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Should I not answer my own questions?

If I solve a tricky problem, should I ask a question about it on Stack Overflow and answer it myself?

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marked as duplicate by ChrisF, Jeff Atwood Mar 9 '11 at 15:21

This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question.

2  
I have mixed feelings about that. It's encouraged (officially), but the few times I've seen it done, it was something trivial/obvious. Perhaps it seemed tricky to the person doing it, but it sure wasn't to very many people reading it. Can clutter up the site if abused like that. –  Brian Knoblauch Jan 20 '10 at 14:00

6 Answers 6

As I mentioned in my answer the best approach is to post your question, wait a day or so and then post your answer.

You might get a better answer than you already have and also it's not that obvious that you already knew the answer ;)

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Yes, it's even encouraged.

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2  
It is encouraged but at the same time if it seems like a blatantly rep gaining ploy, a lot of people will view it negatively and you may not get the results you intended. –  TheTXI Jul 6 '09 at 15:23
    
Most of the ones I've seen post within minutes of the question - pretty blatant. –  OMG Ponies Jan 19 '10 at 19:04

As noted, it's covered by the FAQ. The only thing that I would add is that the answer ought to be self-contained or, at a minimum if it links somewhere else, it should contain enough material to be useful on its own. If it looks like you are just trying to hype your blog, I think you will be rightly downvoted and/or closed as SPAM.

Also, I think it's a good idea to mention that you will be posting your own solution as one alternative in your question. Giving people a heads up may avoid some unthinking downvotes. A subtle reference to the relevant FAQ is may help, too.

Ex:

In keeping with the FAQ [link], I'll be providing my solution as an answer.
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If you do this, be very, very sure that your answer is technically correct. As others have suggested, a good way to do this is to wait 24 hours between posting the question and posting the answer, so you can compare your answer to those provided by other users.

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I think this is covered by one of the site FAQs, but...

Absolutely! You'll get the added benefit of having the community review your answer and offer suggestions for improvement. If nothing else, you'll have added another useful bit of information to the site.

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