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Now take another look at the body, particularly at the first 200 characters. This can be a third preview of your question beyond the title and tags, depending on the particular “view” a person takes while browsing the site. Rewrite the introduction to put as much of a “hook” as you can into the first 200 characters. This should describe the problem and the surprising result you got instead of the expected result. Think of a person who’s knowledgeable in this area; how would get them engaged with your problem in one or two sentences?

But you’re not done! Stay tuned to the site after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question – assuming you registered your account – DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options, may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.

Now take another look at the body, particularly at the first 200 characters. This can be a third preview of your question beyond the title and tags, depending on the particular “view” a person takes while browsing the site. Rewrite the introduction to put as much of a “hook” as you can into the first 200 characters. This should describe the problem and the surprising result you got instead of the expected result. Think of a person who’s knowledgeable in this area; how would you get them engaged with your problem in one or two sentences?

But you’re not done! Stay tuned to the site after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question – assuming you registered your account – DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options and may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.

1. Write down the main verbs and nouns from your problem in the Ask a Question title box. You have no intention of submitting this as your question, yet. Let the search engine automatically show you questions that it thinks are similar. Open any of them separately to see if they pertain to your situation. Take note of any questions that look as if they would solve your problem, but do not, for one reason or another; you might refer back to them in your question and explain why they do not solve your problem. This will prevent well-meaning reviewers from finding them and proposing your question as a duplicate of those.

2. If very few search results came back, look back at the on-topic page to confirm that your problem fits the on-topic list. If your question is not on-topic for the site, it may be closed for being “off-topic”. On the other hand, you may have a unique situation or combination of technology that hasn’t been asked about yet.

• The title: create a sentence from your nouns & verbs that indicate the pertinent software, operating environment, goal, and any errors. You have a limit of 150 characters; this translates to approximately 20-25 average English words.

• The body: start with an outline of: a re-worded summary of your goal and operating environment; representative (sample) input and output; any commands that you tried in pursuit of your goal and their output/results.

• The tags: from the previous step

Take one more look at your question’s title and body. Have you presented the question as well as you can? Before posting the Question, particularly if English is not your strong suit, run a spell checker on the title and body. Many browsers will underline words that they think are misspelled. Capitalize proper nouns such as “I” and “Linux”. Feel free to ask for help in the Unix & Linux chat room or even with a post on English Language Learners. Make sure you have an actual question in your Question! It would end with a question mark and should act as the entry point for any answers.

Now -- finally -- post your question!

But you’re not done! Stay tuned to the site after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question -- assuming you registered your account -- DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options, may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.

Finally, while you’re waiting, it’d be a good time to read What should I do when someone answers my question?. The main point is to up-vote (if you’ve earned that privilege, at 15 reputation points) and/or accept Answers that solve your problem. Do not feel any pressure to accept an answer immediately; it’s fine to do so, but it’s also OK to leave a question out there for a couple days to see if anyone else has other ideas or approaches to your problem.

1. Write down the main verbs and nouns from your problem in the Ask a Question title box. You have no intention of submitting this as your question, yet. As you start typing, a list of Questions that may already have your answer will appear directly below the title field. Let the search engine automatically show you questions that it thinks are similar. Open any of them separately to see if they pertain to your situation. Take note of any questions that look as if they would solve your problem, but do not, for one reason or another; you might refer back to them in your question and explain why they do not solve your problem. This will prevent well-meaning reviewers from finding them and proposing your question as a duplicate of those.

2. If very few search results came back, look back at the on-topic page to confirm that your problem fits the on-topic list. If your question is not on-topic for the site, it may be closed for being “off-topic”. On the other hand, you may have a unique situation or combination of technology that hasn’t been asked about yet.

• The title: create a sentence from your nouns & verbs that indicate the pertinent software, operating environment, goal, and any errors. You have a limit of 150 characters; this translates to approximately 20-25 average English words.

• The body: start with an outline of: a re-worded summary of your goal and operating environment; representative (sample) input and output; any commands that you tried in pursuit of your goal and their output/results.

• The tags: from the previous step

Take one more look at your question’s title and body. Have you presented the question as well as you can? Before posting the Question, particularly if English is not your strong suit, run a spell checker on the title and body. Many browsers will underline words that they think are misspelled. Capitalize proper nouns such as “I” and “Linux”. Feel free to ask for help in the Unix & Linux chat room or even with a post on English Language Learners. Make sure you have an actual question in your Question! It would end with a question mark and should act as the entry point for any answers.

Now – finally – post your question!

But you’re not done! Stay tuned to the site after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question – assuming you registered your account – DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options, may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.

Finally, while you’re waiting, it’d be a good time to read What should I do when someone answers my question?. The main point is to up-vote (if you’ve earned that privilege, at 15 reputation points) and/or accept Answers that solve your problem. Do not feel any pressure to accept an answer immediately; it’s fine to do so, but it’s also OK to leave a question out there for a couple days to see if anyone else has other ideas or approaches to your problem.

