All Questions
1,326
questions
1
vote
0
answers
46
views
Need to mark inbox read
It seems to me that until recently, if I clicked & followed on a link in my Inbox, the little white-on-red number reduced by one, and if I had read all of the new ones, it vanished. Just recently, ...
- 74.2k
2
votes
1
answer
28
views
Is there a way to determine users with the most questions?
I want to see who the most active users are on ELL, in terms of questions posted. Is there a way I can determine it?
GlorfindelMod
- 14.8k
-5
votes
0
answers
49
views
How to post at ELL and similar sites
I thought everyday common sense applies.
If someone asks "do you have the time"?
I give them the time if I am wearing a watch or have a cellphone.
But at these sites - the ONLY correct ...
- 101
0
votes
0
answers
44
views
Are there web or software applications that can give anagrams, blanagrams, or letter banks, provided a word?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_forms_of_word_play says
Anagram: rearranging the letters of a word or phrase to produce a new
word or phrase
Ambigram: a word which can be read just as well ...
- 4,181
6
votes
1
answer
246
views
Why so many questions about "can I mix tenses in one sentence"?
There seem to be a lot of questions about "Can I have more than one tense in a sentence?" (e.g. I ordered a product on saturday and it has been delivered as well)
I'm wondering if there's ...
CommunityBot
- 1
2
votes
3
answers
82
views
Should we provide guidance warning not to trust ChatGPT?
These days one often finds questions that include stuff along the lines of, “and ChatGPT tells me blah-blah,” where blah-blah is some utter garbage. Correcting the misapprehensions that stem from ill-...
gotubeMod
- 51k
2
votes
1
answer
100
views
The tag “simple” should be deleted
NB: the tag no longer exists.
I found that there is a tag called simple in Ell Stack Exchange. For me, this tag is useless, and I don’t know who created this tag.
Maybe the user want to create the tag ...
CommunityBot
- 1
2
votes
1
answer
146
views
Book that covers less obvious rules for using 'a/an' and 'the' articles
Could you suggest a comprehensive textbook or academic research study that covers all the cases of using articles (a/an and the) in English? I'm having trouble finding a detailed and well-reasoned ...
CommunityBot
- 1
6
votes
3
answers
138
views
Are badge numbers a little weird?
Look at this picture:
The badge number is on the right of the icon and nearer to the right icon, it seems that the number is for the right badge instead of the left. Maybe moving the position of the ...
- 101
17
votes
1
answer
277
views
Enable Question Rate Limit on ELL
The moderators would like to request that the SE team enable the daily question rate limit for our site. A common pattern seems to be that users, in their eagerness to learn English (which is a good ...
- 101
1
vote
1
answer
36
views
Why does the `register` tag get converted to `formality`?
I wanted to indicate that the phrase got a steal is in a very informal register:
I just got a steal on a lawn mower down at the hardware store. They're going out of business.
I edited a question to ...
- 12k
2
votes
2
answers
106
views
What can I do to improve the following post to get a better acceptance?
How can I fix this linked question so that it'll get a positive response? What is wrong with this question?
Question to fix
gotubeMod
- 51k
1
vote
2
answers
70
views
A test to decide whether we should consult AI-generated writing or not
I know mentioning AI often triggers people here. I totally understand that because I've seen AI answer my questions in the worst way possible; it provides, with confidence, incorrect information in ...
- 108k
1
vote
0
answers
41
views
Can the site fix the auto-capitalization error for I.e.?
I find the auto-complete/auto-correct feature of the site quite a pain, especially when it introduces errors. The abbreviation I.e. [sic] shouldn't be capitalized if it's used as it is below. I don't ...
- 132k
14
votes
5
answers
398
views
To non-native speakers: Do your speech organs get tired while speaking English?
Heads-up: This question is purely opinion-based, I am therefore asking it on Meta. Please let me know if it is off-topic here.
I am a non-native speaker of English and have been speaking English for ...
- 91
4
votes
1
answer
147
views
Vocabulary tag rework?
The vocabulary tag has 1000 over questions, but unfortunately I'm not very sure how to tag questions with that tag. The description reads:
This tag is for questions about a body of words. It should ...
CommunityBot
- 1
4
votes
1
answer
76
views
What happened to the image in answer feature?
I used to be able to add an image to a question or answer. Is this broken? Now I just get a little blue and white thumbnail and a link usually saying 'enter image description here'. When I click on ...
