Questions tagged [discussion]
This tag is used for questions that ask users to discuss an idea, concept, or problem in an abstract way. A discussion question may not necessarily have a clear-cut right or wrong answer and is often subjective. On Meta, you do not need to use community-wiki mode for subjective topics unless you are asking a "poll" question.
2,328
questions
163
votes
30
answers
20k
views
List of comment templates
Inspired by this question on meta.cstheory.SE. The post at meta.Tex.SE is quite impressive.
We often leave generic comments to OP and answer posters such as "if this is a homework, please add a tag," ...
280
votes
10
answers
30k
views
List of Generalisations of Common Questions
Here is a list of generalised faqs to which other questions may be deduped against, split by topic (please edit the question).
Arithmetic arithmetic
Laws of signs (minus times minus is plus): Why is ...
37
votes
213
answers
13k
views
Requests for Reopen & Undeletion Votes, etc. (volume 10/2012 - 12/2014) [duplicate]
The purpose of this thread is to help focus the attention of the community on posts that may require exceptional handling. This includes requests for reopen and undeletion votes. A request should be ...
42
votes
226
answers
19k
views
Requests for Reopen & Undeletion Votes, etc. (volume 01/2015 - 07/2018 ) [duplicate]
The purpose of this thread is to help focus the attention of the community on posts that may require exceptional handling. This includes requests for reopen and undeletion votes. A request should be ...
46
votes
189
answers
15k
views
Requests for Reopen & Undeletion Votes (volume 07/2018 - 12/2020) [duplicate]
The purpose of this thread is to help focus the attention of the community on posts that may require reopen and undeletion votes. A request should be posted as an answer below (one request per answer)....
35
votes
70
answers
5k
views
Tag merging and synonyms [closed]
Moderator's Note: I am (at least) temporarily closing this thread. New suggestions should be made in the current Winter tag cleanup meta-thread.
This is half a question, half an announcement. I ...
81
votes
27
answers
9k
views
Congratulations: the big thread!
Also known as the happiest place on the website! Use this thread to congratulate MSE users that you feel have reached a significant milestone on the website, or to congratulate the website itself, if ...
213
votes
1
answer
36k
views
How to ask a homework question
How to ask a homework question
Can I ask a homework question here?
How do I ask a homework question on this website?
What information should I include in a question about homework?
Why don't you ...
- 74k
115
votes
7
answers
16k
views
Enforcement of Quality Standards
Math SE has a long-standing policy regarding what constitutes a Good Question. The policy is intended to ensure that the collection of questions and answers here is of high quality, is searchable, ...
- 30.4k
36
votes
103
answers
12k
views
Requests for Reopen & Undeletion Votes (volume 01/2022 - today)
The purpose of this thread is to focus the attention of the community on posts that may require reopen and undeletion votes. A request should be posted as an answer below (one request per answer).
...
- 88.7k
61
votes
4
answers
2k
views
How to grab users' attention on an old question?
Unfortunately, I haven't figured out whether this question is appropriate here. So I'm sorry if it is not. But nevertheless, here it is.
For example, I have a question. A problem, or maybe a piece of ...
- 329
37
votes
10
answers
7k
views
List of chatrooms
This is a place where we could collect list of chat rooms associated with this site. There are several rooms which have potential to be useful if more users were aware of them or more users visited ...
38
votes
2
answers
3k
views
Clarify an old answer
Today I went to ask a question, but I discovered that somebody else had already asked the exact same thing. Goody for me, right?
Well, the trouble is, the question got several answers, but I don't ...
- 6,225
31
votes
72
answers
3k
views
Tag management 2015 [duplicate]
Tags need a regular cleanup. This is a customary thread for tag synonyms etc.
Rules of the game are basically the same:
post your suggestion as an answer here if you see
a particularly bad tag (a ...
- 17.7k
146
votes
5
answers
14k
views
Should chat have TeX support?
OK, so chat is now available... but; it has been suggested that for Mathematics we should have TeX support.
The current TeX processing has some non-trivial client impact. Before I even attempt trying ...
- 101
107
votes
7
answers
9k
views
Proposal: Discourage questions that are nothing besides a problem statement
This is a very clear followup to Qiaochu's question: http://meta.math.stackexchange.com/questions/9180/proposal-ban-verbatim-homework-questions
The reason that I create a new post is because I want ...
