If a question is asked as a statement should it be edited?

Question

The question is pretty self explanatory, but to give a little background: I see a lot of questions (specially new users) that are, in fact, statements like: "I want to load my .txt file from another Directory", "Set width of a single colummn according to Content", "Need to add for loop to add a lot of .csv files in the tikzpicture" or "When i right-click i Texmaker the box that usually appears is almost at the top of the page" and so on.

Should those sort of "questions" be edited to turn into proper questions?

I belive this is relevant to improve Performances of Google searches but if it's not relevant please explain why.

Answer 1

This is a syntax question. :)

The problem with most of the questions you refer to is a different one, I think. I don't think the problem is that they aren't questions, but the fact that they include first person subjects or verbs that express needs and desires of the speaker, such as want or need.

So a question like:

• I want to stop a macro from gobbling spaces

if you turned it into a question without changing anything else would be:

• How do I stop a macro from gobbling spaces?

Another way to phrase it would be:

• How to stop a macro from gobbling spaces?

The change here is to remove the first person subject and instead use a "generic" subject (in this case an understood one).

Furthermore, I think that the titles of questions are always interpreted implicitly as questions, so editing them just to turn them into questions isn't particularly helpful, and may even be detrimental. So personally I much prefer a syntax more like:

• Stopping macros from gobbling spaces

Although I like this syntax, I don't think there's much to be gained from changing questions like the one above into a how-to version of the question, nor am I proposing the elimination of all questions with first person subjects. So if that's the only change you make, I don't think it's at all appropriate. It's much more important to make the question contentful. In this respect I agree entirely with Sam's answer too.

But question phrased like:

• My macro keeps gobbling spaces

could likely stand to be rephrase without using my.

One final point. Sometimes rephrasing a statement into a question simply adds useless information. If the statement states a clear problem like:

• Memoir inserts a blank page before chapter

then rephrasing it as a question would simply make it much more wordy, and really doesn't add anything of value at all.

• How do I stop memoir from inserting a blank page before a chapter

The same kind of logic applies to most questions that concern unexpected behaviour or errors. These questions should almost certainly not be restated in the form of an actual question.

Clarification

I'm not proposing that all questions should be turned into this syntax. Questions like How do I stop a macro from gobbling spaces are just as concise as How to stop a macro from gobbling spaces.

I am also absolutely opposed to any idea that this proposal (were it to become very popular) be instituted as a "site rule", since I think having rule-enforcing posses is just as bad as the behaviour that those self-appointed posses are trying to stomp out.

The Bottom Line

Changing the wording of otherwise clear questions just to meet the criteria I've suggested here is a bad idea. And searching out particular wordings in old questions to edit is also a bad idea. Changing unclear or very vague questions to something clearer or less vague is usually helpful, although as with all minor edits, it's better to do this with recent questions than with old questions. As Sam says, searchability should be the key factor.

Answer 2

My personal opinion: If it is clear what the the problem is, I would not edit them. This often makes the question title shorter and easier to understand.

As for the google argument: I don't think this has a big influence. Search terms like "why", "how" etc. usually are not important for the search. Of course I don't know googles algorithms, but searching for "How to load .txt files from other directory?" will probably find the question from you example, as the important words like "load", "another", "directory" and "txt" are all present.

To summarise: mentioning the right keywords is more important for the search then grammar.

The great search function from TeX.Stackexchange is another subject ...