I think there are too many entries where the title is not a question.
Related discussions: How do I write a good title?
Should question titles be phrased as questions? (A straw poll)
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3 Answers
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There's no reason to require that titles be questions. That's just going to make them longer than always needed.
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$\begingroup$ OK. I was under the impression that titles had to be questions, but apparently that's not the case. $\endgroup$– PeterCommented Jun 15, 2017 at 12:52
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I very much prefer titles to be a fully formed question, yes. However, requiring it goes a little too far, I think. I also disagree to some extent with the related discussion “How do I write a good question title?”, which exemplifies my grievance: I believe that, contrary to what answers there claim, starting a title with “How do I …” is not only OK but actually desirable: it focuses the subsequent discussion. “fooing the bar” invites so much more discussion than “How do I foo the bar?” in my experience.
For context, I’m often editing unclear question titles on Stack Overflow, and 90% of the time1 the title becomes much clearer when phrased as a question.
1 Admittedly I just made that number up. But it feels right.
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I take your point, but where this is a problem, it's more that the "question" isn't a question or doesn't make clear what the exact question is. The title is just a symptom.
Looking at it another way, there are many suitable titles that aren't strictly questions (e.g. "Limitations of single molecule sequencing", "Searching for gene expression data by cell line", "Visualisation of long read RNA-Seq splicing"). Insisting on a strict form is wasted effort.