- 74.2k
0
votes
0
answers
60
views
The similar-question panel is sometimes missing on Stack Exchange
The similar-question panel is sometimes missing on Stack Exchange. This makes it much harder for me to find old posts of mine or others' related posts. Is there any way to solve this?
- 3,696
10
votes
8
answers
321
views
Are answers written by AI Chatbots suitable for the site?
Relevant question and answer
What is the grammar point that we changed the structure "S + V and V" into the structure "S + V, Ving"?
Is an answer written by an AI chatbot, such as ...
- 5,371
5
votes
3
answers
88
views
Can I find words with similar spelling using regular expressions or wildcards?
I would like to find words that look similar in spelling. Is there a tool (document, web site/application, and/or software) that can allow me to do that by using wildcards or regular expressions? For ...
J.R.Mod
- 110k
3
votes
1
answer
86
views
The tag “confusing” should be deleted
I found that on Ell Stack Exchange, there is a tag called confusing and I found that this tag was used by 1 question. That question actually asked about the prepositions after the word “confusing”.
(...
LaurelMod
- 15.8k
4
votes
1
answer
112
views
Why my flag was declined as “without evidences”?
I’m new to flagging questions and answers and maybe not familiar with the flagging on this site.
So, I reported the question last week Who is the feds, and I flagged with the reason "need ...
gotubeMod
- 51k
-3
votes
1
answer
87
views
Should we encourage dialects?
Just a thought. Some questions on ELL get asked about pronunciation in various songs, spoken works, films, radio broadcasts etc, where the main problem is the dialect of the speaker. We are asked to ...
- 12k
2
votes
1
answer
136
views
What makes a question earn your upvote?
I did a quick edit to "I see" versus "oh really" and noticed that while four people had answered it, it didn't have a single upvote (until I added mine). I think that is a bit odd ...
- 17.3k
6
votes
0
answers
80
views
One question-editing policy to rule them all
There is some dispute about editing questions here on ELL, specifically correcting grammar and spelling. Multiple Q&As exist, with different and mostly incompatible answers:
When should I correct ...
- 2,423
26
votes
16
answers
2k
views
Contributor's Guide to English Language Learners
I thought it would be nice if we had a community maintained guide to ELL written in easy-to-understand language and arranged to make the most important things to know easy to find. The help center has ...
gotubeMod
- 51k
3
votes
2
answers
94
views
How far does one go when copyediting?
I was editing a few questions but was cautious as to how strongly I should correct orthographic mistakes?
I went with the strategy of adjusting the endings of individual words to better capture the ...
gotubeMod
- 51k
-3
votes
2
answers
251
views
The downvoting practice on ELL sucks
The downvoting practice on ELL sucks. I suspect many new users get discouraged and disappointed by this practice. This practice is not in the least encouraging to put questions anymore. In my case one ...
- 17.3k
11
votes
1
answer
237
views
Searches for finding questions that need attention
This post is intended to be a place to collect queries to help find questions that could use some attention. Maybe they need another answer, maybe the answers need to be voted on, or maybe the ...
- 12k
0
votes
0
answers
73
views
Why do we need the tag "articles" if we already have "indefinite-article", "definite-article" and "zero-article"? If it's redundant why not delete it?
There are four tags about articles: articles, indefinite-article, definite-article and zero-article.
Could you explain to me please why the tag "articles" is needed if we have the other ...
- 5,371
0
votes
0
answers
33
views
Is there alternative choice for "Extensive reading for academic success"?
"Extensive Reading for Academic Success" is a series of books good for those who are preparing for TOEFL. Each of them includes 80 articles and is much cheaper than other TOEFL books.
But I ...
4
votes
0
answers
69
views
2023: a year in moderation
It’s that time of the year again! As we wave goodbye to last year and welcome the new one, we have a tradition of sharing moderation stats for the preceding calendar year.
As most of you here might be ...
- 101
21
votes
0
answers
691
views
Downvoting questions from new users
So I was disappointed to see a -3 score with no guidance at all in the comments for this question:
Can I say "something is happened to my phone"?
The author obviously was new to ELL and a ...
- 12k
12
votes
3
answers
308
views
How to salvage/improve questions: a guide by example
TL;DR: let's make a catalog of "How to salvage your question" examples.
