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For some context, have a look at this meta question, and the comments below it:

Merge the multidimensional-ish tags

Note that the OP is asking for a consolidation. All of the tags that start with the words "Multi-Dimensional" would be merged into a single tag.

But is this the way to go? And if it is, does it apply across-the-board? In other words, is this a unifying principle of tag management?

Or is the unifying principle that all tags should have a single meaning, and therefore we should have a greater number of more-specific tags, as in [multidimensional-array] and [multidimensional-database]?

Or is it some other principle? Or is there no unifying principle at all, and every tag merge/retag request must be handled on a case-by-case basis?

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    I vote for single meaning, with possibly a few rare exceptions. multidimensional is too multidimensional to be useful, IMO.
    – Daniel Fischer
    Jun 6, 2012 at 22:11
  • @DanielFischer: Is [html-lists] one of those exceptions? Note that this proposal succeeded, but this one failed.
    – user102937
    Jun 6, 2012 at 22:18
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    I would even rate that as a single meaning, lists in html. I'm not convinced ordered-list and unordered-list should necessarily be synonymed, but no other programming-related use of those comes to mind, so I don't object. Similarly, unsigned-int, short-int etc. belong to integer and don't stop its meaning to be single enough.
    – Daniel Fischer
    Jun 6, 2012 at 22:35

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I don't think there's a unifying principle and it should be based on usage.

Example of a good general tag - argues for general tags

I follow the very general tag . Its a top 15 tag with 80K questions and its got 11K followers. Even though it crosses many technologies you can effectively answers questions across all of them. People have requested that you shouldn't even be able to have this tag with specifying the RDMS and has been rejected.

Example of a bad general tag - argues for a specific tag

is such an overloaded term that it needed to be banned because people writing VB.NET code didn't want to answer Excel macro questions.

Examples of good general tags that don't really work by themselves - also argues for a general tag

Even though tags should be useful by themselves general tags , , , (all top 40 tags) really aren't. Instead these general tag are extremely useful for people who love to answer or and , but don't really want to answer and . I also don't think anyone wants , , etc..

tl;dr If we try to apply one reasoning for or against general tags to the wrong case we end up with a sub-optimal solution.

On multidimensional

Based on actual usage I think we should have (3K questions) and (423 questions). The combination of and (3 questions) isn't really used and whoever brought that up was not being very helpful.

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  • Uhh... The person who brought up the combination of database and multidimensional was you.
    – user184498
    Jun 6, 2012 at 23:21
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    so you're saying Some Helpful Commenter was not being very helpful
    – Some Helpful Commenter
    Jun 6, 2012 at 23:26

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