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This question stems from a comment by F'x on this question of mine. He said

in its current wording, this is a poll question (“how do people manage…”)

I fully agree with his comment, but I think I disagree with the idea that all poll type question are "off-topic". To me a poll question like "which software should I use to do X" is a poll question that likely will generate a big list of answers of software specifically designed for a task and are unlikely to have a "correct" answer.

I feel many questions on AC.SE, including the one in question, are "how do I manage X" where there are not any/many canned solutions. So while the questions are in essence performing a poll, I don't think they are big list type questions and may actually have a "correct" answer. Are these questions on topic?

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I'll explain in a bit more detail what I meant by my comment. All questions ask for answers, and many questions asks for solutions, procedures, software, etc. These are fine questions to have. To me, a question becomes a poll question when it asks people what they are doing, to measure popularity of various solutions. Then, you'll have one “I use git” answer, with 12 “+1” comments, one “I use svn” answer, with 7 “+1”, one “I use a flat directory structure with date-based file naming” answer, etc.

It's not only about software, mind you. “What process do you use to do X” is also a poll question. It's asking for people's own usage, which is highly subjective. I believe it would be much better to frame such questions as “Here's how I am currently doing that thing, what are the pros and cons of my method and what modifications can you suggest?”.

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