
No Hello (2013) - etxm
https://www.nohello.com/
======
wdutch
I used to work in a big company where people would often drop a "hello" and
then wait for a response before saying why they were messaging. It was mildly
infuriating because I would check the internal chat about once an hour in
order to remain productive. So the first time I check I see the hello, then
next time I check I see what they actually wanted to say doubling the amount
of time until they got a response compared to asking in one go. It doesn't
need to be a single IM message but it should be sent pretty swiftly after.

I always wondered if people wanted to wait until the messagee was sat on the
other end of the keyboard giving their full attention. If this is the case a
phonecall would be more appropriate imo.

~~~
cogman10
It's such a weird thing. Most of my coworkers don't do this, but a few will do
a "Hi" type message.

It wastes so much time for everyone involved.

I sometimes wonder if these same people think I'm being rude when I write a
message like "Hey, xyz, I was wondering if you knew PDQ about ABC?"

Like, are they expecting the convo to go like

    
    
        me: "Hi"
        them: "Hello"
        me: "How's your day been?"
        them: "fine"
        me: "Crazy weather"
        them: "yeah"
        me: "Do you have a second to chat about ABC"?
        them: "Just a sec"
        me: "Ok"
        them: "Ok, shoot"
        me: "Do you if PDQ about ABC?"
        them: "Oh yeah, it's 123"
    

Because I've absolutely had chat conversations like that. It drives me nuts
because it's stuff that can be solved in 10 seconds but ends up taking 30
minutes worth of disruptions.

~~~
_rs
A Hello wastes my time, but sometimes I go along with it to see if that's what
they really wanted - maybe they didn't have a question after all, and when I
have time I'm happy to have a friendly chat:

    
    
        them: Hello
        *hour or two passes*
        me: Hey how are you?
    

But so far every time they say Good and then ask their question :(. A
surprising amount of the time when I wait an hour to respond to a Hello
they'll tell me they already figured out the answer to their question too (I
would never wait that long to respond to actual questions though).

~~~
ivan_ah
> when I wait an hour to respond to a Hello they'll tell me they already
> figured out the answer to their question

I used to be part-time sysadmin back in the day, and I fondly remember the
benefits of not answering quickly.

Morning: "Hey how do I configure XYC in ABC?"

Afternoon: "I figured it out, it's in .abcconfig"

This was very counter-intuitive for me since I wanted to do a good job and
answer quickly, but later I realized it's better for everyone to follow an
informal (but well-defined) SLA.

------
canada_dry
A related peeve...

Using chat for support. The first thing it asks is "Please explain why you
need assistance"...

I fill it in with _all the pertinent details_...

Then, when the support person finally comes online their first or second
message is: _...and how may I help you today?_

~~~
syshum
Or the chat AND phone systems that have you fill out all the info about your
account, then they ask "what is your account number"

Why the hell did I just spend the time to type that in to my phone if I know
have to type it again for you.....

~~~
dredmorbius
Often used to confirm information accuracy, no mis-entered information, or
unauthorised access attempt.

~~~
greenyoda
How does having to enter the same account information twice in the same
session prevent unauthorized access? If an unauthorized person knows my
account number, they can easily enter it twice.

And if the account number doesn't exist or doesn't match the name, they know
immediately that one or the other was mis-entered.

~~~
dredmorbius
Automated dial/entry, handoff to an operator, especially in high-volume
attacks. Verbal repetition requires greater process coordination by the
attacker.

Cues such as hesitation, discomfort, etc., may also be present.

The far more prevalent case is likely simply to guard against mis-keyed
digits.

Similarly in heathcare, virtually every caregiver handoff involves asking for
name and DoB. For the caregiver this helps confirm they are (literally) on the
right page (patient record). Patients may see this as tedious.

~~~
syshum
>>Verbal repetition requires greater process coordination by the attacker.
Cues such as hesitation, discomfort, etc., may also be present.

Actually no... The most effective Social Engineering attacks are ones with
simulated chaos going on in the call, and simulated high emotions by the
caller..

