My question was closed as "primarily opinion-based," but I don't believe it was justified.
If the OP lacks minimal understanding to know that a question is opinion-based, the community shouldn't vote to close it as "primarily opinion-based." Instead, someone should answer it to explain why there isn't a factual answer.
For example, if someone asks:
I'm trying to factor 12, but I don't know if I should do 4 x 3 or 3 x 4. Which one is the right way?
What people do now:
Post comments saying that it's a matter of personal preference whether to write the factors in order from smallest-to-biggest or biggest-to-smallest.
Vote to close it as primarily opinion-based.
How I think we could do better:
- Answer the question to explain that, due to the commutative property of multiplication, 3 x 4 and 4 x 3 are in fact equivalent.
Same for the question that I asked. I asked if there were rules/conventions for listing the steps of simplifying expressions. If there aren't any, then that should be the answer. In this case, "it's primarily opinion-based" is literally the answer to my question!