A Comment is not a Post
Tags: beginners
Published: 2019-12-20 17:42:01

This post is for all the new people just joining the **DEV** community. It's about navigating your way through the neighborhood.

#### Welcome to **DEV**

Your first introduction to **DEV** is usually through one of the Welcome threads. There, you are encouraged to contribute a little something about yourself as an introduction to the rest of the community.
For all of us, it can be a little scary opening yourself up to a large group.

- What should I write?
- Who will see this?
- How do things work around here?

These are common thoughts we have all experienced. For those who take the first step, you might see a response like:
##### Hi

Or the classic:
##### Hello, World!

Others might even write a full sentence or two about how they found this site or even what kind of coding they are interested in.

Whatever you write, just know that you have not created a **Post**, you made a **Comment**. (Even though your browser made an HTTP POST to get that comment to the **DEV** server.)

- A **Post** is the initial message written by an author (in this case, the dev.to staff).
- A **Comment** is a response to a post.
- A **Thread** contains one post and zero or more comments.

Some people after making their first entry, go off and look around at other pages. At some point you look at the [page with the latest posts](https://dev.to/latest) and scroll down looking for your entry. *What's going on? I don't see my entry. It's not here. Did I do it right?*
Some of those will get back to the Welcome Thread and re-enter what they had written the first time unaware that they have just written another comment.

If that is you, don't worry about it. I have a secret to tell you. I made that same mistake! Really. If you search for "Welcome Thread - v44" you will see two comments by a once clueless me.

If you're still not sure you wrote something, or you can't find your comment, click on your profile picture in the upper right hand corner and select your user name (it starts with the **@** sign). On that page, just below your profile box, you'll see a list of links to all the comments you ever made. When you begin writing posts, they will show up there as well.

It's all just a part of finding your way around a new neighborhood. If you get lost, just ask by leaving a comment (you can leave it here and I'll do my best to help). Or, see that big button at the top of this page that says "WRITE A POST"? Press it and ask the entire community. One piece of advice before you actually press that scary looking button, read up on [**Markdown**.](https://guides.github.com/features/mastering-markdown/) It will explain how you can format your post to look nice and even add all those emojis :smile:.
If you have already pressed it, at the bottom of the page is a **?** button that will also guide you.

#### Hearts

One more important topic is hearts :heart:. Every post and comment has a heart symbol associated with it. Use these hearts to tell the author that you like what was written. Whenever I read an interesting post or comment, I always press the :heart:. It lets the author know that someone actually read it.

For myself, I love to receive hearts. It encourages me to write some more. In fact, this post was done because so many people gave me a :heart: to a comment I wrote in the current Welcome Thread. I do my best when someone hearts me to heart them back. It's my way of letting them know that I appreciate the gesture.

#### The Mysterious Unicorn

Now, you might ask yourself, *if the heart indicates I like it, what is that unicorn for?* I have been asked this question before and the truth is "I don't know".
There have been several posts like this one below that have discussed the meaning. {% link https://dev.to/_bigblind/how-do-you-use-each-of-the-emoji-reactions-on-devto %} 
For me, I press it when I really like the post. Maybe we are each meant to leave it to our own interpretation? But at least now you know if you get a unicorn from me, you made an awesome post.

```cs
finally {
  Environment.Exit(0);
}
```

I hope this post has been helpful.
If it has, let me know by leaving me a :heart:.
Even better, leave a comment, or the best thing to do is to pick a topic you like and write your own first post. When I read it, you'll get my :heart:!