There is no evidence or actual theory making a person repeat the same number
over and over again does anything about annoy legit callers

This sounds very much like security policy created in the same manner of
"everyone must change their passwords every 30 days" which we know now makes
things LESS secure not more.

>>The far more prevalent case is likely simply to guard against mis-keyed
digits.

Again your data input validation should be taking care of that before you ever
reach the agent in the first place

~~~
dredmorbius
Most successful, perhaps. Most common, though?

Other points taken.

------
mmaunder
Chill out people. Get a little more patient and a little less nitpicky about
protocol. You’re not that busy or important. None of us are.

This culture of nitpicking text communication styles has been with us for
decades and isn’t going away soon. Same on IRC and Prestel before that. And it
has always been about providing the enforcers with a sense of power and
reinforcing tribalism around those who know the rules and those who need to be
forcibly educated.

If it’s good enough for Lionel Richie, it’s good enough for you.

~~~
abeppu
I do think the context where these communication issues are the most painful
are when there are already other serious problems. But if you have a whole org
where a decent fraction of people engage in these patterns, it can turn your
day into one substantially driven by pointless interrupts.

Broken habits in an org that can exacerbate this:

\- People don't feel safe saying stuff in a group context so there's a large
number of DM conversations at any one time.

\- The chat app is actually used for time-critical issues and sometimes an
immediate response is strongly expected. People feel obligated to rely on
notifications.

\- There's in general a poor commitment to supporting a "low-interrupt" mode
of work for some roles.

~~~
mmaunder
Rules like the above are what causes a chilling effect on public comms and a
rise in DMs. So chill out and create a relaxed space for your colleagues. If
you need a low interrupt mode, get off Slack. If you’re in a job where you
can’t, that’s a separate issue. If you have a time critical comms channel
that’s being used for random chatter, it’s not a time critical channel.

------
thom
The most stressful version of this for me is when someone sidles up to you on
chat and asks "is X working?" or "is Y supposed to do Z?"

Like, if you're saying it's not working: say that. If you're saying it's not
doing what you expect: say that. It's the QA version of "we have to talk" and
I'm instantly anxious until you clarify.

~~~
giancarlostoro
We work in an open space and people usually ask to make sure they arent the
crazy one. It can go either direction: we had to do that cause x, or yeah
thats not how its supposed to work... Followed by... Well its how it works for
now cause of this and this... Along with everyone agreeing its wrong. They
arent trying to mess with you just confirm intended behavior.

~~~
Groxx
In-person I almost universally heard stuff like "is anyone else having
problems with X? the site won't load for me" and that second part _is
crucial_.

In chat, something like 1/4-1/2 are "is X working?" followed by total silence.
Sometimes they _really are_ just asking if it's running, i.e. does X still
exist. Sometimes they're having a failed build on a different system because
their dependency manager cache is broken and it's blaming random libraries.
Sometimes the frontend is busted.

What they're doing _in practice_ is asking for 1:1 dedicated help on
_literally anything_ , so the only reasonable choice for a responder is those
unicorn devs who know everything somehow. They almost never exist, so those
"questions" go unanswered for a long time.

~~~
giancarlostoro
Thats usually who I try to be but I have been burned by it cause I didnt
mention why I was falling behind at two former jobs. It did cost me a job
cause of that plus the fact they were over engineering what would of been a
few months into a few years effort just to be bleeding edge.

It sucks how some environments are worse than others. I think the biggest
quality for software developers is humility. Without humility you could end up
with some nasty devs. I have worked with people who get personallu attached to
their code being quality but they dont follow project protocol or write hacky
code.

------
MivLives
Three other things:

\- Use spacing to make your message easy to parse.

\- Have clear questions that are easy to jump back and respond to. Have them
separated out by spacing, and preferably numbered.

\- If there's something I need to copy paste, an email address, a specific id,
a phone number, then put it on it's own line. Then I can double click and get
the whole thing rather then dragging the cursor to do it.

~~~
Smilliam
To expand on your second point:

The very first thing you should type after your initial greeting should be
your question(s). Don't bury the lede.

You can provide all the additional explanation (i.e. what you were doing when
it broke, where you've looked, what you've tried, etc) _after_ you ask your
questions. By asking up front, you frame the conversation so that the person
you are communicating with can read your supporting information with the
correct context.

