Top 2% here - I have used Stackoverflow this way for years. It has saved me hundreds of hours of searching over the years and still does.
One thing I'd add is I try to leave a thank you comment in addition to an upvote when I find an answer to a hard question.
Getting comments years later thanking you for a quick answer you jotted down at some point is so satisfying.
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Ironically, leaving a "thank you" will typically get deletions/nags from the self-appointed comment police.
As much as I like (and heavily use) SO, it has a real problem with making people feel like shit when asking, answering and commenting.
There are people who are exemplary in their politeness and helpfulness like the top-contributor, John Skeet. There are also quite "mean" people like Hans Passant (also super-high score). I wish more people would use the really fantastic users like Skeet as an example of how to behave.
"Game-ification" strategies in social networks like SO tends to attract uncharitable, persnickety rule-zealots and this seems to have been re-enforced over the years.
Honestly, I am in the camp in favor of deleting "thank you" comments. I view the whole platform as a fantastic way to curate high-quality content for the whole web community. I don't come to Stack Overflow to socialize or make friends, I come because I'm trying to get my widget to work and I just want to find the solution to my problem.
While expressing thanks is definitely an admirable human quality and should be lauded, it frankly does not provide value to the other people viewing the page. Part of the problem, I think, is because "comments" on Stack Overflow have a different meaning and context than 99% of the web. They don't exist for some sort of "social" experience, but as a means of coordinating improvement to the content.
Maybe SO could do better to communicate that difference. Educating new users is one of the biggest challenges in the face of the eternal September that SO receives.
Regardless of their intended purpose according to the SO FAQ, the comments in Stackoverflow are often the most interesting part of a question or answer. They do more than coordinate improvement to the attached question/answer. The comments often provide valuable context, point to other resources, and can offer some opinion.
I agree that a comment consisting of nothing more than "thank you" isn't particularly helpful, but a "thank you" + some twist or application tip is interesting and valuable. Sadly, some SO-cops just see the words "thank you", ignore the rest of comment and then immediately recite the rules and/or delete the comment.
As for SO communicating the difference, I think they already do. Their problem is that people like me _deliberately_ ignore "the rules" and post whatever we think is appropriate-- the mods just can't keep up.
> some SO-cops just see the words "thank you", ignore the rest of comment and then immediately recite the rules and/or delete the comment
If that happens, then the mod is out of line. But what can SO do to prevent that behaviour? If you have ideas I'm sure the community on Meta would be more than happy to entertain suggestions, that's how the platform evolves and grows.
The "comment police" bit is an interesting observation - much of the really petty hostility seems to come from mid-tier power users instead of mods and high-level contributors. I think the article here undervalues how unpleasant it is for a new programmer to get even a single response of "Seriously? Marking for deletion."
Those comments might get removed later, but saying "trolls are everywhere" is too pat when the people abusing new users are very visibly established, popular members of the community. Getting attacked by a random throwaway account is a very different feeling than getting attacked by someone up near the top of the totem pole.
SO mod on comments:
"You should expect comments to get deleted.
If they are oh-so-important, they should get rolled into the post they are commenting on. At which point they are obsolete."
http://meta.stackoverflow.com/a/255140/592746
So, your problem, clearly, is that you think your "thank you" is "oh so important." If your ego wasn't so big, you'd get that.
Just pointing out that one of the things the parent says gives him joy on stack-overflow is actually "not allowed".
I don't have "a problem".
I use stackoverflow quite productively, appreciate its utility, and help folks out with answers when I can. I've gotten acclimated to the rudeness but I wish it were a nicer place.... more skeet less passant.
I was sarcastically criticizing the SO mod's comment, not actually claiming you have a problem.
[Edited for snarkiness.]
oops, sorry!
I have a question about nodejs from 2011 that still gets comments and upvotes regularly.
One of my favorite parts I think is the fact that the correct answer changed over time, so I continued to update the question.
At first the answer to "how to read a file one line at a time" was to use a module, later, a better module came along, eventually nodejs finally added native support for file reading.
I had an "annual update" going for a while since the correct answer changed to often.
Eventually someone came along and completely rewrote my question. Wiped all the history, evolution, etc... And boiled it down to "use native"
I was saddened a little, but understood.
I find a number of stack overflow rules/guidelines to be odd. For example: 'do not say "thanks" or "hello" people reading your question do not have time for that's [sic]
It's definitely a community which has been usurped by the aspie side of programming
That said, I still get thanks on it and it makes me smile when I do