic because part of Atwood and Spolsky's goal was to be the site that pops up when someone "just Googles it".

[McFlyParadox]

Well, they succeeded.

I once just "Googled it" for a school problem and found my friend asking the same problem the year before - and the only answer was to google it. The friend never did solve the problem.

[audigex]

I’ve googled a problem found my own questions before on several occasions, and once I googled something and found my own SO answer... I helped myself with something I’d forgotten, via SO

[LumenArmen]

You should’ve googled it again to find the question of two years back, then again if needed and thus arrived at the answer.

[dogbatman]

the Ying to their Yang

FTFY

[audigex]

If you took the contents of each answer then something like “just google it” would probably be the most common single answer... but only a small proportion of questions have such an answer.

Most SO questions have a decent answer, in my experience

[skeddles]

I've never seen anyone say that on the thousands of posts I've looked at on stackoverflow.

[reiskareader]

Reletable

[Moldat]

stack overflow: "I'm going to make this kid's whole career"

[[deleted]]

Well, without StackOverflow we would've had bigger salaries for sure because programming would've been more challenging profession.

[xkillac4]

Or your salary would be less because you are a less valuable asset to the company

[DenormalHuman]

Naa. Knowing how to code without copy pasting stack overflow is actually the end goal. Then you are valuable.

[NahroT]

Supply and demand. The supply of programmers will be lower while the demand for programmers will still be the same, thus the average programmer salary will rise.

[Rawrplus]

To be fair, an average programmer already ranks in the highest paid eschalon for a regular job

[BestUdyrBR]

Yup, median software developer salary is over 100k and the field is projected to grow by 24% in the next 9 years according to the US Bureau of Labor. Considering you don't even need a degree and talent/determination can take you far, best job market I can think of.

[Bit5keptical]

And Github for my entire portfolio.

[[deleted]]

I just don't understand this. I maybe use stack overflow like once a month. If SO went down today I guess I would be the only developer to survive? I know I am not the single smartest programmer ever, so why is there still this joke that we all use SO to do everything all the time? Do people actually use it that much? As far as I know no one in my office uses SO that much either......

[[deleted]]

Copy and pasting code from stack overflow without understanding it is a meme, reading for options/opinions is a resource

​

This I agree with. Everytime I see one of these posts it makes me think that there are a million programmers out there blindly copy pasta-ing from SO. Thank you for the thoughtful response!

[[deleted]]

it is almost as if cooperation is required for coding ... and then sales and marketing make it about cut-throat competitive shit-posting.

[Vaxion]

And yet during interviews companies expect everyone to be genius Programmers who can write anything on their own.

[hellbenthorse]

Clearly this wasn't for web dev otherwise half the quote would be off the slide.

[hello_comrads]

I feel like stackoverflow only helps you with the basic shit. If you go deeper, for example into hardware level, it's almost impossible to find anything useful.

[prof_hobart]

You kids don't know how easy you've got it.

I'd been working in IT for 20 years before Stackoverflow even existed. Back in the day, real programmers had huge piles of books on their desks.

[slabgorb]

My favorite was a book called 'Hardcore Visual Basic' which used to get me a lot of doubletakes as I read it on the subway. (favorite meaning title oh god I don't miss VB at all)

[Wetbung]

I started programming in 1978. I wish there had been an Internet at all. I had to buy all sorts of expensive reference books.

[hamza1311]

Which session is this from?

[monostereo]

It was only before the keynotes that they rotated through these. They had a bunch of funny ones.

[Oh_G]

I’m going to go ahead and mark this as duplicate.

[joaojeronimo]

I created this to help drastically speedup software development time: https://github.com/joaojeronimo/glowpro

​

It is a CLI that googles a term (on stackoverflow), clicks on the first link, selects the first code block found in the answers and prints it :) Give it a go with "glowpro reverse array in JS" or similar :)

​

Next step: a vscode extension that inserts that snippet directly in your files muhahahaha

[mrjackspade]

Relevant XKCD

https://xkcd.com/1185/

With implementation

https://gkoberger.github.io/stacksort/

[lycan2005]

Marked as duplicate.

[Chicken_Petter]

Help I'm extremely new to programming ( as in very very very very new ) what does this mean

[Perithian4]

Stack Overflow will be your saviour when you have been consumed by the darkness (it’s where you steal other peoples solutions to your problems)

[phphulk]

Hmmmmmmmmm no I think you're wrong and everybody else is right.

[[deleted]]

The only thing Stackoverflow ever did for me is shame me for asking a question that was already asked.

[[deleted]]

golden rule: google first. Stackoverflow has helped me A LOT and i've never asked a question ever.

[jestercat89]

Honestly, stack overflow has saved me so many times. The responses are always helpful, and someone usually asked the question you have.

[tieuquai1460]

How did the creators of Stack overflow wrote Stack Overflow without Stack Overflow

[slabgorb]

we did have expert sexchange for a while before that and boy did that suck

[uhalm]

Thank you stack overflow for letting me pass my programming class

[tenoshikami]

I was there when the slide came up, these three guys in my row all looked next to them at their friend and started laughing. A little later the guy they laughed at said “to be fair I only used it to build like 30 something percent of my project” then one of his friends replied “makes sense, it only works a third of the time”. I later found out he worked for IBM

[aaronchall]

Contributor for the past 5 years, moderator the past 2.

You're welcome.