The Nineteenth Byte

12:08 AM

I have a question about this answer: in its current state, it is a snippet/expression, rather than a full program or function. Is it still valid or should it be flagged as an invalid submission?

caird coinheringaahing

I'd either flag for mod deletion (the mods will go through the whole "this is invalid, flag to be undeleted if/when it's fixed) or, because they're a low-rep user, drop a link to the meta post on snippets, along with an explanation, then follow up in a couple of days (i.e. flag for mod deletion if not fixed)

pppery

The answer is unambiguously a snippet, but the challenge may allow snippets (it says "or evaluate to')

(and yes, that means my comment that I presume brought this to people's attention may also be incorrect)

caird coinheringaahing

Given that it doesn't explicitly say that snippets are allowed, I think going by site default's a better idea than trying to figure out what someone may have meant

pppery

The JavaScript answer would also be invalid then. Close the question as unclear.

caird coinheringaahing

Technically, it fails to include a winning criteria

pppery

12:16 AM

That rule is, in my opinion, stupid, but I guess it also renders the dispute over whether the challenge is unclear moot.

I've cast a close vote, and I'm now going to do a search for "[code-golf] -shortest is:q closed:0" and close vote every question listed there.

caird coinheringaahing

It is kinda nitpicky given that the winning criteria for code golf is pretty clear

> 4,039 results

Good luck with that :P

Plus that misses challenges with stuff like "This is code-golf, so please make your program as short as possible!"

pppery

I was exaggerating.

I was never actually planning to go through and robotically close questions without reading them.

caird coinheringaahing

Yeah, I know. Just thought it'd be interesting to explore

pppery

In fact, when a problem is that obviously widespread, I tend to lose the motivation to tackle it at all

caird coinheringaahing

I generally wouldn't bother systematically tackling it, but rather if I see a question/answer/post with a specific problem, I'll edit/flag/close it and move on

Poor post formatting is my number one enemy on the site :P

pppery

12:28 AM

My #1 enemy is old invalid answers, which I do tackle somewhat systematically

In fact, me running my SEDE query to look at all answers by 1-rep users is what got this tangent started

caird coinheringaahing

That's up there too :P And now that I've got the 20k rep tools, you know I'll be casting VTDs on bad answers :P

pppery

Besides, if I were to actually do that, I suspect they would be reviewed as "leave open"

pppery

3:37 AM

@cairdcoinheringaahing and ... the question passed the Close Vote review queue

I've seen this policy-enforcement contradiction play out far too many times.

caird coinheringaahing

4:36 AM

@pppery I cast a CV because it doesn’t have the winning criteria in the question, and even if I don’t 100% agree it’s necessary, that’s the meta policy. People in the queue may not be aware of that though

If it had the criteria in the question tho, I wouldn’t be convinced it’s unclear simply because of “evaluate”, especially since it’s from 2012

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