~~~
MivLives
I tend to do the reverse, with questions as the very last thing. Sorta
introduce what I'm about to be asking about.

------
dvtrn
Related thought,

But how do we feel about people breaking their thoughts up?

Into individually

sent

Messages?

Like this?

One

Right after

The other.

Anyone else find the constant badgering of dings and vibrations when
colleagues communicate like this to be a real teeth grinder when you’re zeroed
in on work (or trying to take a short pomodoro / coffee break and space out
for a bit between tasks)?

~~~
kfrzcode
Nope. Not my duty to modulate my communication to YOUR notification
preferences.

I say this as someone who has been working remote with various teams for
nearly seven years.

Crucial to the success of any remote team is feeling comfortable sharing and
communicating via async and text based means.

You can always just turn $SLACKISH off and actually focus. If you're on call
or in a situation wherein you need to watch messages and respond immediately -
you're not going to reach flow state anyways.

Do not disturb and other notification settings exist so you can decide when
you get dings.

I'll leave my bite sized messages for detailed threading, thanks!

~~~
dvtrn
I’m not asking you or anyone to moderate or change anything about how you
communicate, friend (entirely because I know how futile it is). Just idly
pondering if others have similar reactions to it.

~~~
kfrzcode
Fair play! I have a tendency to take a hard-line on this relatively minor
issue.

~~~
dvtrn
Why is that, you think?

~~~
kfrzcode
Deep seated psychological issues with control.

------
bo1024
This raised the question of - why not use email instead, then?

Then answer I came up with is that the asker wants an immediate-ish response.

But in this case, the "hello" makes sense not as a pleasantry, but as a way of
finding out, "if I ask you a question right now, will I be able to get an
immediate-ish response?"

It doesn't sound like this problem can be easily solved with "nohello", it
sounds like a more involved solution might be needed.

~~~
scarface74
Or you can just send me a brief sentence about what your problem is. So I can
decide how much of a context switch it is. At my last company, I could be
working on any number of problems from the front end (not likely), to
infrastructure, to dealing with documentation for a customer. If you tell me
what the issue is, when I do come up for air, I can decide where I place you
in the queue. A “hello” goes to the bottom of the queue. I might not even put
“respond to bo1234 to see what he wants.”

If I am asking a question where your response isn’t blocking me, I’ll say
that...

“No rush, it’s not blocking me. I have X,Y I can be working on”.

“I’m working a little late tonight. If you’re busy, this can be a tomorrow
problem.”

I personally prefer a wall of text telling me everything they have already
tried. If they have already tried my first ideas, I can decide whether I have
time or not.

~~~
bo1024
So it sounds like you want email, or a ticketing system. Not live chat. am I
right?

------
ignoranceprior
I was in an IRC channel a while back that had "Don't ask to ask, ask" in its
topic, because it was so common for people to join and write "May I ask a
question?".

~~~
glandium
"May I ask a question?"

"You just did."

"May I ask another?"

"You just did."

~~~
hinkley
"May I ask two more questions?"

"You are allowed 3 questions and you just used them."

------
rachelbythebay
This started going inside Google quite a while back. My feeling then is about
the same as now: feel free to say "hello" to me if we happen to be on the same
IM system at the same time and you are "opening hailing frequencies", so to
speak. I might not be there. I might not have a chance to chat right then. You
can find out both without a serious investment in time pre-typing some huge
thing which might be a total waste anyway.

It's a good opportunity to get some idea of how quickly things will move, and
whether the other end is willing and able to have a solid chat at that time.
This applies to being either party in the chat: the asker or the asked!

What's far more annoying is when the [typing] indicator goes on and stays on
for a couple of minutes, at which point you are "rewarded" with a wall of
text. By then, they have filibustered the chat, and are probably three steps
down the wrong road if they got off on the wrong foot, and they need to be
backed up and pointed in another direction.

If they start small and evolve it as a natural conversation with back and
forths, then a whole lot of needless typing can be avoided.

------
rapsacnz
People who just say "Hi" to me often don't get an answer at all.

I don't want to risk someone interrupting my chain of thought with some
request that I can't / don't want to act on.

But if I respond to a "Hi" and then decide that I don't want to deal with the
actual question, that's perceived as rude.

If you ask the question straight out, then I can decide to respond or not.