1. New users sometimes skip past the sign-up page and post as a guest. If you register your account, you’ll have an easier time editing your own post with updates and clarifications, commenting on your question, and commenting on Answers to your question.
2. Take a minute and read through our tour page. It’s a quick introduction to the site (and to Stack Exchange) and it earns you a badge! If you’ve been to other Stack Exchange sites already, it will look familiar. Pay particular attention to the section that’s unique to UNIX & Linux, the "Ask about…" and "Don’t ask about" section.
3. Right at the end of the tour, there’s a link to our Help Center; there’s a lot to read there, so poke around the links that you find interesting. Since you’re interested in asking a good question, pay particular attention to these:

1. Write down the main verbs and nouns from your problem in the Ask a Question title box. You have no intention of submitting this as your question, yet. Let the search engine automatically show you questions that it thinks are similar. Open any of them separately to see if they pertain to your situation. Take note of any questions that look as if they would solve your problem, but do not, for one reason or another; you might refer back to them in your question and explain why they do not solve your problem. This will prevent well-meaning reviewers from finding them and proposing your question as a duplicate of those.

2. If very few search results came back, look back at the on-topic page to confirm that your problem fits the on-topic list. If your question is not on-topic for the site, it may be closed for being “off-topic”. On the other hand, you may have a very unique situation or combination of technology that hasn’t been asked about yet.

Are you asking for an architectural-level solution? Something a consultant might be paid to spend several weeks on? You should have a “toe hold” on your problem and have tried several things, and have specific error messages or confusion in hand before asking a question; otherwise, your question risks being closed as “too broad”.

If you’re not sure what an objective, specific, and clear question might look like, you could do worse than to browse the top-voted questions or top-viewed questions. Many of those “top” questions rose there because of their canonical nature, and so generated many views and votes; they may very well be broader in scope than your question. To get a more targeted list of questions, head over to the tags page and enter some of the key words from your question, one at a time. When you find a matching tag, click on it to get a list of questions with that tag, then sort the questions by “Frequent” or by “Votes” to see what well-received questions in that tag look like.

With the list of tags in hand, write a first draft of your question, either directly in the Ask a Question form or in your favorite editor. Set up each of three sections:

Take one more look at your question’s title and body. Is your best foot forward? Before posting the Question, particularly if English is not your strong suit, run a spell checker on the title and body. Many browsers will underline words that they think are misspelled. Capitalize proper nouns such as “I” and “Linux”. Feel free to ask for help in the Unix & Linux chat room or even with a post on English Language Learners. Make sure you have an actual question in your Question! It would end with a question mark and should act as the entry point for any answers.

Post your question!

You’re not done! “Babysit” the Question immediately after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question -- assuming you registered your account -- DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options, may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.

1. Register an account - New users sometimes skip past the sign-up page and post as a guest. If you register your account, you’ll have an easier time editing your own post with updates and clarifications, commenting on your question, and commenting on Answers to your question.
2. Take our tour - Take a minute and read through our tour page. It’s a quick introduction to the site (and to Stack Exchange) and it earns you a badge! If you’ve been to other Stack Exchange sites already, it will look familiar. Pay particular attention to the section that’s unique to UNIX & Linux, the "Ask about…" and "Don’t ask about" section.
3. Browse the help pages - Right at the end of the tour, there’s a link to our Help Center; there’s a lot to read there, so poke around the links that you find interesting. Since you’re interested in asking a good question, pay particular attention to these:

1. Write down the main verbs and nouns from your problem in the Ask a Question title box. You have no intention of submitting this as your question, yet. Let the search engine automatically show you questions that it thinks are similar. Open any of them separately to see if they pertain to your situation. Take note of any questions that look as if they would solve your problem, but do not, for one reason or another; you might refer back to them in your question and explain why they do not solve your problem. This will prevent well-meaning reviewers from finding them and proposing your question as a duplicate of those.

2. If very few search results came back, look back at the on-topic page to confirm that your problem fits the on-topic list. If your question is not on-topic for the site, it may be closed for being “off-topic”. On the other hand, you may have a unique situation or combination of technology that hasn’t been asked about yet.

Are you asking for an architectural-level solution? Something a consultant might be paid to spend several weeks on? You should have made some attempt at solving your problem; share those commands and any specific error messages or confusion before asking a question; otherwise, your question risks being closed as “too broad”.

If you’re not sure what an objective, specific, and clear question might look like, you could do worse than to browse the top-voted questions or top-viewed questions. Many of those “top” questions rose there because of their canonical nature, and so generated many views and votes; they may very well be broader in scope than your question. To get a more targeted list of questions, head over to the tags page and enter some key words from your question, one at a time. When you find a matching tag, click on it to get a list of questions with that tag, then sort the questions by “Frequent” or by “Votes” to see what well-received questions in that tag look like.

Now write a first draft of your question, either directly in the Ask a Question form or in your favorite editor. Set up each of three sections:

Take one more look at your question’s title and body. Have you presented the question as well as you can? Before posting the Question, particularly if English is not your strong suit, run a spell checker on the title and body. Many browsers will underline words that they think are misspelled. Capitalize proper nouns such as “I” and “Linux”. Feel free to ask for help in the Unix & Linux chat room or even with a post on English Language Learners. Make sure you have an actual question in your Question! It would end with a question mark and should act as the entry point for any answers.

Now -- finally -- post your question!

But you’re not done! Stay tuned to the site after posting for as long as you can, in case there are immediate requests for clarification. The active users of the site may read your question and enter comments requesting clarification. If they do ask for clarification, respond by editing your question using the “edit” link towards the bottom of your question -- assuming you registered your account -- DO NOT clarify your question in the comments! Comments do not support all the formatting options, may be deleted or collapsed together, all of which make it harder than it needs to be to piece together the correct question.