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I know it's not recommended to add tags to titles, e.g., "Javascript - how to remove extra spaces between words". Without "javascript" the title can be applied to multiple languages. I often want to go back and find a post I made via a web search engine or have others find it for that matter. If I leave "Javascript" out of the title, I feel like I need to add the title plus "Javascript" in the description.

Is that what we are expected to do? I don't think tags can effectively be used by external search engines.

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    I think the most relevant tag is already automatically part of the <title> of the particular question's html... – Bart Aug 15 '12 at 13:03
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    Good point, but it's already being addressed: Stack Overflow automatically adds the first (or most important? I don't remember) tag to the page's title for that reason. – Pëkka Aug 15 '12 at 13:03
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    You could always make it a real question. "How can I remove extra spaces between words using JavaScript?" It makes it more human readable, puts the key terms in the title, and doesn't read like someone trying to tweak SEO. – ale Aug 15 '12 at 13:06
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    Is there a problem with searching "[javascript] how to remove extra spaces between words"? – Gaffi Aug 15 '12 at 14:00
  • @gafi - On SO directly I imagine that will work well. I'm referring to SEO. Updated question to reflect as such. – P.Brian.Mackey Aug 15 '12 at 14:04
  • @Bart: Most popular tag, not necessarily most relevant (to the question). – ale Aug 15 '12 at 14:14
  • @TartLevee 90% of what I say is nonsense. The other 10% is best ignored. ;) Thanks for that though. I vaguely remembered something. – Bart Aug 15 '12 at 14:22
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You are not expected to worry about this.

The SEO is already taken care of for you. Your best shot at getting your question to show up in people's results is to ask it in the most natural way and use the system the way it it was designed. Properly tagging your question with the most relevant tags will serve the end you mention far more effectively than fiddling with your own question title. The tags help you show up in other pages of related content and they also get factored in to the page title and cross-linked from tag urls.

Don't tag stuff your question titles, just ask the most natural language version of your question that is easy to read and understand. If your question is readable and relevant, the machinery will do the rest for you.

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