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Should Code Review be added to the list of sites to suggest to move a question to when marking as off-topic?

If it's not already there simply because of limited space in the dialog, how about bumping "webmasters" and replacing with CR?

I have a gut feeling not much gets moved to webmasters, can anyone confirm that?

dialog

I've suggested questions be moved to CR more than once, but I have to do it by leaving a custom message for a moderator, and I kind of feel like I'm being a nuisance by doing that. If it's not an issue, I can just keep doing it that way.

Edit: It just occurred to me that maybe CR isn't on the list because of its beta status. Is that the case?

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  • 2
    The groupthink through a mis-application of "paradox of choice" is that any more options than that would cause user's heads to explode. By the same logic address forms should have a state dropdown that only includes California, Texas, New York and Florida but whatever.
    – kekekela
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:14
  • What, New York didn't make the list? They must have all moved here to Florida ;)
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:16
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    You'd think so whenever the Rangers are in town :)
    – kekekela
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:18
  • I agree it's a better migration options than others, but I also don't know if beta sites are eligible for the vote option (you can always flag it). But come to think of it, replace Programmers with Code Review once CR surives beta (if it does).
    – Anthony Pegram
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:22
  • @Mr.Disappointment we should mark that one a duplicate of this since this one is in English. ;) But, on a serious note, I've suggested a way around the "5 things in the dialog" limit here, so it can't really be answered in the same way.
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:58
  • Or, you know, ...edit the existing one that already has exposure.
    – Grant Thomas
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:00
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    I'll happily offer Programmers.SE's slot up for replacement.
    – user149432
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:32
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    Please excuse my terrible SQL, but Code Review is number 5 as far as number of migrations that occur (WebMasters is number 7)
    – Josh Darnell
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:36
  • @jadarnel27 I suspected that more stuff was being moved to CR than webmasters, but until now my suspicions were unfounded.
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:37
  • @MarkTrapp I'm making a mistake here, aren't I... I like CR :(
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:39
  • @GGG What, no! Not at all! And I'm not bitter about the 37% rejected rate from SO on Programmers due to the migration path. Not one bit.
    – user149432
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:48
  • @MarkTrapp yeah, that's the impression I got from looking at your bio ;) Honestly I'm a little foggy on what's fair game for Programmers myself (so I'd never move anything there even if I could)... I'm just hoping people have enough common sense to know what a code review is supposed to be. I'm probably being too optimistic...
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 17:02

3 Answers 3

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Yes, please.

My purely anecdotal evidence suggests that code review questions (like this one) are on the rise on SO, and far more so than questions that belong on any other existing SE site not already on the auto-migration list. I've had to comment a CR.SE link and vote to close as off-topic a whole bunch of times over the last few weeks.

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  • There's no need for anecdotal evidence. There is plenty of actual data (accessible by the right people) to show which sites in the Exchange are the top targets for migration from Stack Overflow. If Code Review is one of them I expect it would replace something on the current list. I bet it's not, though.
    – ale
    Commented May 16, 2012 at 18:57
  • @AlEverett - Currently, Code Review is #6, and webmaster is #17. Data I'm not sure what date range that covers, though.
    – Bobson
    Commented Jan 9, 2013 at 16:00
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    There is no way to programmatically obtain data on how many questions should have been migrated to code review.
    – Lightness Races in Orbit
    Commented Jan 9, 2013 at 16:03
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IMO no.

I fear that people don't get what Codereview is, and what it isn't. Specifically, I would expect every crappy "plz debug my code" question that washes ashore on Stack Overflow to get migrate votes. I've had discussions even with higher-rep users who wanted to migrate walls of code to Codereview because, hey, it's code and it needs fixing, right?

This is the one site that I can't see as a migration target at all.

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  • I could definitely put it to use for code-posts where the posted code actually (knowingly) works as expected (on the face of it). There was a time where I personally flagged at least one appropriate question a day.
    – Grant Thomas
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:12
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    @Mr I still think flagging is the way - this is one thing I wouldn't trust the community with. (I can be wrong, of course.)
    – Pekka
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:23
  • Pekka, I actually had similar thoughts when posting this. In fact I've advocated moving the same kind of crap question I think you are referring to from CR to SO. I hesitated to post this for that exact reason. I think the real solution to the problem is a stricter set of rules about what is acceptable on CR... get it out in the open, get everyone on the same page. I'm still going to +1 this even though it goes against what I'm asking for, because it's an important point.
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:28
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    @GGG yeah, I see what you mean. The thing is that I think it's impossible to get everyone with migrate rights on the same page about Code Review. Look at how long it took until Programmers.SE stopped being SO's toilet bowl, and how much discussion was necessary to get there ...
    – Pekka
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:41
  • Who says it stopped?
    – Anthony Pegram
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:50
  • @Anthony :) well, I think it is fair to say it has improved.
    – Pekka
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 16:54
  • I came here thinking we should add such a migrate link, but you've convinced me otherwise... well done, sir
    – Adam Rackis
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 17:08
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    I would expect every crappy "plz debug my code" question that washes ashore on Stack Overflow to get migrate votes. Yuuuuup.
    – user1228
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 18:49
  • I agree with everything you say here. But if this reasoning were carried to its logical end, Programmers should not be one of the unlocked migration paths, either, because all kinds of crappy questions get sent there. Anything that looks remotely subjective or "not constructive" gets at least 1 or 2 migration votes, and if you ask Mark Trapp, all those questions eventually end up on Programmers, forcing him to close them.
    – Cody Gray
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 19:36
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    @Cody yeah, I see what you mean :) But I think the problem would be intensified on Code Review, and the boundaries between a good CR question and a bad one are even more difficult to grasp.
    – Pekka
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 19:52
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    I really don't understand the confusion about what's appropriate for a code review. If it's so confusing, shouldn't someone clear it up by writing a set of rules?
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 24, 2012 at 5:13
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    Developers who "don't get" what code review is should be shot. If users with high rep are voting to migrate debugging "questions" to code review, then we should require them to write their employing company in their profile so that we may avoid it for all eternity.
    – Lightness Races in Orbit
    Commented Feb 25, 2012 at 19:32
  • @Won't: I don't think it's fair to suggest that experienced close-voters have a habit of suggesting that crappy debugging questions should be sent to CR.SE; we tend to instead just say "not a question" or "too localised" (though a "we're not here to debug your code for you" close reason would be nice too!)
    – Lightness Races in Orbit
    Commented Feb 25, 2012 at 19:34
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It all depends from how much questions asked on Stack Overflow should have been asked on Code Review; if that is a case that happens less times than with other sites, then it doesn't make sense to add the site to the migration path, and replace another site.

Consider that moderators can migrate questions everywhere, and they normally consult with the moderators of the receiving site. The dialog for closing questions appears like the following one, when a moderator select "is off topic" as reason to close.

screenshot

Flag the question for moderation attention, select "other," and reports the exact reason you are flagging the question.

screenshot

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  • Yeah, this is what I've been doing, it just felt weird.
    – The Community
    Commented Feb 23, 2012 at 15:57
  • 1
    A choice of site or a dropdown (or the search!) really is what should be happening in this section.
    – JoshDM
    Commented Feb 26, 2013 at 18:16
  • This answer should be in the FAQ.
    – Inbar Rose
    Commented Oct 16, 2013 at 14:31

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