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Recently a question I submitted on the advantages and disadvantages of using different programming languages was closed. The reason was that the question was deemed too broad.

I can see two sides to this decision.

I agree that the question was indeed quite broad and near the boundary of what should be acceptable, however, it was deliberately asked in a way where it was supposed to be focused on the advantages of programming languages in the context of bioacoustics. I also agree that some the answers were also getting a bit ridiculous e.g. “as a proponent of XX language I think that…” and I don’t believe we as a community came down hard enough on them.

However, whilst I admit there were issues, the question was extremely popular with a lot of views and engagement. This is something I get asked about a lot and I believe is of interest, especially to early careers researchers and students. The site should be able to ask question like these, which are perhaps broad, but supply much needed information. Asking a more specific question such as, “which language should I learn for bioacoustics deep learning?” is less broad but also less useful because bioacoustics requires integrated acoustic analysis which involves signal processing, data management, compatibility with software etc.

So the question is, how do we, as a community, allow useful questions like this without letting the site become overly opinion based?

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    $\begingroup$ The moderator (and SE staff) @V2Blast who closed it justified it by "That whole table seems to effectively be a self-answer to the question, and would probably be more appropriate as an answer than as part of the question. That said, however, this sort of question is not a good fit for the Stack Exchange Q&A format. "What are all of the things that these 3 languages are good and bad at?" is way too broad for a single Q&A, and also seems quite subjective (especially at the level of simplification being done in this post). As such, I've closed this question. " $\endgroup$
    – Noil
    Commented Jul 31, 2022 at 17:18
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks for adding - good to have the official reason here. $\endgroup$
    – user213
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 9:52

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I found the gathered information very useful, and not that broad to my opinion.

Would a wiki style be more appropriate (your question without the table, and your table as a wiki response so that everybody can add things to the table)? The other responses and the comments could be used to discuss about it.

To deal with the opinion-based issue, maybe a link should be the requirement for each table cell (or line?) to support the judgment.

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    $\begingroup$ I think a wiki may have been the way to and I agree that I should have specified links in the answers with some evidence. I think part of the reason this was closed is that it was too close to the classic "which programming language is best" question that is never useful. However, this was a more specific context and perhaps a community wiki is a better fit. $\endgroup$
    – user213
    Commented Aug 1, 2022 at 9:55
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I agree that I did appreciate that question (and see how it would be very valuable to students, ECRs, and even later stage folks that might not be up to speed on new programming languages being used more widely. At the same time, I do see some of the reasons it was closed...particularly how the table itself was actually a good answer (or good starting answer!) in itself. The way many answers interacted with the post suggested additions or modifications to the table, which to me, points to this type of question being a great candidate for a community wiki as @noil suggested.

I'm glad you brought this to Meta for discussion because I think there are two things to address

(1) is there a way this question could be reworked to allow it to be reopened as a wiki? I don't have any suggestions at the moment but will keep thinking about it! As its written, to me it is different than a "shopping" question because it asks specifically about pros and cons not just a simple "what should I use?" (I know it wasn't closed as a shopping question, but I am still sort of trying to learn about those and how to avoid them so that is what most quickly came to mind with this closure)

(2) this is a perfect example to discuss how we can tackle these sorts of questions.

So, perhaps in the language of our sites help, we can give examples of what types of questions are too broad ("Should I analyze my data with Matlab or R?") and how they could be modified to be appropriate ("Which programming language is faster (R vs Matlab) for doing automated detection of sterotyped high frequency dolphin sounds?")

*Note - is that a better way of asking? Open to feedback :)

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I was also sad to see this question, as well as the other question on startup, closed down. I think the vast amount of users here will be scientists in one or another capacity, and we have no problem parsing through answers of a more subjective nature.

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    $\begingroup$ Maybe there could be a tag that would highlight these types of questions - career-advice or something like that. That would allow those questions, but give them a specific home and maybe a specific set of guidelines. $\endgroup$
    – selene
    Commented Aug 2, 2022 at 16:15
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I also agree that the question & answers were helpful and provided valuable information, and that there should be a place for that type of question to exist somewhere.

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