Before posting
Follow our guidelines. If you are new to Hibernate, read the
documentation first (and available tutorials/quickstart guide and samples). It is not a good idea to ignore this - data persistence is a complex topic and you will get lost quickly if you try to explore it on your own.
Consult the documentation. An amazing amount of questions on the NHibernate forum can be answered with a simple look in the
reference documentation, the available demo applications, or one of the dozens of articles and tutorials. Don't be surprised if you get a simple link or a grumpy response if you haven't read anything.
Search! Don't think that posting is faster than searching for the information yourself. Not many people will share your view. An amazing number of posters haven't searched the forum, the website, or even the reference documentation. Nothing degrades the forum signal/noise ratio more than seeing the same questions over and over.
:arrow: As NHibernate is a port of
Hibernate, you can find a huge amount of informations in its
documentation and
forum (don't be afraid by Java)
:arrow: NHibernate bugs/issues can be found in
NHibernate Jira (it is an
issue tracking system). Your problem can be a know issue, and in this case you can provide help/suggestions to fix it.
Read the FAQ. This is a no-brainer. Most forum questions are already answered in the FAQs.
Use the NHibernate log. There is an enormous amount of information to be gleaned from the NHibernate log and you will learn a lot about how NHibernate works if you get familiar with it. Learning about the log messages will help you resolve future problems more quickly.
Try to resolve the problem yourself. It is much quicker for you to find out as much about your problem than to wait while someone on the other side of the world responds to your questions with more questions. Please also consult the Hibernate source, especially demos and unit tests. We use them to test Hibernates behavior, and so can you.
Use your debugger. An amazingly huge number of problems can be solved incredibly quickly by just putting a break point in the right place. NHibernate is open source, so you can can put the NHibernate source in your IDE sourcepath and step into NHibernate code if necessary.
Isolate your problem. Always recreate the problem in a stripped down test case with just two or three classes with one or two properties before posting. First, it is very hard to take the time to read a long post. If you isolate the problem, you will probably find the cause. If you can not, at least we will have a much better chance. And if you need to modify the NHibernate source code, don't forget to post the patch and test cases you wrote.
When posting
Give a good title. Don't use titles like "Help me!" or "bug in NHibernate" or "I think ...". You should provide the technologie/feature that bothers you with some other relevant information.
Give as much (relevant) information as possible. Don't ignore the bullet points in the text field, fill out the required information. Yes, everything is needed in almost all cases.
Avoid comparaison with others Object Relationnal Mapping softwares; most of the time, it leads to unproductive debates.
Format your post and write well. Reading an unformatted post is a pain. Especially use 'quote' and 'code' formatters.
Write in standard english and avoid abbreviations. It is very painful to read bad english, so don't be suprised if you receive no answer.
Don't send private messages (or e-mail) to ask for help. Always use the forum when you have anything to say. Private messages are here for private matters.
Don't blame NHibernate. 99% of posts titled "bug in NHibernate" are simple user error. This is very annoying for all of us.
Don't insult NHibernate or the people who worked hard to develop it. You want an answer to your problem, right? Insulting people is a really bad way to get it. If you are frustrated and spent a lot of time on your problem, take a deep breath and have a break before you post. With load of people on the forum, NHibernate developers are insulted quite often, but we certainly don't enjoy the experience and we are not your punching bag.
After posting
Keep trying to solve your problem. Even after posting, you still have responsibility for your problem, because you are the one being paid/committed to solve it. And if you solve it, you can thank the people who helped you or share the solution (if you solve it yourself).
RTFM is a completely valid response to your question. If you are told to read the documentation, do it! Nobody will quote and copy/paste the documentation.
If no-one answered your question, it was probably your fault. Give more (relevant) information. Try to explain yourself better. Perhaps nobody knows the answer. And don't forget to isolate the problem.
Don't "bump up" your posting. Don't ask why nobody answers you every other hour, simply follow the steps outlined here. Moderators will very likely delete your "bump" right away.
NHibernate is an Open Source project. It means that nobody is paid (or have the obligation) to work on it or to answer your questions, so please, be gentle. :wink:
And as an Open Source project, any contribution if really appreciated; read:
NHibernate Needs You!
How to contribute to NHibernateContrib
Regards,
The NHibernate Team.
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