I think it's great that you're working on this. Like tye said, brevity is crucial. Simple, direct language with examples will also go a long way. Many monks and visitors have English as a second (or third... or fourth, you show-offs!) language. Below is a stab at the way I'd approach it. It's a first draft so feel free to munge or poach if you like it.

How to ask a question on Perl Monks

First time? Ask your question here: Seekers of Perl Wisdom (SOPW). Scroll to the bottom and enter it under Add your question. There are other sections of the site but SOPW is most likely what you want.

How to help the monks help you

Title your question well. The title should contain the gist or subject of your question or problem.

Examples of good titles–

Titles that are not helpful–

Your question is being read by others who cannot see your screen, your code, or what you are trying to do. If you want a good answer, you need to give all the information someone else would need to understand the problem.

Example of a good question–

Why do selects fail sometimes with DBI

…I can’t figure out why my selects fail sometimes but work other times. This is my code:

my $dbh = DBI->connect($data_source, $username, $auth, \%attr);
my $sth = $dbh->prepare("SELECT foo FROM bar WHERE baz = '$qux'");
$sth->execute();

[download]

Example of a poor question–

I'M ON A DEADLINE! PLEEZE HELP!

Why doesn't my CGI work?

There is no way to answer that question. 1,000 things could be wrong with a script and "work" is not even meaningful without first knowing what it's supposed to do.

Use PerlMonks formatting + simple HTML. Put <code>code inside code tags</code>. They are treated specially here. Please do not use <pre>pre tags</pre>!

(et cetera?)

In reply to Alternative "how to ask" stub by Your Mother
in thread RFC - How to ask... by ww

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


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