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I edited this post, which had been put on hold as primary opinion based. Although I did not get to review it in the Close Review queue, I would have voted to close it myself as well. I did not want the question to be reopened based on my edits, but it contained a grammatically incorrect statement, that additionally, inappropriately, had a question mark attached to it (i.e. the sentence wasn't a question).

My edit caused the post to be show up in the reopen queue, although I did not select the reopen link below the question (and I reviewed to leave closed).

Could the automatic reopen of edited post be changed so that, if an edit is done by a person with high enough reputation that the reopen link shows, that that link should explicitly be selected? Or alternatively that the "edit session" of a closed vote shows an additional Save edits and vote to reopen button next to the Save Edits button?

In general not every improvement to a closed question (e.g. removing typos, grammatical errors, thanks, etc) warrants reopening of that question, but I rather have those improvements in there, to help the OP, or someone else, to already get it in a better state, in case it warrants reopening by further edits at some point.

(If I get to review such a question in the review queue, I normally take the time to make the edits, before the question gets closed, by opening a second window/tab on the original, circumventing the whole reopen issue)

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  • "My edit caused the post to be show up in the reopen queue". Is this a bug or a feature?
    – Faheem Mitha
    Apr 6, 2015 at 9:25
  • @FaheemMitha I think that this is meant as a feature.
    – Anthon
    Apr 6, 2015 at 15:14

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
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If a question is closed and you don't think it's worth reopening, then it's usually not worth editing. Ideally, all closed questions should be either reopened or deleted.

One thing that is worth editing about closed questions is their tags. Questions that were missing important tags may have failed to reach the subject experts who would have been able to recognize the gem hidden in a poorly-written post and edit it into a good question. Tagging the question properly makes it more likely to reach the right people. In this case, the question should be proposed for reopening, so tag edits should send it into the reopen queue according to the normal rules (or even with a more inclusive policy than non-tag edits).

The one case where I see this making sense is duplicate questions, which are not meant to be deleted. Often the edit made by someone who is not the author won't affect the fact that the question is a duplicate. Editing duplicates for things like spelling and presentation is often worthwhile to make them more prone to be found in a search, which is the point of keeping duplicates around.

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  • Some closed/on hold questions can only be considered for reopening if the author takes some editing action e.g providing additional info. If the author puts in e.g. "thanks" at the end of the Q in the original post, there is little chance (s)he will remove that during such a reopen edit. If others approve of that as is, I might get to review that and remove the chit-chat. I rather waste my time getting these in shape as well, just in case the OP provides the changes that warrant a reopen.
    – Anthon
    Apr 19, 2015 at 5:03
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That's a feature. In general, there is little point in editing a closed post unless you want to improve it for reopening. If you don't want it to enter the reopen queue, don't edit it.

That said, I too am guilty of doing this. It seems that you too are one of those pedantic people who can't stand seeing mistakes in a text without fixing them. I share your pain. I will also sometimes succumb to my pedantry and correct closed questions but the general SE stance is to just leave them alone and not bother fixing unless you want it to be in the reopen queue.

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  • I am certainly one of those pedantic people, but I don't agree that there is little point in editing these close votes. As long as the stick around they are an example for others that gets replicated. It is like with kids, you can be an exemplary example for years, but one slip of the tongue when you hit your thumb with a hammer and they pick up the swearword you issued and will never let go. I really would prefer to be able to edit those "thanks", "hi", "im" etc out before they get replicated without automatic reopening.
    – Anthon
    Apr 8, 2015 at 17:57
  • @Anthon I don't disagree. I also sometimes edit closed posts just because the errors bother me. However, this is a relatively rare occurrence and not really worth the trouble of fixing. As a general rule, we want edits to automatically place questions in the reopen queue.
    – terdon Mod
    Apr 9, 2015 at 10:18

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