I'm fairly certain most of us have seen this text at some point on Wikipedia:
This article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.
With the primary goal of a frictionless option for partial answers to encourage:
- those with partial answers to post their partial answers using the answer form instead of the comment form, and
- the community to jump in and help flesh out such partial answers instead of downvoting them because they aren't fleshed out
... and a secondary goal of providing a standard avenue for elevating partial answers posted as comments to proper answers and preventing the premature deletion of said comments with this avenue (more on this later in the proposal).
I propose that we introduce a new and very simple format ON META STACK OVERFLOW ONLY specifically for posting partial answers and call them "stubs".
###What is a stub?
A stub is a partial answer whose author has willfully forfeit ownership of the answer with the goal of constructive edits by the community and discussion resulting in a clear and fully-fleshed out answer.
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The poster should mark the answer as community wiki, and
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include the following template text at the top of their answer:
> This answer is a [stub](https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/388135/this-answer-is-a-stub-a-partial-solution-for-partial-answers-on-meta). > The author has renounced ownership of this answer. You can help by editing this post.
Posts following this format are hereinafter (in this question) referred to as "stubs" or a "stub".
###Why do we need stubs?
We need this on Meta because people are afraid to post partial answers, and the community generally responds to partial answers with downvotes. We need a clear signal to the community that the poster of an answer knows that it is a partial answer and would like the community's help fleshing it out. They may not be able to do so themselves for any number of reasons.
We need this because posting partial answers as comments is also not ideal. Doing that creates a barrier to further discussion about the partial answer, but may inspire others to create a full answer on the topic so they aren't completely without merit. It becomes problematic when there are many partial answers posted as comments in a single thread, or when those partial answers spark discussions that aren't relevant to the post that the comment thread resides under.
###What should I do when I see a stub?
If you feel that you have any improvements to offer whatsoever, feel completely free to go ham and improve it with edits, or post requests for clarification or additional information as needed.
If you think that the information contained within the stub is inaccurate, please edit it to be accurate.
###When should I downvote stubs?
You should still downvote if you fundamentally disagree with the premise of the answer; however, please refrain from downvoting these answers on the basis that they are partial answers, or are unclear. Instead please comment to request clarification and additional information, or submit an edit to the effect required.
Please leave a comment (preferable over a downvote) on the basis of a perceived lack of research effort, formation effort, or any other kind of effort-lacking-ness if you aren't able yourself to improve the answer with edits. That is going to come with the territory of partial answers. They will inherently be lacking in some way and we need to help polish them into the best possible version they can be.
###Won't posters abuse this format to prevent downvotes on their posts?
Users should still downvote bad ideas as they see them, or answers that they don't think are useful. I'm not saying that should change.
Now if posters use this format and simultaneously show that they are not open to edits or constructive discussion, you should feel free to vote as you normally would. As I say later, the voting recommendation isn't a rule, just a recommendation that I hope users reading this will heed.
###When should the stub template be removed?
Once the answer is well and truly fleshed out (i.e. no longer a stub), the template text can be removed and the answer will be a normal community wiki answer.
###What should I do if I see a partial answer posted as a comment and would like to discuss the idea?
Post a new stub (possibly linking to the original comment in the answer somehow to prevent confusion), then invite the author of the comment to discuss the partial answer under the new stub in a comment replying to the original comment.
Once the discussion has been started under the new stub, or it is clear that the author of the comment has been made aware of the new stub, the comment can be flagged as no longer needed. Moderators reviewing such flags should investigate to determine that a stub has been created, and that the author of the original comment has been made aware of the stub.
###Why the boilerplate which most users would not find if it's not in a help topic or coded into the answer editor?
The idea here is that people who read this question will start suggesting to those posting partial answers as comments that this is an option and link here, or start posting stubs on behalf of commenters as I suggest in this proposal.
###Aren't you just saying that partial answers are acceptable and people should get used to them?
Partial answers are acceptable, and people should get used to them; however, there is an inherent issue with partial answers and the longstanding rules around post ownership. If it isn't clear that the answer poster knows that it is a partial answer and is open to the community editing it or helping to flesh it out, the community will generally react with downvotes as opposed to constructive discussion and edits to clarify or flesh it out.
This happens regardless of whether an answer is community wiki due to widespread misunderstanding of the feature, and because of that widespread misunderstanding, even if you do understand the purpose of the feature, you can't ever truly be certain if the person posting a community wiki answer understands the purpose. Therefore there is an initial barrier that you must overcome before investing your efforts in such a post. This removes that barrier and goes one step further to say that the author knowingly no longer has any more say in the ultimate formulation of the answer than any other member of the community, blowing that barrier to smithereens.
This is to create a clear signal to the community that edits of all shapes and sizes are welcome to such posts, and the normal ownership rules have been willfully forfeit in the goal of constructively fleshing out the answer.
###How is this new rule going to be enforced?
It won't be enforced, because it's not a rule. It's a proposed cultural shift in our handling of a specific subset of answers with a clear visual signal to prompt the alternate reaction that I'm hoping for, with clear guidance for the community via a link to this question in the stub.
There is absolutely nothing stopping anyone from ignoring this completely and handling these answers as they normally would, but I'm hoping that this will catch on and I'm banking on the good will of the community to make it happen.
This isn't a perfect solution, and it isn't meant to be. I could propose feature changes and rule changes, but this is something we can actually do with the features and rules we have right now, we only need to change how we interact with these answers.
We can prevent the premature deletion of partial answers posted as comments, and we can create a standard avenue for elevating these partial-answer-comments to actual full answers and stimulate further constructive discussion in a healthy manner. We just need to work together.
This is absolutely a rough draft of this idea. Please feel free to request clarifications or additional information. Please also feel free to edit this post for clarity or to further flesh out the idea.