While doing a review, I saw this "first question" Creating simple citygml 3D models based on 2D shapefiles (alkis) shp2gml using Python?. To my surprise, the OP posted a first question with the sole purpose of sharing a (lengthy) solution he/she found after some research.
What's the appropriate action for this kind of questions?
I left a comment suggesting to post the solution as a self-answer. But I just wanted to check with the meta.
I agree with you.
As someone coming across this question via your Meta question, rather than via the Review Queue, the action I took and would suggest is appropriate in either case, was to make a comment (like you did) but also to apply a downvote to draw the asker's attention to the high desirability of correcting the "Q&A format breakage" (and not rewarding it). In such cases I would only downvote if there was a net positive score because downvoting well written content to a negative score is likely to attract an immediate sympathy upvote which undoes the desired message. Once the Q&A was largely fixed I withdrew my downvote.
An alternative of voting to close as "unclear what you are asking" would not work because it would prevent them self-answering (the very action that we want them to learn to take).
Self-answering is quite acceptable here, and encouraged. There is even an option to Answer your own question while posting a Question
An answer should not be given in the body of the question, rather it should be formatted as a question and then the solution given in an answer.