~~~
axaxs
Yeah, I have a co-worker notorious about this. I just quit answering until he
writes something amounting to a statement. It's annoying to keep clicking away
from a problem for niceties, especially when it's every...single..day.

~~~
deeteecee
i think it would be reasonable to just guide him to say "hey, you often just
start off these online messages with 'hi.' can you just get to the point
first?"

~~~
axaxs
Oh, I have...but more gently. His reply is that he prefers to engage in
conversation than just receive a reply. I do understand that point, but also
that it's a bit selfish.

~~~
boring_twenties
Well then. He can wait in the conversation queue, instead of the request
queue.

------
BitwiseFool
Years ago I worked with several people from UK. No subject matter will be
broached until pleasantries have been exchanged. After a period of time they
will ask to proceed. Then, only after a definitive "yes, go ahead" and a "no,
this is not too much trouble", will they finally make their request. I found
it both charming and terribly inefficient.

~~~
nmstoker
It's the same with those ponderous extended variants on "can I just jump in
here. Would you mind if I asked a question? Because I'm curious to know..." \-
seem to be to be used by people from all over.

~~~
a_lieb
I've found that one a lot more common than the "Hello" thing, but I'm sure it
varies by the team.

------
persona
There is a strong counter-argument though, based on the increase of online
meetings and screen sharing scenarios... Not everybody always remembers to
silence screen notifications while sharing screens.

Which leads to more-than-once-a-week situations of "Hi - full question or
comment notification that probably shouldn't be seen by co-worker/boss/client"
popping up during the share.

A simple "hello" \--wait for answer-- protocol makes it a quick way of
checking if it's a good time.

------
Brushfire
I totally agree with the sentiment represented here but thinking linking
someone to this is a bad way to handle the situation with others. I think it’s
best handled by asking them after they make one of these requests and they get
their answer. Linking to external sites feels passive aggressive to most
people who are just trying to be nice.

~~~
jez
But it's the kind of thing you can put in your Slack status so that the moment
someone opens up a DM with you, they might see it, read it, and then know, all
before they've typed out their first message.

------
brushfoot
Pinging someone with a "hey" or "hello" isn't really the same as putting a
call on hold. As the site points out, chat is asynchronous, so the recipient
doesn't have to wait around as they would on hold. Plus it's a status check.
With a call you have instant audio feedback to know they're on the line. Not
so with chat.

Granted, you don't always need to establish the recipient's immediate
availability. But often chat gets used for questions that need answers _almost
now_ but don't warrant the time and emotional investment of a phone call.

If you don't do a status check, you risk the recipient not being available to
answer your question in time. And if they aren't, you'll waste more time
typing your question than you would have with a precautionary hello.

~~~
qayxc
Hm. Don't most chat programs offer a status?

Like "Away", "DND", "Available", etc.?

~~~
brushfoot
Yes...but I've never worked at a place where they were accurate.

------
jefecoon
To whomever went to the trouble of writing this up, then giving it a dedicated
domain -- thank you, you're making the world a better place.

------
aussieguy1234
The jist of this is you should still be polite and say Hi or Hello in your
message, but include the question in the message.

You'll get a response much faster.

I'll often do something like

Hi <name>, <insert question>

------
john_moscow
I usually go for a combined approach: pre-type my long question in Notepad++,
then post a polite "hello" immediately followed by another message with the
actual question. So it's both polite and considerate.

It has a bonus point of not losing what you typed in case the chat window bugs
out.

~~~
s_c_r
This is a good approach. More people should do this. I should do this.

------
gilad
I call this Hi-jacking

~~~
karl11
So good

------
wruza
Please don't finish with "Ok/good" neither¹.

