Community FAQ

(For Stack Overflow and Meta Stack Overflow)

For official guidance from Stack Exchange, visit the Help Center.

Stack Overflow is part of a wider network; for issues that apply to Stack Exchange sites in general, see the FAQ list on Meta Stack Exchange.

Meta Stack Overflow

• How does Meta Stack Overflow work?

Tagging

• When is tag creation appropriate, and how does it work?
• How can we get rid of misspelled and unused (or "zombie") tags?
• How do tag removal (burnination) requests work?

Editing

• How do I format my code blocks?
• When should I make edits to code?

Posting

• What is the proper way to approach SO as someone totally new to programming?
• Before you post your next question
• Why won't the system allow me to ask questions for several days?
• Something in my web site or project doesn't work. Can I just paste a link to it?
• Why we're not customer support for [your favorite company]
• Should I send students to Stack Overflow?
• Are htaccess questions ever on-topic at SO?

Reputation

• Why did I gain/lose reputation? Can I audit my reputation history?

Voting

• What can I do about getting a sudden flood of revenge downvotes?

Moderation

• When to flag an answer as "not an answer"?
• Is there a guide for the Triage queue?

Other

• How do I deal with non-English content?
• Choosing between Stack Overflow and Programmers Stack Exchange
• Where can I ask questions that don't fit or are off-topic for Stack Overflow?
• What do the colors on Stack Overflow mean?

Is your question not part of the FAQ?

First look at questions tagged faq-proposed to see if there is a question not in this index that might have the answer you seek. If you still can't find an answer, then see the following instructions for proposing an FAQ question.

How can a question be added to this FAQ?

• Ask only the question, stated plainly and simply, in the question body. The answer goes in an answer.

• Link back to this index by pasting this at the end of the question:

  [Return to FAQ index](/q/251225)

• Tag as faq-proposed and support. When a post seems to have hit a mature state, it will have faq added by a moderator.

• Flag for a moderator to mark community wiki. Any FAQ post not yet community wiki should be made into a community wiki.

• After the post has the faq tag added to it, add a link to it in the above table of contents.