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The recent spate of re-tags initiated by mbq has pushed a lot of questions to the top of the site. Editing tags and re-tagging etc do not change the question content and hence I am not sure why the software is designed to push these questions to the top.

In any case, is there way to re-tag/edit tags without the question bouncing to the top?

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  • $\begingroup$ As an extension to this should the moderators be able to choose to not have the question bounced back to the top for any edits they do? $\endgroup$
    – Andy W
    Sep 16, 2010 at 12:31
  • $\begingroup$ I was under the impression that mods can do 'silent edits' i.e., if a mod edits a tag the question will not bounce up. But, that seems to be incorrect. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 16, 2010 at 14:05

2 Answers 2

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Note that we have a few ranking methods available -- the tabs on the right side of the page just above questions.

If you sort by Active, then the re-tagged questions rise to the top. However ..

If you sort by New, only new questions appear at the very top.

If you sort by Hottest, questions with activity other than re-tagging seem to appear.

So, I think we're fine since the site is flexible enough to offer a few different views.

The remaining issue is what the front page of the site shows when the user has not performed any sorting or clicked on "Questions". In this case, maybe we could ask that the "default view" for the front page be the "Hottest" questions rather than "Active"?

I'd rather not exclude re-tagging entirely since it's nice to have the option to see that particular activity (since not only moderators can do this, and we'd like to catch mistaken re-tags).

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  • $\begingroup$ Hmm. Is it just me, or is the hot view from the tab on the front page slightly different than the hot view after you clicking on questions? Is this a caching issue? $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Sep 16, 2010 at 18:12
  • $\begingroup$ @ars What you say makes sense for a single re-tag. But, we should also find a way to discourage massive re-tag. Massive re-tags should ideally by silent edits as they are fixing some issue that we have with tags (e.g., eliminate useless tags, change tags to something appropriate etc) As far as I understand the 'active' tab is the default tab for most of us and the effect of a massive re-tag is very perplexing at first. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 16, 2010 at 18:15
  • $\begingroup$ Also if you change the tab, the site remembers it. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 16, 2010 at 18:38
  • $\begingroup$ @Srikant: right, active is the default, so my suggestion was to make "hot" the default. Keep in mind that detecting massive re-tags might be desirable if due to malicious activity, spamming, etc. $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Sep 16, 2010 at 18:43
  • $\begingroup$ @ars Your point about 'detecting massive retags' makes sense. I am almost about to give up on the idea of silent edits with perhaps one exception: Perhaps, the silent edit should be a mod feature to be implemented after community consensus? What do you think about that? $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 16, 2010 at 19:21
  • $\begingroup$ @Srikant: the issue with silent edits is that they're not subject to review. This may not be desirable but this is subjective -- I tend to favor more open systems. $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Sep 16, 2010 at 20:34
  • $\begingroup$ @ars Even I am in favor of open review and hence the requirement that mods can do silent edit only if community reaches consensus on meta on some particular re-tag. At least that is what I meant in my previous comment. $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 16, 2010 at 22:18
  • $\begingroup$ @Srikant: oh, I get what you're saying now. Not sure it's necessary though -- sounds like layering a process where the results aren't objectionable as they stand. Re-tagging is already subject to review as it happens in the open and easily corrected. Switching tabs to New or Hot is pretty easy to overcome the sorting issue. $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Sep 17, 2010 at 0:05
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What can I say... sorry?
I am usually using Newest tab, so that the questions are ordered by the creation time.

EDIT: Now I see at least one question gathered new answer thanks to that ;-)

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  • $\begingroup$ @mbq not a big issue. Nevertheless, my question still remains. Isn't there a mod feature that lets you do invisible edits? $\endgroup$
    – svadali
    Sep 16, 2010 at 17:13
  • $\begingroup$ Don't think you need to be sorry, this is a feature not a bug. :) See my answer -- in particular, can mods change the default view for the front page? $\endgroup$
    – ars
    Sep 16, 2010 at 17:54
  • $\begingroup$ @ars, @Srikant I was joking with that sorry. Seriously speaking, there is no special mod edit mode; only SE team can run scripts that do such hidden modifications. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 16, 2010 at 18:53
  • $\begingroup$ @mbq renames can be done silently $\endgroup$
    – Jeff Atwood
    Sep 18, 2010 at 4:41
  • $\begingroup$ @Jeff renames yes, removals (AFAIK) no. Also this was rather a campaign to clean out esoteric leftovers and badly tagged questions from the beginning of the site when almost anyone could create a tag. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 18, 2010 at 9:45
  • $\begingroup$ @Jeff To this end, we were planning to propose silent retags on chat cast. $\endgroup$
    – user88
    Sep 18, 2010 at 9:47

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