Tagging - 2019-04-11

Martin Sleziak

00:45

I will just add that regarding "small" and "big" tags I see things similarly as Arctic Char. Both of them are useful (maybe for slightly different purposes). When creating new tags, the community should try to have some balance between creating big tags and small tags.

If I use tags for searching and I get too many search results, a smaller more specific tag will help me to filter the results better. (I will get less search results.)

But this works only if the tag is really used on the questions. If we have too many very specific tags, it's quite likely that many of them will not be used. (Simply because users do not know about them.)

On the other hand, if people follow some tags (tag watching, email subscription), they are more likely to use some of the bigger tags. So it's good if each question has also some of the larger tags with more followers.

Probably the use of watched tags (favorited tags) might even increase a bit after the custom question lists are released network-wide. (Currently they are only available on Meta Stack Exchange, but plans are we should get them on all sites at some point.)

new-tag Two new tags logic-programming and closed-world-assumption were created by ab123.

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Q: Closed world reasoning/assumption with abnormality

My question is regarding example $3.$ in the image above. What I understand by closed world assumption is that all information has been mentioned and that anything else that can not be inferred from this information is assumed to be false. But I can't understand how it leads us to conclude...

Andrews

04:34

@ArcticChar You mean Fukaya Category?

Arctic Char

@Andrews Yes. I donno what happened to me when I typed those comments. Full of typos and grammatical mistakes.....

Andrews

05:44

@MartinSleziak I suppose they'll be unsurprisingly deleted by Saad soon as long as he's online.

Martin Sleziak

06:12

@Andrews Which you mention as a good thing or as a bad thing?

If somebody created some tags without putting too much thought into it, it's better that they are removed.

in Math Mods' Office, 2 days ago, by Arctic Char

@MartinSleziak, yes it is, but (1) SE won't change the system anyway, and (2) if one consider only more advanced subject, there are still 1-2 users in quite some fields doing daily cleanup. So I would say more advanced subject, the tag systems is still working okay.

Perhaps that falls under daily clean up.

Logic programming

Logic programming is a type of programming paradigm which is largely based on formal logic. Any program written in a logic programming language is a set of sentences in logical form, expressing facts and rules about some problem domain. Major logic programming language families include Prolog, Answer set programming (ASP) and Datalog. In all of these languages, rules are written in the form of clauses: H :- B1, …, Bn.and are read declaratively as logical implications: H if B1 and … and Bn.H is called the head of the rule and B1, …, Bn is called the body. Facts are rules that have no body, and...

Closed-world assumption

The closed-world assumption (CWA), in a formal system of logic used for knowledge representation, is the presumption that a statement that is true is also known to be true. Therefore, conversely, what is not currently known to be true, is false. The same name also refers to a logical formalization of this assumption by Raymond Reiter. The opposite of the closed-world assumption is the open-world assumption (OWA), stating that lack of knowledge does not imply falsity. Decisions on CWA vs. OWA determine the understanding of the actual semantics of a conceptual expression with the same notations of...

I do not know that area well enough to know whether these tags are potentially going to be useful or not.

Is it clear to you that they are going to be useful?

I'll just repeat what Asaf Karagila said. (He was not a moderator at the time, but I do not think it changes that much.)

There is a saying that it's easier to apologize later than get permission first. I disagree with that when it comes to new tags. When I see a new tag which wasn't discussed on meta first, I will almost always delete it. Especially if I wouldn't be 168% sure that I'd agree with having that tag on the site. — Asaf Karagila ♦ Oct 2 '14 at 4:36

And even if we look at the answer here: Should every new tag be discussed on meta before creation?

> That said, it should be incumbent on the tag-creator to fill in a tag-excerpt and at least a stub of a tag-wiki mentioning the scope of the tag shortly after its creation. New tags lacking either of these are probably fair game for quick removal (although many of our largest tags don't have a tag-wiki to speak of).

> The tag-creator should probably also make an effort to demonstrate the value of the tag by adding it to some reasonable number of existing questions. (A well-reasoned meta-argument about the value of a tag doesn't mean much if it's not put into practice.)

So far the tag-creator has did neither of those things.

Andrews

06:54

@MartinSleziak I mean now that the tags may not exsit for long, I don't hope to see these short-life tags bother you and us.

Martin Sleziak

To be honest, I did not understood the above message. But that probably matters that much!

It's not important whether creating tags and retagging bothers some users - the important thing is whether it is useful for the site.

Andrews

I suggest we should add some instruction when creating new tags, there's no such thing yet.

Martin Sleziak

In any case, I am glad that recently this room get a bit more visitors than usually. (Although clearly, various users do not agree with each other about some tag-related stuff, But that is to be expected on almost any topic - not only tags.)

Andrews

When creating new tags, it only shows *Did you intend to create these tags?
Check your spelling and make sure existing tags do not already cover the topic.*

Martin Sleziak

@Andrews There are several posts on meta about creating tags. It's true that there isn't a single post which would briefly summarize best practices in creating tags.

However, I am a bit skeptical whether it would be even possible to write down something with which every (or almost every) user would agree.

Some of the past discussions about tag creations: New Tags: When? or How liberally should we handle tag creation?

@quid What do you think about some kind of faq (or faq-proposed) post on meta? (As suggested above by Andrews.)

Andrews

07:04

Martin Sleziak

I believe this was implemented in 2015 as a result of this discussion - before that there was no pop-up: Warning for new tags.

Of course, some basic info about creating tags is in the help-center: math.stackexchange.com/help/privileges/create-tags (I suppose that it is not too much to expect that tag-creator at least have read this.) But certainly, there is a space for improvements - at the very least, if there is a separate post on meta about with tag-creation FAQ, link to that post could be added there.

Andrews

07:19

As in the picture, you can't find any instruction on creating new tags. At least we can add a link in the help-center

Martin Sleziak

That might be reasonable. I have pinged quid above. (He seems to be the moderator who deals with tag-related issues most often.) We will see what they say about this.

Or if some FAQ on creation tag is created on meta, that link could go there.

Another issue is (as I just noticed) that the warning is not shown on meta.

I have noticed that the warning only appears on the main site. Perhaps it could be reasonable to extend this on the main site? (I found out this by mistake - I wanted to check the exact text shown in the warning. So I tried to create a new tag in this question - and I found out that I was shown nothing.) — Martin Sleziak 11 mins ago

Andrews

10:56

@MartinSleziak Two new tags logic-programming and closed-world-assumption were deleted by Saad: math.stackexchange.com/posts/3182485/revisions

Andrews

14:34

@MartinSleziak You used [Edit removed during grace period] to bump the post Warning for new tags on meta?

Martin Sleziak

No, not really.

As I explained in the comment above, I bumped it by mistake.

> I wanted to check the exact text shown in the warning. So I tried to create a new tag in this question - and I found out that I was shown nothing.

Andrews

BTW, will discussion on meta several years ago not out-of-date?

Martin Sleziak

So what happened was hat I typed something among the tags, expecting that I will be shown a warning before the edit is saved. You can still see asdf among the new tags.

@Andrews It depends on the topic.

If there was some discussion about the same issue since then which changed community consensus/site policy, then it is no longer relevant.

But clearly, not every issue can be revisited every few montsh.

@Andrews Do you have some specific post on meta in mind?

quid

@MartinSleziak sure, actually I am surprised it does not exist.

2

Andrews

@MartinSleziak No, I'm just wondering if there's a rough criterion for this.

quid

14:41

Having links in the help-center and the pop-up is more complicated.

Andrews

And in comment "I have noticed that the warning only appears on the main site. Perhaps it could be reasonable to extend this on the main site?", do you mean "extend this on the meta cite"?

Martin Sleziak

@quid Well, one reason I can think of is that it might be difficult to write down something to which most of the community will agree. (Just see the recent disagreement in the Math Mods' Office about a new tag and general practices with creating new tags.)

And an additional reason is that probably nobody bothered to write down something.

Yes, I meant that warnings should also be shown on meta and not only on the main site. (I should have noticed the mistake in my comment.)

quid

@MartinSleziak yes, likely that's a reason.

Martin Sleziak

If we're supposed to make some FAQ-post for creating tags, what should go in there?

1. The tag-creator should also create the tag-info.

2. When in doubt, ask on meta rather than just directly create new tags.

3. Advice some caution about creating new tags.

What else?

4. Avoid meta tags.

5. Avoid ambiguous tag names.

I'm not sure I can think of something else from the top of my head. Maybe I should browse a bit through some old meta threads related to this.

Oh, yes - it's better not to retag too many questions soon after creating new tags. (BTW the related feature request has not received attention from SE so far.)

Andrews

@MartinSleziak What do you mean by "avoid meta tags"?

Martin Sleziak

14:56

Here is relevant question: The “meta-tags”..

Ideally, a tag should correspond to some area of mathematics. Tags which can be applied to any area are not so good. Some examples: elementary, difficult, generalization, etc.

There is an agreement that some meta tags are worth keeping, for example, soft-question, reference-request, solution-verification and a few others have been around for some time - and they are unlikely to be removed in the future.

But in general it is better not to have too many tags of this type. Such tags are called meta tags in the SE terminology.

Andrews

online-resources is also one of them? (not frequently used nowadays, though)

Martin Sleziak

Yes, it can be considered a meta tag.

Andrews

And is there a list of all meta tags?

Martin Sleziak

I am quite fond of this tag - but I think I've mentioned that when you brought it up before.

@Andrews No, not really.

I think some people would not even agree whether or not some of the tags should be considered meta tags.

Andrews

@MartinSleziak Yes, I remember this

Martin Sleziak

15:03

For example, is applications to be considered a meta tag, or not.

The fact that I personally like the tag should not mean that much. (And since I mentioned that I am in favor of keeping that tag, to some extent it's my responsibility to add it to question where it is suitable.)

@quid Since you happen to be here - there are several suggestion in this thread, it was bumped not too long ago: Do we want tag warnings, and for which tags? Do moderators plan to forward some of those suggestions to SE employees and some point so that they get implemented?

Martin Sleziak

15:24

This is what I got as a response on the tag-creations warning (which I bumped by mistake):

@MartinSleziak Easy enough to enable it, but best to start by opening a new discussion here on meta to see if folks generally feel the warning would help. — Adam Lear ♦ 3 mins ago

Martin Sleziak

16:44

I have made a post on meta: Warning when creating a new tag on meta. I am not really sure why it still wasn't picked up by feeds.

quid

17:01

@MartinSleziak the thread predates my tenure. I'd have assumed that's in place.

Martin Sleziak

@quid I don't think any of those warnings already exists.

It can be easily tested by posting a new question.

But I also think that the list here is maintained to be more-or-less complete - and I don't see such warnings there: Which are blacklisted tags and blacklisted phrases?

The warning for (proof-theory) has the highest number of upvotes. I did not get any warning for this question: Test of a tag-warning.

I do not think they are reputation-dependent. (But I might be wrong.)

quid

I see. I'll check.

Martin Sleziak

I have deleted the linked post - the only purpose was to test whether I get some warning.

But I assume that as a moderator you have access directly to the list of phrases, regexes, tags which are used for blacklisting and warnings.

Feeds

23:24

Martin Sleziak has made a change to the feeds posted into this room

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$Mathematics$ Tagging