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Coincidentally, I have found a methodology for OP to save his/her posts to avoid to be deleted.

Whenever the OP find his/her post(not answered) have 1 or 2 votes of deletion, then do

  1. delete the post;

  2. undelete the post.

Warning: Do not leave or refresh when the post is deleted.

If everything goes well, the votes of deletion will come back to 0...

Is it legal? Or a bug?

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9
  • If this is a bug, then this is a serious bug, and someone should test this immediately. Anyone want to help test this? – user206222 Apr 3 '13 at 15:36
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    @Telthien There is a legitimate use for that; a user could delete his own post and edit it while deleted, then undelete. A pattern of doing what the OP suggests would eventually attract community/moderator attention, though. – Andrew Barber Apr 3 '13 at 15:37
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    @AndrewBarber I'm not sure the delete votes should be cleared, though. If the question has been sufficiently edited, then it won't accrue any more delete votes, and the point is moot. – user206222 Apr 3 '13 at 15:38
  • @Telthien Once the post has been deleted, existing delete votes are irrelevant. – Andrew Barber Apr 3 '13 at 15:40
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    @AndrewBarber Not if the user undeletes their question. – user206222 Apr 3 '13 at 15:40
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    Is this really that big a problem? – Martijn Pieters Apr 3 '13 at 15:41
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    @Telthien It doesn't matter who deleted it. A user deleting their own question is almost always intending to leave it deleted, or to edit it and undelete it. In either case, the previously-existing delete votes really should not put the question back on the fast-track for deletion. – Andrew Barber Apr 3 '13 at 15:43
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    @AndrewBarber Hmm... We may have to leave this as a casual disagreement :P Though that makes sense, I would still argue that a question won't get more delete votes if it's been properly edited. Nevertheless, both solutions work, I think, in this case. – user206222 Apr 3 '13 at 15:46
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    @Telthien Agree to disagree; resolved! ;) – Andrew Barber Apr 3 '13 at 15:52
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The exact procedure you describe would be an exploit of the system, and would eventually attract attention from the community and, therefore, moderators.

The basic functionality does serve a potential purpose, though; the OP could delete their post when they see delete votes coming, and edit it to improve it, and undelete it after. That would be a legitimate use of this.

In practice, the exploit would be fairly rare. It would only happen in a rapid-fire situation of closes/comments/votes/deletes. In such a case, the question will tend to have a lot of attention, and the people who delete-voted would be very likely to see what happened, and flag for moderator attention.

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2
  • Given this change, is this kind of abuse even possible anymore? – Cody Gray Apr 4 '13 at 1:06
  • @CodyGray I think that once the OP casts a delete vote, it counts as being deleted by them, even if there were other delete votes. I'm not 100% on that from that post or experience, though. – Andrew Barber Apr 4 '13 at 1:13

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