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In a couple of comments recently, I have been told that instead of commenting or voting to close, I should flag questions that would be appropriate for say, tex.stackexchange.com "for migration". However, when I flag a question on StackOverflow, there is no explicit option to flag for migration.

I have learned that such an option used to exist, but apparently it doesn't any more.

Moreover, I don't think voting to close a question as "off-topic - belongs on another site" will cause it to be automatically migrated either. Again, it used to, but it doesn't seem to any more.

So now, it seems, we can only use the generic "flag for moderator attention for some other reason" option for this - is that right? So only the people who have been told, or have guessed, that this is still an option, will actually do so?

This seems like a ridiculously overkill way to avoid bad flags for migration. Surely there is a better way to handle this supposed problem?

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    This is the Internet. People don't read. Therefore we can't have nice things. The total number of questions that actually deserve migration is probably small enough to make it more efficient to do it manually.
    – Jonathan Garber
    Dec 30, 2013 at 14:27

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Moreover, I don't think voting to close a question as "off-topic - belongs on another site" will cause it to be automatically migrated either.

Yeah, it will - if at least three other people agree with you and vote the same way.

A bit of background might be helpful here: there has always been an unbelievable amount of whining associated with the migration feature, some of it warranted, most of it just silly. As a result, various restrictions were put in place to try to limit the number of unwarranted migrations:

  • Questions must receive at least 4 votes for the same "belongs on" site to be migrated
  • Questions older than 60 days can't be migrated at all
  • If the question is closed or deleted on the destination site, the migration is rejected.

For what it's worth, I still comment when I don't think a post is worth migrating, and I don't see why you would stop just because it might get migrated - if the question would be better asked on Tex, go ahead and say so; this might even serve to introduce other readers to the existence of that site.

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  • This question, which I voted to close, looks like 5 people voted to close it as off-topic, but doesn't look like it was migrated. Can you explain what happened there?
    – Robin Green
    Dec 30, 2013 at 16:07
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    Yup - you didn't select "belongs on another site -> super user", you just picked the "general computing is OT for SO" reason (and so did everyone else).
    – Shog9
    Dec 30, 2013 at 16:15
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..I should flag questions that would be appropriate for say, tex.stackexchange.com "for migration". However, when I flag a question on StackOverflow, there is no explicit option to flag for migration.

To flag for a question to be migrated, you need click the following (in order):

  1. Flag
  2. it should be closed for another reason...
  3. off-topic because...
  4. This question belongs on another site in the Stack Exchange network
    4.1 belongs on meta.stackoverflow.com
    4.2 belongs on superuser.com
    4.3 belongs on tex.stackexchange.com
    4.4 belongs on dba.stackexchange.com
    4.5 belongs on sharepoint.stackexchange.com
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  • I have "vote to close" privileges on StackOverflow, which is the site I'm talking about. I thought flagging to close was superfluous because I can already vote to close?
    – Robin Green
    Dec 30, 2013 at 14:33
  • If a question needs closing and you have sufficient privileges, then yes most certainly vote to close rather than flag. However, you said "flag to migrate", not flag to close. If you vote to close then the question will remain on Stack OVerflow but as closed. However, the question might be a great question and not in need of being closed and is just on the wrong Stack site, so just needs moving (migrating), which is what I thought you were asking about
    – James
    Dec 30, 2013 at 14:41
  • So I have to hope that the moderator telepathically picks up my assessment that it should be migrated, and not closed, even though I am flagging it for closure?!
    – Robin Green
    Dec 30, 2013 at 14:43
  • I suppose the wording isn't perfect as you initially chose "closed for another reason" but the final choice is "belongs on another Stack site", which means it will be closed on SO but moved/migrated to another Stack site.
    – James
    Dec 30, 2013 at 14:45

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