I think age is a primary factor. The one you mention is a year old.
Yep, but it is still relevant. I have now found the answer somewhere else, and would post it on that thread (as it is ranking highly on Google if you type in the relevant question).
As it is, it is useless. I don’t see any benefit of locking down threads in this way…
Well, for a start, those threads will be referencing older versions of WordPress.
It’s done automatically, and as esmi pointed out, they’ve got older versions of WP.
Also older versions of plugins, PHP, SQL … the lists go on. Age is a huge factor, but relevancy is why we don’t DELETE them. 🙂
I appreciate all your points.
A lot of questions will still be relevant between versions of WordPress (I mean, it doesn’t get completely re-written on every release) and an answer of
“This isn’t much of a problem any more in 3.x, now you just have to do this:”
is still helpful to the average user who finds the thread by typing a question into Google! 🙂
I don’t see why you would deliberately stop people from answering old questions. I had guessed it was automated, I was just wondering if there was a real reason for the hard-line closure of threads other than the possibility that it could be regarding old versions.
A closed question with no answers is slightly worse than useless anyway, so I think it would be better if they did get deleted in that case?
There isn’t enough man/woman power for that most liklely.
There aren’t that many mods on here, and they are busy trying to help when they are on here. Plus they spend time policing what they can
A closed question with no answers is slightly worse than useless anyway, so I think it would be better if they did get deleted in that case?
We generally only INTENTIONALLY (i.e. manually) close posts that are so out of date or impossible to support or *ahem* unfriendly (if you start cursing at everyone, we will close your post). So the closed UNSOLVED posts are generally ones that ages out. At that point, yeah, we probably could delete them. Some of them have thought processes that are useful in kicking your brain to debug, though.
I’ve found some old, unsolved, topics useful because they’ve already tried something that I was thinking of doing. Cuts down on wasted time.
I’ve found some old, unsolved, topics useful because they’ve already tried something that I was thinking of doing. Cuts down on wasted time.
My point exactly. How much better would it be if you could post back telling people how you ended up doing it, then it would cut down on wasted time even more, as people would have direct access to the solution.
I guess it boils down to having too many threads to moderate?
How much better would it be if you could post back telling people how you ended up doing it
But the situation will not be exactly the same. I’ll probably be using a different (newer) version of WP, for a start. So my solution may not be applicable to their original problem.
Perhaps if you thought of ‘Old closed posts’ as ‘archives’ that would help? 🙂
I’ll probably be using a different (newer) version of WP, for a start.
This is true, and would be fair enough, if we are treating it as a personal one-on-one with the OP.
my solution may not be applicable to their original problem.
I’m thinking of this as much for the benefit of other users as for the original posters. It seems to cut down on the potential that these forums have for being an absolute goldmine of WP related knowledge.
The hundreds/thousands of people who find the thread (which has been killed but still appears at the top of Google) will likely have a newer version too. In any case – as you said – even an example of the process you went through to fix it will often help.
I too have been frustrated when I can’t post the answer to a question that at least started me down the right path towards enlightenment, just because the thread is too old. Kind of kills the fuzzy feeling I’d get “paying it forward.”
As for the argument that the original poster would still be using an old version of WP… (A) Isn’t it drilled into our mutton-heads that we need to keep up to date with the latest releases? So they would (or should) be using the latest version. (B) I agree that most of WP doesn’t get depreciated, so a lot of solutions, even to older questions, still work on newer versions. Even so, a simple version “checkin” would alleviate confusion, which a lot of people do anyway.
(( Just my $0.02 ))
Generally I link back to them to say ‘Based on <this post> I did foo, but then I read <this other post> and did bar, which lead me to baz!’
It’s frustrating, but it’s the way it is, so there it is 🙂 You don’t have to like everything that’s done here, but you do have to find a way YOU can work with it 🙂 Everyone’s gonna be a bit different.
