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Zap the [advice] "meta-tag" has already been addressed at some point, but it's come up recently again. A search on yields 62 questions, most (if not all) are highly subjective.

Can this tag be addressed (and blacklisted)?

It's definitely a meta-tag, and shouldn't be hanging around even after it was removed the first time.

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Personally I see no reason to keep tags that go against the whole purpose of a Q&A site.

Since advice usually translates into "what should I do when..." or "What can I use for...", this tag should be burninate and blacklisted to prevent further usage.

Take the very essence of advice:

Opinion about what could or should be done about a situation or problem; counsel.

This is not the purpose of a Q&A site, as stated by the FAQ, where it read on the first paragraph:

You should only ask practical, answerable questions based on actual problems that you face.

advice, by the bellow analysis, ends up on a chatty situation where the answers are personal opinions or a guidance on a broad subject, not a practical solution to a practical problem at hand.


After going thru the 61 questions that are currently using the tag :

End up closed: 13 Questions

Meaning that they were not respecting what stated by the FAQ.

Not a single line of code: 40 Questions

Meaning that all or almost all of them have no practical problem to be solved, ending up most of the times generating an opinion as an answer or a chatty situation.

No Answers: 5 Questions

No users relating with the question subject.


as a specific language tag

There are four questions that use the as a language-specific tag, and for those particular cases, the tag itself should be prefixed with the programming language that it refers to, avoiding having the same tag with two very different meanings.

  1. Exception produced in “before()” advice is caught too late
  2. AspectJ - Is it possible to catch execution of an advice?
  3. Policy enforcement to add a new item - ASPECTJ
  4. Emacs/Emacs Lisp: can I insert advice before interactive form? or how to intelligently pre-set the compile-command?

I did found this description for advice at Introduction to AspectJ:

To actually implement crosscutting behavior, we use advice. Advice brings together a pointcut (to pick out join points) and a body of code (to run at each of those join points).


summary of questions with an unnecessary usage of the tag

Found some questions where the advice tag is not needed, since the remaining tags are specific enough to identify the question and capture the relevant users attention:

python temporarily disable try except blocks [closed]

Building structure (MVC?) into an existing messy javascript / jQuery web application

Need advice on design domain object with good OO

php mvc business logic - need advice

How to use @package & @subpackage in phpdoc?

Understanding production level code that is uncommented

advice on datastructure for ajax/javascript/jquery page

is there something like pic c documentation?

Please go over my ActiveRecord Associations for Appointments

What are some arguments AGAINST using EntityFramework?

Continue with Python, or would the Arduino be easier?

Implementation design for serializable command pattern

is there method of automatically filling in foreign keys SQL

Webpage, accessing data from 3rd party sites (How hard?)

How to control network client pc

S3 Alternatives for storage of 2Gb?

Advice on purchasing the book “Service-Oriented Design with Ruby and Rails” by Paul Dix

Erlang / Python framework for Web2.0 / Mobile2.0 application, includes video, chat, click-to-call etc

Handle options and Functions?

Perl MVC to replace my current website code?

Can I set a state within a function?

Current project tells me I need to look at Javascript OOP, should I?

Advise on a payment system (PayPal API or other)

Advise on a payment system (PayPal API or other)

How can I build a online chat website?

Class structure for the proposed data and its containers?

Is SharePoint a good solution for me?

Delphi and storing database

will coding and learning asp.net mvc as I go be disastrous or effective

Environment setup for front-end development

Creating custom XML widgets for Android UI


as a stand-alone tag or meta-tag is not recommended due to the misleading of its name, since it could be a language-specific issue or a "cry for help".

The tag should be Burnidate and removed from the questions that really don't need it.

Also, questions that are using it as a language-specific tag, should have it replaced with an advice-something or something-advice tag that really specifies what she refers to. This way users will not use this tag to ask questions like "should I use x or y for my website?", leaving it be to identify a language-specific method.

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