I have these VVs in my chatbox below each message, one V for delivered and one
V for _read_. Please only reply if you have objections and/or questions and/or
more time to think. Otherwise,

    
    
      silence implies consent (until reply)
    

Another open-ended question is "when will you show up at <location> / be
free?". I don't know. Maybe not today. Maybe not even this week. Because "as a
cooperating peer I will either show up and help you ASAP, or negotiate the
term, or maybe will delegate and not show up at all, but I can only do that
_knowing what the deal is_ ". Don't be afraid of being imperative, just shoot
your problem at me, and we'll decide. Even if you just miss my company and
want to share a bottle or two. When in doubt, remember the second V rule.

¹ You cannot expect third parties to follow these seemingly non-polite
shortcuts of course, but it makes messaging much easier for those who are your
most reliable peers. Repeating the same polite handshake/TIME_WAIT routines
again and again and again quickly converges to the point where it is not even
remotely polite².

² That may sound harsh at the face value, but I seen how good relationships
suffered because of exactly these sorts of conversation. A busy person will
answer "yes" to "busy?" when all their contact wanted was to meet at the
evening. Or "in the city, can't talk" to "where are you?" when they meant "if
you're near X, do Y". But all windows close during the day and at the evening
it is too late to ask again, because kids, plans, etc. Repeat that few times
and both be repulsed.

------
29athrowaway

        A: Hello
        B: Hello
        A: How do I do X?
        B: <instructions>
        B: Does that answer your question?
        A: Yes
        A: Bye
        B: Bye
    
    
        A: Acquire attention lock
        B: Attention lock acquired
        A: Information request
        B: Information request reply
        B: Reply satisfaction request
        A: Reply satisfaction response
        A: Release attention lock
        B: Attention lock released

------
SethTro
Google has a whole list of these (ActionableIM, OnlyHello, ContextPlz); I'm
into FastHello

1\. Open the chat window, and type your question with no "hello". Do not press
enter. 2\. Instead, press Ctrl-A and then Ctrl-X to cut your question out of
the chat window and into your clipboard. 3\. type and send "hello" 4\. Pause
2-5 seconds 5\. Ctrl-P and enter to send your full question.

~~~
jay_kyburz
"Hello" <Control Enter> Type your question. Your welcome.

~~~
aaron695
You can thank email for people being to scared to do this.

------
beaker52
I grew up in IRC. I almost got fired from my first job for being to direct
around sensitive colleagues. My boss coached me to start my emails with "Hello
:)". I'm better but I still get into trouble from time to time, especially on
a Monday morning when I forget to ask how someone's weekend was!

That's also a fun one because I love breaking the "my weekend was great how
about you?" monotony by actually telling the truth. I remember once going for
an interview and the interviewer casually asked how my weekend was as we
walked through the office. He wasn't expecting me to say that I didn't have a
great time because I'd spent it moving out of my ex's place and a family
member passed away the same weekend. How was your weekend?

I mostly dislike all these fake interactions we have. Show me something real
any day of the week. If you can't service my request because your mind is on
something else, I'd take that. Just give me a human, not a half-assed care-
less social dressage.

------
tgb
Part of the 'hello' problem is to get around the lack of context about what
the other person is doing - particularly about who else might see their screen
at that time. I still prefer just asking the question but that was the reason
some others gave when I asked why they did the 'hello's.

------
iforgotpassword
While it's a bit annoying I never saw the problem with this.

The article sounds like the author will give their full attention to the chat
application after replying "hello" until they receive another message.

You can just switch yourself to nonblocking mode and handle other events and
wait until epoll marks this chat readable again, or if you don't have any sort
notifications turned on, just check back when you have a second. Worst case,
the person at the other end wastes their time, _not_ you. If it takes you an
hour, their bad. But chances are they turn to something else in the meantime
and don't stare at the chat window for hours on end. Would be kinda bad if you
were on vacation and accidentally left your chat client running.

