What is the stackoverflow way of redirecting repetitive questions? I am seeing some get closed, some get voted up and down, some get linked to several places, is there a best way? Yes I have reviewed FAQ and searched some results prior to posting.

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There you go... – paddy Oct 31 '12 at 1:26
so you somehow migrated the question.... how did you do this? I must be missing something.... – user1783588 Oct 31 '12 at 1:27
Someone with appropriate privileges on SO migrated your question because it was off topic but was suitable for Meta. – paddy Oct 31 '12 at 1:30
Ah. so I have to wait for migrating privileged, so I assume in the mean time I should just flag? – user1783588 Oct 31 '12 at 1:32
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There's at least a little bit of irony in calling people "n00b" and then posting this on Stack Overflow. – NullUserException อ_อ Oct 31 '12 at 1:55
1  
Both "noob" and the over application of caps lock are widely conidered to not live up to the standard of professionalism that we try to maintain. – dmckee Oct 31 '12 at 3:08
I was referring to myself as n00b.... I thought that was very obvious but I will explicitly state this now. I am trying to improve my understanding and have learned that this is not a friendly place for questions. Now I know. – user1783588 Nov 7 '12 at 18:44

migrated from stackoverflow.com Oct 31 '12 at 1:21

2 Answers

On StackOverflow, and indeed other StackExchange sites, it is expected that a person asking a question has done sufficient research prior to asking.

The reason you see questions voted down is because they are inappropriate, off-topic, confusing, or poorly researched...

The reason you see questions voted up is because they are well-presented, well-researched, and useful.

When a question has been asked before, it is generally linked and that often results in the new question being closed or having its answers merged. The reason for this is that StackExchange is trying to create a repository of useful information that is easy to access and search, rather than just being a Q/A site for dummies.

The community contributes to this goal by taking appropriate action. There are restrictions on what users can do in this respect, based on their reputation points.

Much of this information could have been gleaned by reading the FAQ.

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yes I realize that, I still am struggling to find some questions when I search. – user1783588 Oct 31 '12 at 1:36
The art is understanding the problem you're currently facing so that the right search keywords become obvious by itself. – Chichiray Oct 31 '12 at 1:48
@user1783588 If you don't understand what you are asking and therefore cannot search effectively then by all means ask a question... But put effort into asking the question, and accept that it might be closed, merged or migrated if necessary. – paddy Oct 31 '12 at 2:17

The best way is for the new user to check if the question has been asked already. Then you don't have to ask it again, because the answer is already there.

Some questions, like this one

Could anyone explain these undefined behaviors (i = i++ + ++i , i = i++, etc...)

keep getting re-asked several times a week. Even though many of these are deleted, it already has more than 50 duplicates linked to it.

Asking it yet again, perhaps for the second time the same day, might attract some downvotes from frustrated users.

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