I've been seeing a lot of questions lately asking for apps that do x or y, and so I read the main site's FAQ again and noticed that it's not explicitly stated that asking for app recommendations is off-topic.
Was this changed recently? Was it ever officially a rule?
I believe the standing rule is to not ask: "What is the best application that does X?"
Instead you should ask "How can I do X?"
In other words, it needs to be a solvable problem. App recommendations (what is the best app) are very subjective and there is no definite answer.
background
I've had my question (http://android.stackexchange.com/questions/31918/how-can-i-sort-filter-and-tag-files-images-in-android-ics-4-0) closed until I rephrased it from "which app should i use to do X" to "how can I do X".
As I pointed out in the comments there, the question itself didnt change one bit - just the choice of words. Still, one of the versions is valid, the other is not. Why not?
As can be seen in the edit history, the first version of my question was not a popularity poll. I did not ask for the best app to do something, I asked for any app that could do it.
Now, in my opinion, either a question is valid, or its not, but it should not have anything to do with the wording. If the question was potentially helpful for others, answerable and not subjective, why close it? Is "you can hammer a nail with a hammer" subjective?
argumentation
I could have argued that my question was good, but i couldnt have argued about it being not-in-line with the FAQ (as it currently stands), so I edited it. But I would like to hold my point - that question was OK in its first version too!
What I want to say is, "how to do X" and "with what should I do X" are basically the same. So maybe we shouldnt close the second type just because of the wording? Both questions WILL attract exactly the same answers! Maybe the proper action would be just to edit the qeustion for the more desirable wording, instead of flagging and closing?
Actually, the "whats the best tool/app to do X" is also valid. Those questions are answerable, and those answers are as subjective as any other! What do I mean? When I ask "whats the best tool to hammer nails" the obvious answer is "a hammer". Its not subjective, right? Still, there will be people, who arent really experienced with hammers, and they have been using big rocks to hammer nails, and they will recommend rocks. Its doable, but not optimal. Such answers would be downvoted, the "hammer" answer would be upvoted. We end up in the same situation, in which we would end up with a "how do I hammer nails?". Those questions are the same!
I know that in some more complex cases, there will be many equally valid answers to the same "whats the best" question. Example? "Whats the best app to draw on a PC with a graphics tablet?" Some would say its Photoshop, others would say GIMP, someone will say its Inkscape. But that usually means that the question is just not specific enough. If the costs are a big issue, then GIMP will be superior to photoshop, and that will not be subjective. If youre interested in doing mostly vector graphics (which is not specified in the original question) then Inkscape will be better than GIMP.
summary
In my opinion, the ban for "whats the best app/what app should I use to do X" should be removed from the FAQ, or perhaps replaced with a suggestion of the preferred wordings. (How instead of with what). Questions that are against this ban should be simply edited, instead of being closed.
