Linked Questions

427 votes
54 answers
220k views

Loopholes that are forbidden by default

There are a number of standard loopholes which experienced question-setters seek to explicitly close. However, inexperienced question-setters may unintentionally leave them open, or respondents may ...
53 votes
0 answers
2k views

How to count bytes FAQ

We've got a lot of questions asking how to count the bytes in different situations. This question is here to put them all in one spot. General questions How to count "interactive" answers ...
51 votes
6 answers
8k views

Default for Code Golf: Program, Function or Snippet?

One of the things many (new?) users forget to specify in code-golf challenges is whether the answers should provide a full program or a function (or even just a snippet). For most such things, we have ...
38 votes
15 answers
4k views

New users' guides to golfing rules in specific languages

What are the most important rules a first-time golfer in a given language should know? For instance, how do golfed programs usually take input and output? Each language should have a single CW answer ...
3 votes
1 answer
161 views

Is the interpreter part of the language or a separate language?

As I understand it, for our purposes a language is more or less defined by its implementation. That's one of the reasons why a program like Vim can also be "language". You just count keystrokes ...
59 votes
6 answers
18k views

What are programming languages? [duplicate]

Often, answers to questions asking for "programs" or talking about "programming languages" utilize things like sed, awk, … in ...
2 votes
1 answer
169 views

Is using the Swift REPL for my answer valid? [duplicate]

This is a very strange hack that I came across the other day. In the Swift REPL, if I create an instance of any type (say for example, a String), it automatically gets assigned to a variable in the ...
1 vote
2 answers
123 views

Bytecount for code solution

I know I'm probably on thin ice, but I tried an answer in the print "Hello, World!" challenge. I consider it to be 5 bytes total, but the user ais523 pointed out that I had to count the ...
7 votes
1 answer
268 views

If your answer is acts differently depending on context, how safe do you have to be?

This is kind of a follow-up to / re-asking of "Should point-free function expressions be allowed when a function is asked for?" with specific reference to the only language I know how to golf in, j, ...
1 vote
0 answers
53 views

What's the Java policy with REPL existing? [duplicate]

An extension of When do I have to include things like Java's public static void main. Unless you've (probably) been living under a rock, you (probably) know that Java 9 is (probably) going to ...
1 vote
1 answer
95 views

Necessity of Wrapping Solution into Method/Function

I've noticed that sometimes people using exotic languages like Brainfuck don't ever explicitly wrap a solution into a method/function. While sometimes I see solutions in Java and such where they are ...
11 votes
1 answer
321 views

Is an answer valid if it works only at the interactive prompt? [duplicate]

My answer here works only on the interactive Python prompt, which writes output to the screen if not stored in a variable or None. Is such an answer valid?