Hi @Nietzsche,
Thanks for sharing your experience in studying for SAS certification, and for using the SAS Community as a sounding board.
Since your original topic was not meant as a question, but simply a discussion, I modified the thread to mark it as "No solution needed for this topic." That is a checkbox that is available when you create a post, but it's subtle and easy to miss. With this checked, the "Accept Solution" button is not enabled and the topic doesn't "count" as an unanswered question.
As far as SAS moderators marking solutions -- that is a standard practice in support communities such as ours. The community is here to help SAS users learn and find answers to their questions. When someone posts a question they have their specific need for an answer, but then the same topic may resonate with hundreds or thousands of future users who are looking for similar information. Solved topics provide a faster path to the answers people seek, and they rank better on search engines.
As moderators we often accept solutions when the original poster doesn't come back to do so. Those solutions are often provided by other community members, not only SAS employees. We want community members to get "credit" for their helpful contributions. When a solution is accepted (by the original poster or by a moderator), all participants/subscribers for that particular topic receive a notification with the details (depending on notification settings in your account preferences).
Chris