:orphan:

.. _mail_guidelines:

Guidelines for contributing to the mailing list
===============================================

To ensure community members provide accurate and quick responses to questions on the mailing list,
please follow the guidelines below:


#. Write an informative subject to your email regarding your question or problem.

#. **DO NOT** copy and paste lengthy log or error output without context.

   Remember you are addressing human beings, and we do not have time to read through pages of logs, especially if we don't understand
   what you want.

#. Provide us with

   * a short description of what you want to accomplish with NEST and why.
   * an example script, code snippet, or equation, if applicable.
   * relevant publications related to your question, if applicable.
   * if you are having problems,

      * the steps you took that lead to the problem.
      * the specific error messages you get.
      * relevant system and version information (e.g.,  Ubuntu 18.04/ NEST 2.20 installed using Conda).

#. Keep topics separate.

   It's better to write multiple emails each with it's own topic thread than
   to try to ask several diverse questions in one email. Some of your questions may get overlooked if
   there is just too much information to read through.

.. grid:: 2

   .. grid-item-card:: |mailicon| Access the mailing list
       :link-type: url 
       :link: https://www.nest-initiative.org/mailinglist/


----

**Feel free to contribute to the conversation!**

The purpose of the mailing list
is to share ideas and solutions. We encourage all our users to provide their
knowledge and experience to those seeking advice.

.. |mailicon| image:: ../../static/img/email_orange64.png
