Timeline for Why has the title been usurped as the question?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
26 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jun 28, 2021 at 9:18 | comment | added | Kamil Maciorowski | Possible negative synergy when combined with other poor decisions. This question fortunately does not fully rely on its title. If it did, I would read "unexpected o", because the site uses text figures in titles. Only the body explains it's "unexpected zero", the digit. If not the body, I would need to paste the title elsewhere to tell what it means. The font for poets is not the only thing that blatantly ignores the technical scope of the site (ex. 1, ex. 2). | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 21:26 | comment | added | Kamil Maciorowski | @Shōgun8 It may be technically good but it feels awful. I find writing like this coarse and unprofessional (in whatever profession except Morse code telegraphist). Your impression may vary, I understand this. AFAIK the site is not only about helping random people; it's about building a knowledge base. The more a post looks like a well-written technical article, the better. That's why I think "it's standard practice in any writing that the main text should be complete in itself" should also apply here. I can stand mediocrity but we should at least aim higher. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 18:06 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ roaima, it was posted as an answer but somehow got moved to a comment. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:33 | comment | added | Chris Davies | @Shōgun8 you've made a really good point. Care to write it as answer so it others can (also) upvote it? I'm looking for discussion, not just making a whinge | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:20 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ Kamil Maciorowski, I think your hypothetical post is a really good post; all it begs for is more supporting information. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:19 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ roaima, if you think this post isn't in the stye new style that you seem to be questioning, as the question that you posted in the title, then we disagree about the style of your post. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:13 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ roaima, but those are basically just supporting information to your question in the title, even if they're in the form of a question. The subsequent questions provide information about why you ask the question on the title. With every additional question, scope creep becomes more probable, but in this case, the topic brought up in the original question is supported and strengthened by the questions in paragraph three. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:02 | comment | added | Kamil Maciorowski | @Shōgun8 There are questions in the body, they make the body complete. What I'm against is if the title was "How can I frobnicate?" and the body was rough "I did foo bar, the error was baz. I'm on Ubuntu." A body like this begs for some opening and/or closure. The question (or a question; closely related, similar question) can be either one. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 17:02 | comment | added | Chris Davies | @Shōgun8 my questions are in paragraph three. My summary is in the title | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 16:50 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ Kamil Maciorowski, take this very post as an example. It written very well and the style is pleasing. You can see that the question is in the title and it looks great. It is not in the body and it wouldn't addy anything useful if it was. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 13:25 | comment | added | Kamil Maciorowski | @Shōgun8 My point is per standard practice in any writing the main text should be complete in itself, so the question should be in the body, even if it's in the title. I don't mind the question in the title; I do mind the question not in the body. So IMO not only supporting information should be in the body. Supporting information and the question. It's about style, elegance. We encourage proper formatting, paragraphs (i.e. not a wall of text), general clarity, punctuation… One can either write with style or not. If you choose extreme pragmatism over a bit of style, fine. And awful. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 9:54 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | @ Kamil Maciorowski, "awful practice?" No, it is pragmatic to ask the question in the title, and use the body for supporting information; if you don't use the body for supporting information then what is the point of the body? It most certainly shouldn't be used to ask multiple questions; therefore it should only be used to add information to support the question. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 9:48 | comment | added | Kamil Maciorowski | @Shōgun8 The body should only be used for supporting information. – Only? Awful practice. I fully agree with what @ilkkachu wrote: the main text should be complete in itself. | |
| Jun 4, 2021 at 8:37 | comment | added | Shōgun8 | I think it makes a to of sense to use the title as the question. The most important reason is to prevent people form posting multiple questions in the body of a single post, as each post should be only 1 question. Using the title to ask the question makes the post very clear to the people that are looking for ana answer to a is,ilar question. The body should only be used for supporting information. | |
| Jun 2, 2021 at 0:27 | answer | added | Philip Couling | timeline score: 11 | |
| May 31, 2021 at 18:08 | comment | added | secemp9 | Worse is, that it seems that this kind of "trend" invite more possibility for "duplicate" posts than anything else @RayButterworth | |
| May 29, 2021 at 12:16 | comment | added | Chris Davies | @ilkkachu the question writing prompts do not lead people down this route, though | |
| May 29, 2021 at 10:29 | comment | added | ilkkachu | It's standard practice in any writing that the main text should be complete in itself, without needing the reader to read the headings. It's also usual for lazy writers to completely ignore that guideline... I wonder how much that correlates here with the question otherwise lacking needed information. | |
| May 29, 2021 at 0:43 | comment | added | Ray Butterworth | @Kusalananda, yes, it reminds me of when people would send e-mail with the message starting in the Subject and then continue the sentence in the Body. It was especially annoying when someone would then forward the message with a new Title like "Can you help with this?", and the most important part of the whole thing would get lost. | |
| May 28, 2021 at 17:00 | comment | added | Jeff Schaller Mod | Yep, I have that problem (writing too much). No one's going to read it before they ask a question here, either. All to say, I agree with the sentiment. | |
| May 28, 2021 at 16:35 | comment | added | Chris Davies | @JeffSchaller how many people read that? :-) It's a pleasant version of ESR's "how to ask a decent question", which although accurate is also IMO way too long for most readers | |
| May 28, 2021 at 16:09 | history | edited | Chris Davies | CC BY-SA 4.0 | added 5 characters in body |
| May 28, 2021 at 15:22 | history | became hot meta post | |||
| May 28, 2021 at 14:45 | comment | added | Jeff Schaller Mod | Question bodies that only say "as in the title" bother me, too. I guess it's my habit of scrolling only the body back & forth to understand it. I don't know off-hand if the prompts have changed, but I'd certainly claim that "include all the information someone would need" would include the pertinent information from the title. Also: unix.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/5015/… | |
| May 28, 2021 at 14:45 | comment | added | Kusalananda Mod | Personally, I don't think this is right. The title should be a terse summary of the issue that makes it easy to see what the question is about. The body of the question should be the full question, including supporting information. Once you've clicked on the title to open the question, the title should no longer be needed. | |
| May 28, 2021 at 14:14 | history | asked | Chris Davies | CC BY-SA 4.0 |