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How can we be more coherent about tagging?

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Some discussion was held at: meta.gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/494/…. I've since decided that we could probably shift them to [fps]. – Grace Note♦ Jul 23 '10 at 13:50
If we do decide something, one of the two synonyms (rpg ← role-playing-game and first-person-shooter ← fps) needs to go. – badp♦ Jul 28 '10 at 11:37

2 Answers

up vote 5 down vote

I worry about [fps] in particular, since it's commonly overloaded in the gaming community, meaning [first-person-shooter] and [frames-per-second]. It's my opinion that we should use always use the long form, and synonym to the short form.

I'm ok with either solution, but for crying out loud, one way or the other, and consistent synonyms.

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I actually agree with Jeff regarding FPS specifically, because even though we will get questions about frames-per-second, with all due respect "framerate" is a better tag. It is overloaded, but not that significantly, and we have a better alternative. – Grace Note♦ Jul 23 '10 at 14:47
@Grace I'm willing to accept that. – C. Ross Jul 23 '10 at 14:55
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Just have fps ← first-person-shooter, add a synonym and retag the few that are about framerate. Currently the ratio is 3 to 25. I implemented framerate ← frames-per-second, please check the synonym proposal – badp♦ Jul 23 '10 at 15:15
up vote 2 down vote

I think we can afford to use TLAs when they're common between experts. [first-person-shooters] should become [fps]; we can then add a synonym into the system through the tag page, info tab.

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@badp I endorse your request, [fps] instead of [first-person-shooter] – user59 Jul 23 '10 at 17:50
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Because no one will ever confuse that with frames per second... – tzenes Jul 25 '10 at 1:17
Think of the synonym system: what can you do without error, [fps] ← [first-person-shooter] or [first-person-shooter] ← [fps]? – badp♦ Jul 25 '10 at 9:07
@tzenes: agreed, discussions of FPS in [zone] of [game] are very pertinent to some games, esp mmorpgs where latency kills. FPS for shooters is the more common of the two as its a genre, but frames are common for trouble shooting/advice. i think that FPS (for either meaning) will fail due to its ambivalence. someone could use it to inaccurately refer to Frames / First without realizing it. – mfg Jul 30 '10 at 13:39
@mfg, if somebody gets it wrong there are many users with the retagging stick who can fix it. We have 26 questions on first person shooters and all of 3 questions on framerate, so framerate discussion is quite rare so far. All the fears about FPS also meaning frames per seconds are really overblown. – badp♦ Jul 30 '10 at 16:42
@badp consider the following: User comes to the site, wants to know how to increase framerate in Dwarf fortress. Types in the tags [Dwarf Fortress] [FPS]. Both valid tags. Antony comes along (big DF guy on gaming.SE) and knows this is wrong and retags [Dwarf Fortress] [Framerate]. Easy fix. Now imagine another person come to the site with the same question and searches for [Dwarf Fortress] [FPS]. Gets no results so asks the question again... Or says, this site sucks, and goes away... Or worse goes through and retags every [Framerate] as [FPS]. An [FPS] tag sounds like asking for trouble. – tzenes Jul 30 '10 at 17:00
@tzenes: it's three out of 1,160 questions. – badp♦ Jul 30 '10 at 17:26
@badp try to imagine if there were 2,000 [FPS] and 250 [Framerate] (same ratio) and someone goes through and retags them all. Finding the 250 needles in that Haystack is not something I want to do. Though, this argument could just as easily be solved by not having an [FPS] tag (making it an unusable tag). Its not the [Framerate] tag I object to its the [FPS] one. – tzenes Jul 31 '10 at 2:50
@badp i think you have a good point on scale. also, it may not be ideal but regarding re-asking the question, the user would be prompted to check out the other posts about framerate (unless they use only FPS). – mfg Aug 2 '10 at 12:26

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