- 93k
99
votes
4
answers
5k
views
Dealing with answers in comments.
I have noticed, of late, people providing answers/copious hints to the question in comments instead of actually adding an answer on their own.
Other people might choose not to answer, as the ...
- 82.9k
46
votes
2
answers
3k
views
Best way of asking "check my proof" questions
I am trying to learn proof based math on my own and once I construct a proof, I often have a gut feeling that it's not airtight.
What is the best way of asking such questions?
My findings till now:
...
- 6,663
52
votes
4
answers
5k
views
Guidelines for good use of MathJax in question titles
Motivation:
Every once in a while, I find myself making edits like this one, where OP (likely due to inexperience in asking questions) has used display math mode ($$...
- 17.9k
71
votes
13
answers
23k
views
FAQ for math.stackexchange
Right now, the faq only contains the boilerplate explanations of the stackoverflow engine, reputation levels, etc.
This page serves as an index of other important support questions for the community.
...
22
votes
1
answer
1k
views
The "meta-tags".
What are the tags reference-request, soft-question, big-list for? When are they used? When should they not be used?
- 74k
16
votes
4
answers
1k
views
How much bumping is too much?
Quite often some old questions are bumped for various reasons.
They are edited to correct minor typos, punctuation, adding links, adding a more informative title etc.
They are retagged - e.g. for the ...
64
votes
5
answers
4k
views
Is it appropriate to downvote answers for the sake of deleting a question?
I have noticed that sometimes answers are downvoted in order to cause the automatic deletion of a question by the community user. In particular, there are closed questions with $1$-point answers - ...
user61527
34
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Should we ask for Question Quotas like those that have been available for the big three?
Our site is growing quite rapidly: currently each day there are
about 150 new questions asked
about 250 new answers posted
about 150 edits made to posts.
Each of the above actions changes the front ...
- 74k
92
votes
9
answers
12k
views
Coping with abstract duplicate questions.
Any longtime reader cannot help but notice that we get many abstract duplicate questions, e.g. this recent question on partial fraction computation, which is not essentially different from many other ...
- 276k
31
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Cereal downvotes [duplicate]
It would appear I have a serial downvoter, probably based on my comments at Vector field on an odd sphere
Anything to be done?
How very odd. I put Cereal on purpose. I do not think it confuses the ...
- 141k
55
votes
2
answers
4k
views
What should one do when one's question has been answered in the comments? [duplicate]
Once in a while, when one is venturing out of one's area of expertise, one may post a question and find it answered quickly and completely in the comments section. Perhaps someone has linked to a well-...
user856
48
votes
10
answers
4k
views
A Consolidated Homework Policy
A certain theme during the Town Hall Chat was on the question of a homework policy. The idea of such a policy is not new. As one user said in the chat,
I liked Rob john's suggestion towards ...
- 93k
19
votes
41
answers
2k
views
Tag management 2019 [duplicate]
New year, new tag management thread.
Rules of the game are basically the same:
Post your suggestion as an answer here if you see
A particularly bad tag (a rule of thumb: «if I can't imagine a ...
- 17.9k
28
votes
2
answers
4k
views
How to answer proof-verification questions?
Sometimes, proof-verification questions ask for verification of a valid and overall solid proof (some examples: What is the $\dim L(X,Y)$?, Prove $(\overline{A \cap B}) \subseteq \overline{A} \cap \...
- 158
91
votes
2
answers
4k
views
Why do some users delete their questions after receiving an answer?
It has happened several times now that a question is deleted by its author a few minutes after I post an answer.
I suspect it's because the question is a homework question and the user wants to ...
- 40.1k
23
votes
4
answers
4k
views
MathJax: better way to prepare a Math.StackExchange question?
So right now, to write up a question for Math.StackExchange, I use Firefox to come here, say I'm going to ask a question, and start typing in the box (like I am now). The only way I have to test ...
- 1,493
15
votes
35
answers
2k
views
Tag management 2017 [duplicate]
New year, new tag management thread.
Rules of the game are basically the same:
Post your suggestion as an answer here if you see
A particularly bad tag (a rule of thumb: «if I can't imagine a ...
