Yesterday, I absent-mindedly left my headlights on when I returned to work from lunch and when I went to leave for a doctor appointment at 4:15, the battery was completely dead. A friend and I tried to pop-start it, but had no luck. Then someone who works in the building came over to give a jump start.
After playing with the jumper cables for a little while, we got it started. Which led me to look into the correct way to connect the cables, which is:
Dead battery: jumper cable to positive terminal
Live battery: jumper cable to positive terminal
Live battery: jumper cable to neutral terminal
Dead battery: jumper cable to some ground on or near the engine (shiny metal)
They also recommended shutting off the engine of the car giving the jump-start to protect the alternator.
So there you go. And here you go: http://www.carbuyingtips.com/jumpstart.htm
