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I just saw this post on the Mathematica SE meta, referencing this one on Ask Ubuntu, with a new feature SE is trialling in SO. These are "tag warnings", which are meant to alert users about things they should be doing in the course of adding tags to their question. Here is a relevant screenshot:

tag warning example

This comes with a warning:

However, note that this feature is still experimental, so we don't know how well it performs, if at all (and we might eventually remove it).

However, they could still be useful, and we could volunteer to field-test it in a non-code SE site. Off the top of my head, this could be a good place for the ugly caps in the and tags, which have a steady stream of people that ignore them. It could also be a good place for a gentle nudge towards our homework-and-exercises meta page.

If you think Physics.SE should experiment with this feature, please provide a tag and corresponding warning as an answer (consider including an explanation, too!). Upvote suggestions you agree with, downvote suggestions you disagree with. If, on the other hand, you think Physics should stay out of this, leave an answer to that effect instead.

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    $\begingroup$ Seems like a great idea. $\endgroup$
    – Danu
    Commented Nov 10, 2015 at 12:07
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    $\begingroup$ Sounds like a great idea and it could be the nay-sayer in me, but I cannot imagine the whole thing working as expected (i.e., people are going to ignore it because either they don't know better or they just don't care; this partly is why we are allowed to edit things to make it better). $\endgroup$
    – Kyle Kanos
    Commented Nov 10, 2015 at 12:53
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    $\begingroup$ I think this is a brilliant idea for tags like homework-and-exercises or resource-recommendation where people should read the guidance in meta before posting according to the tag description, and also for easily misused tags like mathematical-physics or measurement-problem. $\endgroup$
    – ACuriousMind Mod
    Commented Nov 10, 2015 at 13:54
  • $\begingroup$ Great idea. Similar meta post on Math.SE: meta.math.stackexchange.com/q/21873/11127 $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Nov 11, 2015 at 21:33
  • $\begingroup$ FYI: It appears that Phys.SE moderators don't have the privilege to create/edit tag warnings by themselves. We would need to ask the SE team to implement any tag warning. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 21, 2017 at 23:28
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    $\begingroup$ This thread should probably be CW to encourage improving the answers. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 22, 2017 at 12:53

6 Answers 6

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Do not use this tag unless your question is about the fundamental research area called mathematical physics. Questions do not qualify for this tag simply because they involve math.

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  • $\begingroup$ I fully agree with having a warning for this tag, but I don't think this is the text it should have. This explains what m.phys is (so it's perfectly fine as the tag wiki excerpt) but it does very little to help someone unfamiliar with the field know why they shouldn't be using the tag. $\endgroup$
    – David Z Mod
    Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 1:50
  • $\begingroup$ Feel free to try to improve answer. (Older versions can be accessed via the edit history anyway.) $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 28, 2017 at 13:37
  • $\begingroup$ Whoops, I only just remembered this... anyway I've edited to propose a new wording. $\endgroup$
    – David Z Mod
    Commented Aug 17, 2017 at 7:27
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DO NOT USE THIS TAG if a more descriptive tag applies.

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  • $\begingroup$ No longer necessary, because it's a dead tag... $\endgroup$
    – auden
    Commented Jul 31, 2017 at 23:39
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    $\begingroup$ July 27, 2017: general-physics tag now officially blacklisted. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Aug 2, 2017 at 15:20
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This is NOT a homework help site or a site which solves random problems presented by users. Please show your work to solve the problem and ask a conceptual, focused question about the problem. See How do I ask homework questions on Physics Stack Exchange? for details.

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    $\begingroup$ I'm not at all a fan of that 'random' in the first sentence, and I feel that the focus should be on the conceptual nature of questions first and the need to show work second (or we get "but I put my workings!" and similar complaints). There also seems to be no way to include links in the tag warning. $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Commented Aug 3, 2017 at 8:59
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DO NOT USE THIS TAG just because the question contains an equation of motion!

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    $\begingroup$ Please help me understand this. The tag info says "DO NOT USE THIS TAG just because the question contains an equation of motion! Almost all physical systems have equations of motion, with the possible exception of static systems. Hence it is often a poor way to classify a question to use this tag." Thus, the entire info is the warning. Unless it guides users regarding what it is to be used for, how can any one use this tag meaningfully? What use would be this warning? And well, if we don't want posts about e-o-m to be tagged with e-o-m tag, why don't we simply burninate this tag? $\endgroup$
    – 299792458
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 5:40
  • $\begingroup$ Because for certain questions it is presumably the most appropriate tag. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 5:53
  • $\begingroup$ But shouldn't the info mention what kind are these certain questions for which it is appropriate? i.e. some usage guidelines too, apart from the warning? $\endgroup$
    – 299792458
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 5:55
  • $\begingroup$ Possibly. It is just that nobody has gotten around to do that yet. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 6:01
  • $\begingroup$ I can volunteer, but right now, the problem is, I myself don't see the utility :P That's why I posted that comment. Maybe someone will stumble on to this some day, find some purpose for this tag, and fix this. :) $\endgroup$
    – 299792458
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 6:05
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DO NOT USE THIS TAG just because the question deals with a law of physics!

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    $\begingroup$ I feel that this one and the EOM one could use some added detail on what the tag should be used for. $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Commented Jul 22, 2017 at 13:21
  • $\begingroup$ Right, I agree. This was meant as a start. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 22, 2017 at 13:23
  • $\begingroup$ Why does this tag even exist? It is as meaningless as "general physics". I will propose to remove it. $\endgroup$
    – valerio
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 15:38
  • $\begingroup$ centralcharge beats you to it. $\endgroup$
    – Qmechanic Mod
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 15:46
  • $\begingroup$ Just seen it. How many votes are required to proceed with the elimination? I feel that that thread is a really good one, but not enough people take a look at it really: 337 views in 4 years? We should do something about its visibility, even if I'm not sure about what... $\endgroup$
    – valerio
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 15:55
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DO NOT USE THIS TAG just because your equation has code in it! If your question is on debugging code, ask it on Stack Overflow.

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    $\begingroup$ How much evidence is there that this tag actually gets misused in practice? The tag warning wouldn't hurt either way, but I'm not fully sure this one is that necessary. $\endgroup$
    – Emilio Pisanty
    Commented Jul 23, 2017 at 0:20
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    $\begingroup$ Not to mention that SO isn't the only (and probably not the likely) place for the kinds of questions/debugging that would show up here. Computational Science or Code Review may be more apt. Or Cross Validated depending on the question. There's a lot of other places that would be context specific since we deal with science-related codes. $\endgroup$
    – tpg2114
    Commented Jul 31, 2017 at 18:57

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