Re-open question with non-TeX-solution to non-TeX-problem?

Question

[Joseph Wright recommended asking this question here.]

This question has been closed as off-topic because the underlying problem has been determined to be on Adobe Reader's side. Now I've tried a fix for AR and it works great. I wondered if the question should be re-opened and answered accordingly, even though it's a solution outside of (La)TeX. Questions regarding other popular auxiliary tools like TeXnicCenter or Lyx are answered here, too -- so why not one on Adobe Reader?

Considering the open way I worded the question in the title and the text, the fix would definitely answer the question appropriately.

Edit: From the faq:

What kind of questions can I ask here?

If you have a question about ...

• [...]

• (La)TeX related software and tools like BibTeX, LyX, LaTeX editors, viewers, and converters

I guess AR is a "viewer"?

Answer 1

I'd say this is within the scope of the site, albeit borderline. Some questions in the same vein which are not really about TeX, but highly voted and non-controversial:

• How to track changes between PDFs?
• How to create small final PDF files for the Internet

I know the site has more examples non-TeX solutions to issues that seem to be solvable with TeX -- it's certainly not a panacea for any problem you throw at it, and sometimes there's just a better way to skin your particular cat.

The question was asked in a good faith, you clearly believed it has something to do with pdfTeX -- which eventually turned out not to be the case. For this reason, I think it should be allowed to stay and be reopened, you may also answer it yourself with the solution you mentioned in your comment, and that will bring the matter to a close.

To all others: Although I understand the urge to reduce the number of unanswerable and off-topic questions, which are partly a consequence of our "no-excessive-downvote" pseudo-policy, let's try not to end up with a "close police" as certain other SE sites.

Answer 2

I'd like to point out that not all closing is meant negatively. There was a suggestion to move this question to SuperUser. I have no idea what happens on SuperUser, but if it were more likely that the question would have gotten an answer more quickly on SU then migration would have been absolutely the right thing to do.

There's a fine line between "questions about TeX and friends" and "questions that users of TeX and friends may be interested in". On MO, I'm quite hardline about this, but here I'd be more relaxed. The "asked in good faith" test is a little hard to apply as it relies on a judgement of motives, but I think the rule-of-thumb that I'd use is: "Is it a question that a user of TeX might come across when they are working on a TeX-thingy?".

Obviously, if we get a flood of questions about Acrobat then we might need to be a little more strict ...

(And I completely agree with Martin's call for not having a "close police")

Answer 3

Sure, seems fine. I nominated it for reopening. It'll take 4 other users (or a mod) to reopen it.