------
capableweb
This is good advice, for the people who tends to ask to ask, or surround their
questions with bunch of fluff.

On the other hand, is you, the question-receiver. The example starts with "CO-
WORKER WAITS WHILE YOU PHRASE YOUR QUESTION" but that's not how I usually deal
with these types of conversations.

If someone just writes "Hi" to me without something else and I'm busy, I won't
reply until there is more messages, and instead continue with my work.

Although, ideally there would be no "Hi" messages. But, not everything goes as
we want it to.

------
nmstoker
What interests me about this is often I feel the person may be trying (perhaps
poorly) to help you and it's just backfiring.

Most often it feels like an attempt to get initial attention because if they
launch straight into something the start may be lost whilst the recipient is
switching focus.

Clearly the point against this would be that you'll have the chat history
available, but there are apps where the flashing up of the notifications is in
the corner and they disappear inconveniently before you've focused. So perhaps
I suspect it's an attempt to get that focus moved and _then_ start with the
payload.

There is some logic in this, annoying as it can be. People do really badly
with focus when switching context, just look at how often someone will call
you, you say your name (ie the person they were hoping to speak to usually)
and then they ask if they could speak to <your name>, because they've been
primed to ask this and didn't update mentally in light of new info fast enough
to kill the needless question.

I don't advocate the initial hello, but at times, I've broken text up where I
get the key detail follow up ready in advance before the initial gambit is
sent. This stops it being a whopping paragraph. I'd only use this sparingly
but it helps at times and there's a hint of the focus aware point in it.

------
jodrellblank
This concept has to be the new[1] whathaveyoutried.com, the site which became
the favourite snarky unhelpful comment on StackOverflow for a while and which
the author realised was a bad and unhelpful approach and regretted making.

Just say "Hello" back. You don't have to wait while they are typing. And if
you are busy enough that you don't want to be disturbed, put "Do not disturb"
on or close the chat client.

[1] newer, anyway. That was 2008 to this 2013. What's the 2018 version?

------
lma21
I'm sorry, but are you really losing that much productivity by being a bit
more human and replying to that hello, asking how the other person this? in
any case, once the question is asked, you will be context switching and trying
to find that answer.

I find that saying hello and then waiting is more practical. If the other
person is busy, then they won't reply and they'll reply at a more convenient
time.

~~~
bmn__
There were more arguments than just productivity.

The article supplied an telephone analogy. Put yourself into the situation of
the recipient. Would you or would you not mind being put on hold immediately
after being called?

> I find that [doing something that does not affect me adversely, but does for
> the other party] is more practical.

That kind of reasoning for the benefit of oneself without consideration for
the other side causes bad blood.

------
trias
if you write "hello" and they answer "hello", they are under some social
obligation to answer rather promptly, whereas if you write your question
first, it may simply get ignored. So I tend to write a short hello first.

possibly some other social factors at play here, but still, my experience.

~~~
Trasmatta
That's exactly the problem, though. You're expecting prompt replies in an
async communication medium. Ask your question and then they'll get to it when
they have time. If they never reply when you do that then there's a larger
issue, but that rarely ever happens. People expecting immediate replies in
Slack is a big issue that leads to a lot of unneeded stress at work, and
decreases everyone's productivity in the long run.

~~~
trias
I dont expect an immediate reply, just within reasonable time. I i've made the
experience that a question you ask upfront simply gets ignored and then
forgotten.

~~~
Trasmatta
When that happens to me, I'll give it a reasonable amount of time based on the
importance of the question (which could be a few hours or a few days) and then
gently prompt with "hey, sorry to bug you, wondering if you had a chance to
look at my question?". That has never not worked out for me.

If it's such an emergency that it can't wait, then I can call them. But most
of the things we think are emergencies aren't, and most things can wait longer
than we think.

------
goblin89
An approach I’m using to deal with “hello”-only messages:

– Jog your memory for any input you might’ve been awaiting or could use from
the “hello” person, and hit them back with a greeting + request or question.

– If they really cannot help you on anything and you are not inclined to chit-
chat, just ignore the “hello” message until substance follows.

