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I have deleted a question because of being on hold and also my own misunderstanding of the question type which might be considered as "proofreading". here I want to know:

"How can I delete it completely?"!

Actually I've deleted it but it's still in search results after searching it and also apparently I still get down-vote while the question didn't have answer yet! Shall I flag it?

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  • 3
    A deleted question cannot get downvotes. Are you sure it was deleted and not simply closed? Difficult to know what is going on without a link to the question.
    – Oded StaffMod
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 9:56
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    Search results are cached for few minutes so yes, you might still see it few minutes after deleting. You can't get downvotes on deleted question. Please post a link and we can check further.
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 9:57
  • Ok thanks, first I thought it's because of being cached but after 50 minutes of deletion I still see it in Google! here is the link: german.stackexchange.com/questions/34176/…
    – Armin
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:02
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    This question was voluntarily removed by its author. Still caching, Google caches stuff too.
    – Mithical
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:03
  • @Mithrandir true, worth an answer. (my first comment was meant only for SE internal site search)
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:04
  • But still I see that it gets referred from Google!
    – Armin
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:04
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    @Armin so what? Most people will just see this. And nobody (not even high rep users and moderators) can downvote the question.
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:06

1 Answer 1

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after 50 minutes of deletion I still see it in Google

Stack Exchange doesn't control what search results Google caches. It can take forever until Google trashes the cache for a specific question that is now deleted. And there is nothing SO can do about this. They are just the party hosting a site that is cached by Google. I can have made a copy of that question too, which doesn't get automatically deleted either.

The search result will now point to the deleted question page, as Shadow Wizard indicated in a comment. The page can still be accessed from Google cache though.

enter image description here

If you really want to have those results removed, you should ask Google, not SO. Don't expect too much of that, since they have a strict policy on what to delete and what not.

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  • Is asking Google really an option? I doubt any of the reasons they state in that link apply for the OP.
    – rene Mod
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:12
  • It was more like a "there is nothing to gain here" comment.
    – Patrick Hofman
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:15
  • Yes, I thought you meant that. Wouldn't it be nice if you added the chance of success of contacting Google to remove that search result.
    – rene Mod
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:23
  • Ok Thanks a lot for your effort @Patrick Hofman!
    – Armin
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 10:28
  • There is a tool in the Google Webmaster tools which will allow you to request an URL be re-crawled sooner than usual. There used to be a similar form for normal mortals, but I'm not sure if it's still active.
    – ale
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 13:44
  • @ale I assume they got flooded with millions of daily requests so instead of just ignoring them all they prefered to remove the option. IMO it's better this way, less waste of time for people. :)
    – Shadow Wizard
    Commented Jan 10, 2017 at 13:56

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