Question put long or short preferred?

Question

Would people rather read a question put in the simplest terms and ask for any more essential information in the comments, or am I more likely to get an answer if I add as many relevant details as possible? Thanks.

Answer 1

Even the most mundane detail or seemingly non-related action can help you get a concrete reply (installed program X yesterday etc) as opposed to commented suggestions and followup questions so I'd recommend to provide as much detail as possible when asking. Not saying you should always try to avoid the latter but being preemptive can save everyone time.

Some people can be put off by a wall of text so why not both? Ask a quick summation up front or after (a slight expansion on the title) while still going into detail in the body of your question. See my post here for some tips, How do I ask a question that is hard to describe?. If in doubt, go the detail route.

From my personal experience over the years on StackExchange, I find that writing a "well worded" question from what I suggested above can in some instances give you the answer^* before even submitting it because it makes you think about your issue in full, a type of Rubber duck debugging if you may. Not always applicable to 3d and Blender especially if new but you get the point I hope.

^{*One of the reasons I have no questions on my profile ;)}

Answer 2

Short is good.

But clear is better.

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Really long answer:

It is not the length of the text, but clarity what matters.

A few potinters:

• Think hard of a clear title.

  Vague titles help no one. Avoid "how do I fix this?", "Issue with textures", "Problem with render please help!"

  A clearly stated question is the first and most important step to reach someone that knows the answer.

• Strip the question from anecdotal and subjective information

  " I'm so frustrated" , "I followed all of the tutorials online to no avail", "I clicked on some stuff and now it doesn't work as expected" and such phrases say nothing about the issue you are having and might confuse or put readers off.

  Instead, write something like: I'm trying to do (...explain clearly), I did X, and got Y, I tried to fix it by doing Z and I got this result: (image or a concise description), but I was expecting this: (image or description).

• Use clear language and proper punctuation.

  "OMG I hit the thingy yo that like makes some vertices smashed and now it all weird LOL can u hlp plz?", will only leave some reader perplexed. Specially those that do not live in english speaking countries.

  While this site is not about correct grammar and syntax of the english language, a clearly written sentence does wonders in terms of conveying ideas. Avoid confusing and terms or idioms.

• Don't rely on external links and try to make the answer self contained.

  Make it easier for others to help you, don't expect them to watch 50 minutes of a video just to figure out what step you missed.

Having a clear and concise question will yield better answers.

But don't hold out on details and illustrations.

• Do not presume that others will immediately understand what you are doing.

  Ask your self the following: will someone that knows absolutely nothing about my project understand what I'm describing?

Oftentimes by trying to verbalize the issue you will find the solution yourself.

• Don't wait for others to ask you for more information, be forthcoming and volunteer as much information as you see fit.

  If people have to ask you a lot of questions on the comments, your chances of getting a proper answer go down. You might get a comment asking you a question when you are away from your computer, and maybe the person that asked you will not log in until next week (or ever again) to read the response to a comment, or it might happen that the person has lost interest in helping you...

  If your question gets pushed down and disappears from the first page of the site your chances of getting an answers go down as well.

A lot of the questions that remain unanswered in this site do not contain enough information for anyone to find a proper answer.