– If “hello” was too much of a bother at the moment, perhaps you should’ve
been using DnD mode?

– An effective way to use DnD and remain accessible is to set up a periodic
alarm to check instant messengers. If you find a lone “hello” when checking
messages and you can’t think of any input you might want from that person,
“hello” back and leave it until next alarm. Your counterparty will learn to
get to the point quicker.

------
marstall
if I'm in regular communication with someone, I'll skip the hi or inline it.
the hello comes in handy when I'm getting in touch with someone I might only
talk to once every couple weeks. then I like to just kind of break the ice,
make friendly conversation so we both can feel at ease and friendly with each
other.

I like to be friends with my co-workers - and there are times where if you are
hitting them up for an ask, and ignoring them otherwise, thet might feel like
you don't value them as a person ... A greeting, a little gossip or "HR"
repartée can make two people trust each other - which
in the end can foster its own kind of efficiency!

------
andersco
I had a colleague at a company that would always start his Slack chats with
“Hey” and then wait for a reply. My “response” was to not respond until he
finally got the message and would continue with what he actually had to say.
Worked for me but YMMV.

------
brachika
I had a colleague who would do exactly this in order to slack at work ->
pinging someone and saying 'hello', then some time passes until the person
responds, then the enquirer asks a question, then the person responds and it
goes on...

And everytime during the stand-ups the person would be - "Oh, I couldn't
communicate the issue on time, I will continue working in the issue today..."

I noticed this once because we spent two hours discussing about some topic.

(we have a milestone-based flexible release model, milestones could be
scheduled every couple of months at times, so the person would slack quite a
lot)

------
meigetsu
I generally agree with this, but I also think there is a legitimate use case
for saying “Hello”, namely when you have a request that actually needs a
fairly imminent response and if the person you are pinging isn’t responding
right away, you need to move on to someone else.

If you type the full message to the first person and don’t get an immediate
response, as you paste the same message to other people, the first person or
few people who didn’t respond immediately might waste their time duplicating
work that someone else you reached is already doing.

------
jancsika
Gotta love how programmers are so anti-social they'd rather bitch for decades
about salutations than elect even a single dev to spend five minutes scripting
a pleasant-reply-bot.

------
jay_kyburz
I always assume its because the person wants to make sure you are there before
they bother to type the question. If not they will work it out themselves.

Never respond to hi. :)

------
replies-to-fool
This might be a little farfetched but is a possible solution to this having
chat messages be directly previewed so that the person on the other end can
see what you're typing as you do so.

This could bridge the gap between the speed of chatting and talking.

Or are there unintended cinsequences I'm not accounting for (such as
accidentaly copy pasting unintended info)?

------
arthurcolle
I don't get how someone can get so annoyed at what is just basic politeness.
Clearly, computers are making some folks insane

~~~
twodave
I think the point is that basic politeness involves not appearances of being
polite, but rather thinking of the other person, their time, and how you would
feel if the roles were reversed. I do agree though that going as far as to
register a domain for this one social quirk is a bit much.

~~~
dredmorbius
_basic politeness involves not appearances of being polite, but rather
thinking of the other person_

THIS!!!

I have the unfortunate experience of somewhat regularly engaging with people
who:

1\. Act in a manner / do something they think the other party should
appreciate, where

2\. The other party does not in fact appreciate this, and is often burdened,
bothered, or inconvenienced.

3\. When informed of this, the first party both accuses the second that they
are ungrateful (for not actually being helped) and controlling (for expressing
alternate preferences, including often no assistance).

The cycle can reepeat, over precisely the same exchanges, repeatedly and over
long periods.

Small children not knowing better is excusable. Adults not so much.

Kindness and consideration are not forcing your preferences down another's
throat (exceptions for specific therapeutic expertise and treatment), but in
offering to someone _that which they express a preference for or interest in_.
So long as this isn't actively acutely harmful, one should oblige, aand
graciously.

Keep in mind that "where the roles reversed" _may_ not be a reliable guide.
It's not what you would want, but what _they_ prefer.

