1

Please have a look at this question:

using sql without any server

The answer by pQd is correct if a bit short. Someone else posted a duplicate answer and received the upvotes instead.

Here's pQd's answer (now deleted) in its entirety:

try sqlite.

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13
  • 4
    I'm not seeing this. Is the pQd answer now deleted? Regardless, the answer to questions like this tends to be "yeah, sometimes the rep system isn't 'fair,' and we've all lost out on some rep that's 'rightfully ours' at one point or another; best to just move on to another question."
    – Pops
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:30
  • @PopularDemand Yes. I updated this question to include it.
    – Adam Lear StaffMod
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:30
  • 11
    Upon review: good job, anonymous (to me) moderator. Just posting a link is barely an answer at all. At least Eclipse's answer includes a non-zero amount of justification ("cross-platform, self-contained and serverless").
    – Pops
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:34
  • @PopularDemand - agree, but couldn't Bill have given him more than 4 minutes to elaborate on the answer more before deleting it?
    – Adam Rackis
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:38
  • 2
    Good point, @AdamRackis. I did briefly consider that, but based on Bill's past performance, I gave him the benefit of the doubt and figured that he had reason to believe that the answer wouldn't be updated.
    – Pops
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:41
  • @PopularDemand - yeah. Looking at the user in question, he's been a member for almost 3 years, and has a total of 10 posts. Bill was probably right on this one.
    – Adam Rackis
    Dec 13, 2011 at 23:43
  • 4
    Worth noting that extremely short answers like that tend to show up in the low quality posts section of Review, where folks are quick to flag them...
    – Shog9
    Dec 14, 2011 at 0:01
  • meta.stackexchange.com/questions/116301/… "Link-only answers can be actively harmful if links break. And they do break, even on sites that are seemingly going to be around forever..."
    – gnat
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:26
  • @gnat: the original answer did not include a link
    – Andomar
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:31
  • I see. what makes you think that original answer did not include a link?
    – gnat
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:46
  • @gnat: Well, that's the way I remember it. It was edited later to add the link. Then a moderator copied the version with the link over to meta. The original answer is gone, so hard to double-check.
    – Andomar
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:57
  • undeleted revision shows the link: stackoverflow.com/revisions/… "try [sqlite][1].(line break)(line break) [1]: sqlite.org"
    – gnat
    Dec 28, 2011 at 14:07
  • @gnat: Looks like you're right, I thought that was his 2nd answer, but it's the undeleted original.
    – Andomar
    Dec 28, 2011 at 14:35

3 Answers 3

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14

pQd is correct if a bit short

The emphasis here is mine; the problem here is that the answer whilst technically correct is virtually without substance - or rather, link only. Perhaps I should explain. There is quite a "usefulness chasm" between this answer:

Try SQlite.

and:

Try SQlite. SQLite is a sql-like database system that saves the database state to a single file somewhere on the file system, as opposed to requiring a full server. It does not have the full performance optimisations in SQL terms of full servers such as Postgres or MySQL; however, it does not require the overhead of a server.

and so on. The accepted answer contains some extra info:

It's cross-platform, self-contained and serverless.

Which the other does not.

Let's look at it from another angle entirely. Suppose I gave this answer:

Use UnicornDB!

You've never heard of UnicornDB. Unlike sqlite, 99% of SO do not know what it is. As an answer, therefore, it is unhelpful. Are you going to follow the link? Maybe. But the problem with links is link rot. So when the author of the project decides he/she is fed up and issues 410's to you, we no longer have an answer that was valid because aside from that link there is no information in it.

Long story short, if you want your answers not to be deleted it is best to ensure they contain more than two words and a link. Or, if you prefer it in web terms, don't issue redirects in answers.

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2
  • I've undeleted the answer. If you don't mind, I copied the SQLite description you posted here.
    – NullUserException อ_อ
    Dec 14, 2011 at 0:04
  • Nope not at all. It's not the best description I have ever given but never mind...!
    – user142852
    Dec 14, 2011 at 0:19
7

The answer was probably flagged as "not an answer" or "should be a comment" and subsequently deleted by a 10K+ user or moderator. There is no hard-and-fast rule about how much information needs to be in an answer, but some people would certainly consider a single link to be too short to be considered a "real" answer. Providing an answer that comprises a single link is bad for a number of reasons.

  1. It suffers from "link rot"
  2. It requires the reader to click through to another site to get information that should have been summarized in the answer
  3. It can be perceived as a shameless plug for the linked site

Remember that Stack Overflow gets a lot of traffic and generates a correspondingly large number of flags. It would be very easy for a reviewer to see this post under the review tab and flag it without a second thought, and equally easy for a 10K+ user or moderator to delete it and move on to the next one of thousands of unresolved flags.

Shog9 ♦ has pointed out one more reason that answers like this will probably be flagged:

links are stripped from the text shown on the Review page - the answer would have appeared as, "try sqlite.", two words, nothing more.

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  • 5
    It was flagged as Not an Answer. Also worth noting: links are stripped from the text shown on the Review page - the answer would have appeared as, "try sqlite.", two words, nothing more.
    – Shog9
    Dec 14, 2011 at 0:14
-5

Disagree with the other answers. A longer answer would provide an inferior experience to just Googling for "SQLite". SO is supposed to make the web better, not worse.

(I'm just answering my own question because the system prompts me to do so, and I disagree with the other answers.)

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6
  • How can "It's not what I'm looking for according to that description in this answer" inferior to "I spend minutes searching the web for the correct website and now I know it's not what I'm looking for"?
    – Time Traveling Bobby
    Dec 28, 2011 at 12:45
  • This is rather bad form, but I guess you can tell from the downvotes
    – prusswan
    Dec 28, 2011 at 12:49
  • I guess that should read "a longer answer with just generic info"? I feel that a longer answer with specific, on-topic info would be different from just a search for SQLite.
    – Arjan
    Dec 28, 2011 at 12:50
  • @Bobby: Because the descriptions on the web are much better than a 1-minute scribbling on SO. And also because SQLite is actively changing.
    – Andomar
    Dec 28, 2011 at 12:56
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    As discussed earlier the consensus is not to write a "1-minute scribbling", but rather summarize or quote the stuff you're linking to, so that the answer itself is reasonable well written and informative.
    – Time Traveling Bobby
    Dec 28, 2011 at 13:37
  • even if you didn't agree with the other answers, there was no need to be subjected to pressure from the system ;)
    – prusswan
    Dec 28, 2011 at 14:12

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