13

Background

Usually a post indicates both when it was posted and when it was most recently edited

enter image description here

However community wikis only show when they were most recently edited

enter image description here

This probably makes sense for "true" community wikis where they are created as a wiki page. However; for normal posts which simply become community wiki this often leaves me confused.

This happens particularly often on meta, I have seen a community wikis dated today that seems to request something that already exists. This always throws me until I look at the revision history to see that actually the post is several years old and it is the request that led to the now existing feature. I have come dangerously close to commenting, informing them that the feature they are requesting already exists.

Feature Request

Can the asked/answered date be included on community wikis similar to how it is included on normal posts? I can see no disadvantage to retaining this information as it adds additional context to a post.

Improve this question
3
  • "This probably makes sense for "true" community wikis where they are created as a wiki page. However; for normal posts which simply become community wiki this often leaves me confused." - That actually sounds like an argument against the process of applying CW to where it doesn't belong. IOW, the post shouldn't be CW in the first place.
    – Mysticial
    Commented Feb 25, 2014 at 17:22
  • @Mysticial True, but then we'd need another status for things that are called something else, yet act functionally identical. If a post gets edited too many times, what should we call it?
    – Geobits
    Commented Feb 25, 2014 at 17:26
  • 2
    @Geobits At that point we're getting into the debate on what the purpose of CW is anyway. IMO, edits should not force a post into wiki. (related: Can we disable automatic community wiki conversion for answer edits?)
    – Mysticial
    Commented Feb 25, 2014 at 17:29

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

First of all, what are wiki posts for? To collect knowledge of all users. We need to keep this knowledge up-to-date, and it doesn't matter when it was posted, unless it wasn't edited at all (in this case you will see "answered" timestamp). The thing that matters is the last modification date, the date when this post was updated, which you can find out by looking at the "edited" timestamp. If you really need to know when it was posted, you can see the revisions of the post.

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    What would you say to my example (that I have experienced several times) of community wiki posts requesting changes which were ultimately accepted or became outdated due to other changes so the posting date is important. And most importantly what is actually the disadvantage of including this information (there's clearly space because it's included in all there posts). The problem has been reduced by the removal of "punishment style" automatic community wiki conversions though
    – Richard Tingle
    Commented Oct 3, 2014 at 16:56

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .