The whole site is about coding, so it seems kind of silly to have a tag for it. Was that tag intended to refer to something specific? Is there some reason certain questions should be tagged "coding" and others shouldn't? Looking at the list of questions tagged "coding" I don't see anything most of them have in common (except that they're all presumably about programming, of course). So I figure either the tag is being widely misused and should be renamed or at least explained in a tag wiki, or it's useless and should be deleted.
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Related question: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/3127/…– Andrew GrimmApr 7, 2011 at 5:03
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It could refer to a function or parameter name in some programming languages. It's in some contexts a short form for encoding. But most of the occurences seem indeed of the suspected dull and synonymical kind.– marioApr 7, 2011 at 5:04
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Incidentally @Robert Harvey was something done about this when you marked it status-completed?– David ZApr 7, 2011 at 18:10
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Yes, I removed all the tags, see stackoverflow.com/questions/tagged/coding. The tag is not banned, as I don't have that power, but you can email [email protected] to make the ban request. Reference this question in your email.– user102937Apr 7, 2011 at 18:11
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@Robert: ok thanks, I'll do that.– David ZApr 7, 2011 at 18:16
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Whup...Spoke too soon. I must have had some weird sort going on, because there's still 200+ questions tagged [coding]. Unmarking as completed.– user102937Apr 7, 2011 at 23:23
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3 Answers
Agreed, it is now burninated.
answered Apr 9, 2011 at 4:25
Aside from the fact that almost all the users on the front page of that topic are brand new and the ones that aren't probably don't think they'll get the traction they want on programmers (not the toilet bowl!) then I think that the main thing there is that it's a tag that indicates that someone is new to the site and doesn't quite understand it.
I would suggest that you take the initiative and use that tag as a way to welcome new users and help them focus their questions and learn to ask better questions and be a better community member ;)
This is the only user on that front page that I would've expected to actually ask their question on P.SE Alternative descriptions for 'refactoring' that make a manager happy? https://stackoverflow.com/users/48181/martinus
Otherwise I wonder if the use of this tag wouldn't be another good metric to say "hey, new user, how can we help them be a better member of the community!"
answered Apr 7, 2011 at 5:09
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Programmers is a chocolate bar burial facility, not a toilet bowl! Apr 7, 2011 at 23:56
I would interpret that tag to refer to coding styles and practices. Many such questions would belong more on Programmers than regular SO, but there could be some that manage to fit, such as questions like "how can I properly refactor the following code?"
answered Apr 7, 2011 at 5:11
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1OK, but in that case I think the tag should be called something like
coding-stylesinstead.– David ZApr 7, 2011 at 5:21 -
@David Zaslavsky - Agreed, but there might conceivably be questions that don't quite fit. It should be rarely used, but I'd say it's narrower than the pointless "programming" tag (which I think has been removed). Apr 7, 2011 at 6:00