There are a handful of reasons that a lot of our questions on our main site, ELL, get closed on. Except for "duplicate of ...", ...
- 12k
3
votes
2
answers
146
views
Should we expand the “It’s in the dictionary” close reason to include etymological questions?
Consider the recent question Is cockroach composed of cock and roach?. The post’s title says it all. @FumbleFingers and I both left quick—and perhaps overly snarky—comments illustrating how easily the ...
- 12k
2
votes
3
answers
343
views
Why are my questions no longer being accepted?
Why are my questions no longer being accepted? - That means I am banned from putting questions !!!:
You can’t post new questions right now
Sorry, we are no longer accepting questions from your ...
LaurelMod
- 15.8k
2
votes
2
answers
198
views
Should moderators delete answers for combining terseness with comprehensiveness?
Should moderators delete answers for combining terseness with comprehensiveness?
For example, What do you call a language that doesn't use the European alphabet? asked for "a word" or "...
- 20.9k
3
votes
2
answers
140
views
Providing unsolicited advice in addition to answering the question
The discussion under this question caused me to consider the policy at ELL on unsolicited advice. Consider a situation where there are errors in the examples presented in the original question, which ...
- 20.9k
8
votes
2
answers
296
views
Election check-in 2023: Who's interested in stepping up and being a moderator here?
One of our most recently elected Moderators, David Siegel, is no longer a Mod here, which leaves Laurel and me as the only active Mods, so we are thinking about holding an election to find someone to ...
- 28.3k
2
votes
1
answer
187
views
Duplicates: why not be able to choose more than one?
When you opt to close a question due to its being a duplicate, the program automatically churns up examples and you have to choose one.
Often, more than one applies, yet there is only one choice ...
- 20.9k
2
votes
1
answer
58
views
Weird behavior of [answers] tag when asking question
After this meta post, the tags responses and answers were synonymized, and their behavior in most cases seems to reflect this. They remap, redirect, etc., but I noticed this earlier today when I was ...
- 20.9k
-1
votes
1
answer
107
views
Can you suggest any AI based voice chat robot (such as some website) to practice spoken English?
I see these days, some text based on an AI robot, such as ChatGPT that can input English text, and respond in English, so I can practice my English writing.
But I'm not an English native speaker, and ...
CommunityBot
- 1
3
votes
1
answer
138
views
Online collocation dictionaries and English corpus search resources
Correct prepositions and collocations in general do not come naturally to a non-native speaker. I had been using www.just-the-word.com to check for right combinations, until it went offline some time ...
CommunityBot
- 1
4
votes
2
answers
121
views
Is historical English interpretation part of ELL's remit?
Since ELL is primarily aimed at English learners (not native speakers) and the guide lines state
If you have questions about the following topics, you may want to visit
other Stack Exchange sites to ...
LaurelMod
- 15.8k
0
votes
1
answer
75
views
Is it against the rules to make ChatGPT generate a text and ask questions about how that text is grammatical or not?
I made it write poetry and sometimes, the output doesn't seem to be grammatical or correct at all. Is it ok if I base some of my questions on output generated by ChatGPT?
gotubeMod
- 51k
-3
votes
1
answer
82
views
Can we add a new reason to the "Close" list?
I note that one of our moderators, gotube, has started to remind OPs, who use images of text rather than copy them out, that images cannot be read by screen readers (used by the visually impaired) and ...
- 12k
-1
votes
1
answer
130
views
Why are these questions being closed with the proofreading close reason?
As of writing, this question has four votes to close for the community-specific reason that's often referred to as "proofreading". So does this one.
While I haven't been around in a while, I'...
- 12k
14
votes
5
answers
726
views
Election check-in - Who's interested in stepping up to help being a moderator here?
As you all know, our community currently only has two active moderators which is a bit low for a site of our size. Therefore, we'd like to hold a moderator election in the coming months.
We noticed a ...
gotubeMod
- 51k
3
votes
0
answers
48
views
comment font legibility on ELL (letter-spacing)
Would it be possible to tweak the letter-spacing CSS of the font used for comments, to add just a bit more daylight between letters? I didn't know what Irn Bru was and read it as Im Bru. On my ...
- 3,596
0
votes
1
answer
48
views
How can I underline a text on ELL?
How can I underline a text on ELL? I'm trying to underline some words in a question on ELL but I fail to manage it. My browser is Google.
LaurelMod
- 15.8k