Slack is the primary tool for communicating at Suncoast Developers Guild. This guide covers some of our favorite Slack tips and tricks.

Posting Code!

When you want to post a small code block to Slack it helps to format it!

If you are simply showing a one-line bit of code and want to do it inline you can format it like so:

Hi there, is this code correct: `var answer = 42;` or do I need to do something else?

This will format the snippet var answer = 42; in a stylized manner directly in your message!

If you have a longer block you can enclose it in three backtick (`) characters like this:

Hi Mary, can you help me with this code?
```
var answer = 42;
Console.WriteLine($"The answer to your question is: {answer}");
```
I'm not sure if this is what we were supposed to do. Thanks!

And the code inside the backticks will be formatted as a block of code!

Posting snippets for LONG blocks of code

If you click the lightning bolt icon next to where you would type a message there is an option titled "Create a Text Snippet." This will launch a dialog box where you can:

• Type a title for your text
• Tell Slack the language type for your text (HTML, CSS, C#, JavaScript, Markdown, etc)
• Paste or type your long text
• Type a message to accompany the long text

This posts the long text in a way where the receiving user, or channel, will get a brief summary and a "click to see more" message as opposed to pasting the entire text in backticks, which will include the entire body. If the text is long, creating a snippet is more friendly!