This lesson seems poorly assimilated by many.

------
lukaszkups
To add more to this I once had coworker who fist wrote 'hi' and then, in
addition asked: 'Can I have a question?' (and waited for response) - it was a
bit annoying, and made my style of going straight into conversation ('hi, can
you _reason of the conversation_ :) a bit weird, unpleasant

------
harikb
There are times I have done this if I am not sure if the person at the other
end is presenting/sharing screen and the matter is somewhat sensitive.

If that screen sharing software world and messaging/chat software works had
some sort of protocol/handshake not to step on each other, many frustrating
situations can be avoided.

------
andersco
A related annoyance is people who hit return after every statement, so that
you end up with multiple alerts for the same message, and worse, the alert you
see first is for the last statement that was posted.

------
Minor49er
I've been trying to do this more myself. I have noticed that I'd get someone's
attention, then start writing up what I have to say while they waited for me
to finish typing.

------
todotask
Ought to put (2013) in the title?

Previously discussed
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19648415](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19648415)

~~~
dang
Yes; that thread was 2019 and this one was 2017 - with a comment from
apparently the original author:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14868294](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14868294)

------
jitl
I always push No Hello whenever I start on a new team or at a new company. I
should publish my latest revision, which I think is more kind and convincing
than this original.

------
whatch
What are polite ways to introduce colleagues to this concept?

~~~
jimbobimbo
I have www.nohello.com as my status message.

------
ed25519FUUU
There’s a lot of etiquette we can use to improve chat. Another one is phrasing
questions in a “search friendly” way, using log names and error strings.

------
mkhattab
My manager used to do this all the time.

Typical scenario:

Manager: hey

<an hour or so may go by>

Me: what's up?

Manager: nvm

------
booleandilemma
When someone does this to me I just don't respond.

I generally know who likes to talk with me and who just needs help.

~~~
jodrellblank
Your second sentence implies you respond to the people who like to talk, and
don't respond to the people who "just" need your help. Although it seems like
it ought to be the other way around.

------
greenyoda
I get this kind of "Hello" message all the time. Also popular are "Are you
there?" or "$FIRST_NAME ?". It's one of the reasons why I much prefer e-mail
to chat. With e-mail, people have to actually formulate a question before
hitting "send".

------
etxm
The other thing that gets my goat is the person that sends every line. I guess
it’s hard not to do in slack since “enter” sends, but I really wish slack
would debounce messages notifications from the same person.

~~~
Trasmatta
I feel like at this point anyone using Slack should know to shift-enter to add
a newline without sending. I don't understand why people still have a problem
with that.

------
hanse00
I see go/nohello has gone external, lovely.

~~~
MrMorden
Also aka.ms/nohello.

------
etxm
I really want to set this as my status message in slack, but don’t want people
to think I’m rude.

Would you think it was rude if you saw this link as somebody’s status message?

~~~
dvtrn
I tried for a while before giving up because almost nobody in my org reads
statuses or heeds them to begin with anyway (as I’ve learned on multiple PTO
days where I would change my status to “On vacation, please contact Mike at
——— for support” and getting P1 messages and calls over slack anyway).

Nowadays I’m just a stochastic replier.

~~~
etxm
That’s actually a great point I was on “vacation” last week and got messaged
every single day despite my palm tree emoji.

~~~
dvtrn
Indeed. I’m firmly in camp “slack isn’t the problem with workplace
communication, it just happens to amplify the problems that were already
there”.

Most (not all) tech that tries to “fix” communication in the office suffers
from this problem though so I’m not blaming Slack alone for this. It just is
what it is.

------
redwood
"Hi, quick question"

------
deeteecee
im in sf and we had a new contractor in india who wanted to ask about my PR
comments and started with "hi." yeah...

------
savanpatel
no one is addressing the cultural difference here. In India, people wait in
chat after saying hello for a reply.They assume that other person might be
busy and also from Indian perspective hi followed by asking for help or
question immediately is bad. This is not the case in US where people would
expect the intention right after greeting.

