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I'm referring to my question here: Java optimizations

I don't completely understand why it was closed. It does not violate any of the reasons stated. I am looking for concrete facts, not opinion. I don't think this question would start a large debate/argument.

The only possible reason I can find was stated in a comment by Goran Jovic:

Anyway, your problem was most likely closed because there is no finite answer to it. It would probably spawn dozens of answers each containing a single optimization. This is usually not considered constructive because it is very easy for initial Q&A format to degrade to a poll.

Perhaps this may be true, but is it necessarily bad? I believe the answers to this question are legitimate and would be extremely helpful/constructive. This is evident in the comments again as two people learned something very useful without even a single direct answer.

I can sort of see why it was closed, but was it really necessary? I was honestly looking forward to the answers and thought others would enjoy learning something too.

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marked as duplicate by waiwai933, Cody Gray, random Nov 16 '11 at 17:59


1 Answer 1

up vote 10 down vote accepted

The close reason explains why it was closed:


To make Stack Overflow more of a question and answer site, and less like a forum, we choose to accept questions that can be answered specifically and definitively. This greatly increases our overall signal-to-noise ratio. http://stackoverflow.com/faq describes these rules in greater detail.

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Yes I read that and addressed it in my question. –  tskuzzy Jul 26 '11 at 17:13
@tsk: The Q&A format is one of the fundamental principles of Stack Overflow, and is unlikely to change. If you need a more "forum-like" format, there are many places on the Internet where that is available. We've tried to build something better here; this requires us to be somewhat selective about the questions we can accept. –  Robert Harvey Jul 26 '11 at 17:16
Ok that makes more sense. Thanks. –  tskuzzy Jul 26 '11 at 17:23

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