- 6,935
44
votes
8
answers
2k
views
Under what circumstances is it appropriate to delete a question that has received a good answer?
I would like to have a discussion about the following question:
When is it appropriate to delete a question which has been closed as "missing context or details," but which has generated ...
user61527
42
votes
2
answers
4k
views
How to avoid downvotes for beginner's questions?
I just asking this because of a question I asked a couple of minutes ago. I am still new to sequences and series, just started to study the subject today on my own and I tried to solve some exercises. ...
- 889
34
votes
64
answers
3k
views
Tag management 2016 [duplicate]
Since it is a new year and the old Tag Management question has already over 70 answers, it is time for a new Tag Management thread.
Rules of the game are basically the same:
Post your suggestion as ...
- 25.4k
31
votes
1
answer
2k
views
Are "please check my proof" type of questions proper?
I am investigating a somewhat obscure area of number theory. Can I post a proposition and a complete proof and ask people to check it?
- 366
21
votes
51
answers
2k
views
Tag cleanup 2014 [duplicate]
Tags need a regular cleanup.
There was a number of questions on particular tags recently — but (while proposals for some really major changes should, perhaps, be posted as separate questions) maybe a ...
- 17.7k
21
votes
60
answers
7k
views
Requests for Reopen & Undeletion Votes (volume 01/2021 - 12/2021) [duplicate]
The purpose of this thread is to focus the attention of the community on posts that may require reopen and undeletion votes. A request should be posted as an answer below (one request per answer).
...
- 30.4k
40
votes
3
answers
2k
views
On the inclusion of pages-of-text-as-images in questions
This is to ask if there is and if there should be an official position of math.SE about the inclusion, as images, of pages and pages of printed documents in questions. For a recent example of the ...
- 282k
71
votes
4
answers
5k
views
Fate of the (homework) tag: The community voted.... now what?
Well, the results of the voting seem pretty conclusive:
Leave homework alone: 43 upvotes (20.38%)
Deprecate but don't delete homework: 12 upvotes (5.69%)
Burninate and blacklist homework: ...
- 52.6k
63
votes
62
answers
3k
views
Examples of poor review audits
Since threads about review audits seem to be turning up fairly frequently now, it seemed like a good idea to open a thread to collect examples of those audits where people failed but feel like they ...
45
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Two announcements: new "FAQ" and new "closure rules"
I want to point everybody's attention to two changes that will impact your user-experience here on Math.SE
The first you may have already noticed: the old FAQ page has been replaced by a "help center"...
- 74k
41
votes
2
answers
3k
views
Save the answer in PDF?
Lot of answers here are excellent but there is no way to save it. Even if we can put them in favorites or print them.
What about create a way to save answers in pdf?
Also on meta : Is it ...
user146010
46
votes
2
answers
2k
views
The problem with proof verification
What I am going to bring up is not a new problem. It was hashed again and again and again. It was brought up as far as 2013, and repeatedly almost every year. See 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.
Some of ...
- 399k
22
votes
3
answers
552
views
A way to "watch" questions?
I apologize if this has come up before on meta, because it almost certainly has, but I couldn't find it.
I frequently come across recently asked unanswered questions that I find interesting. However, ...
- 40.6k
16
votes
1
answer
571
views
Original post marked as duplicate
I was just asked to review a question that was posted in 2010, and that has now been closed as a duplicate of a more recent post (this was closed in favour of this).
Is it normal and/or accepted for ...
- 23.3k
65
votes
11
answers
3k
views
What is the site etiquette about (i) asking and (ii) answering questions in a language other than English?
We have a new user who has recently both asked and answered questions in French.
I think we should discuss the appropriateness of this practice.
As of 2023, there is a new policy on this.
- 98.7k
34
votes
4
answers
1k
views
Is there a lower bound to the level of the questions that can be asked in here?
Recently I've seen a couple of questions, specifically this one and this one, that were relatively low level for what I've seen up to now in the site. Basically both questions were just asking for ...
- 15.2k
34
votes
4
answers
1k
views
Don't flag wrong answers?
I recently flagged an answer as "not an answer", and what came back was "declined - flags should not be used to indicate technical inaccuracies, or an altogether wrong answer." I found that surprising,...
- 182k