Titles that describe the question, not the situation posts 61–90
This is a continuation of a long topic, addressed by post number rather than by page. Start at post 1.
Collapsed as off-topic by two members at trust level 3 or above
Taking post #59 at face value and following it one step further.
Avoid "any advice?" at the end. It is so generic that people do not know which part of the post it refers to. Pick the specific part and ask that specific question instead.
Reporting the observation and leaving the explanation open deliberately.
Questions you cannot explain: "I cannot say why I am asking this, but is this compound stable at room temperature?" is more productive than no question at all. People here know that some questions cannot be asked in public and they will work with that constraint.
This is the version I would want a new member to read first.
Building on post #63 rather than restating it.
Since titles keeps coming up, it should probably be a maintained page rather than a recurring thread. I am happy to draft it if someone with more direct experience will review it.
Context that matters: compound, how long in, current dose, relevant history. Context that does not matter: how you feel, your hopes for the outcome, your medical history beyond what affects this specific question. The first set gets you answered. The second set makes the reply longer without making it better.
A qualification I should have led with rather than closed on.
If your question has a deadline — a parcel in transit, a delivery you have to accept or refuse — say so. People answer differently when there is a clock on it.
The rule of thumb is fine; the edge cases are where it earns its keep.
Where I part company with post #67, and it is a narrow parting.
Quantities without units are the single commonest reason a question sits unanswered. "Two and a half" is not a dose, a volume or a concentration until you say which.
Do not apologise in the first line. It costs you the space where the question should be, and nobody here thinks a question is an imposition.
Correct me on the arithmetic if it is wrong; I would rather know.
An observation about titles that I cannot explain and am posting anyway, on the principle that unexplained observations are more useful public than private.
Collapsed as off-topic by two members at trust level 3 or above
"Has anyone had this happen" gets you anecdotes. "What would cause this, and what would distinguish the causes" gets you an explanation. The second question is almost always the one you wanted.
I would call that likely rather than established.
Two sentences on titles and then I will stop, because the rest is speculation and the thread is better without mine.
What is documented is narrow. What is inferred from it is broad. The gap between them is where every argument here lives.
Staff note on titles, since it comes up. We retitle topics fairly often, always leaving the original in the first post and always logging it. It is not a criticism of the wording — it is that a title is how somebody finds this in eighteen months.
The claim is narrower than it sounds, and deliberately so.
I read post #76 twice before replying, because I had assumed the opposite.
Chromatogram questions: describe the method first. Column type, gradient, wavelength, detection method. Everything else follows from method. A chromatogram without method is a number without context.
Trying to state the titles position in a way that someone who disagrees would recognise as fair, because I do not think the version in this thread passes that test.
Titles is worth one more sentence than it usually gets, and the sentence is the one about how the number was arrived at.
I read post #81 twice before replying, because I had assumed the opposite.
Nobody minds being asked to explain a term. The people who use them most are the quickest to define them, and a question that stops to ask is usually a question that gets a better answer.
It is the sort of thing that seems obvious in retrospect and was not at the time.
Coming back to post #85, because the follow-up matters more than the original answer.
A question about somebody else's post should be a reply to that post, not a new topic. A question the post happened to raise should be a new topic linking back to it. The difference is whether the answer is useful without the original.
On post #85 — agreed on the reasoning, with one qualification.
Speaking as somebody who asked badly last month and got a polite request for four missing details: writing the question properly the first time takes ten minutes and saves two days. Learn from me.
That has held every time I have looked, which is not the same as always.