8

When I go to the questions tab (sorted by newest) under my profile's activity page and look through all the questions that I have asked so far, I noticed that my very first asked question's relative-time shows "11 hours ago" and the timestamp (hover over) displays "2015-07-16 03:17:39Z" (Please note: live link relative-time & timestamp may differ as it updates every secs/mins/hours/days - see the screenshot below). But, that's the time I modified the post and not created. The question was originally asked on Jun 5 at 11:39

Here is the screenshot of the same:

enter image description here

While I am okay with the questions sort order on the newest tab as they are arranged by the dates (i.e. newest first) but not happy with the way date and time is shown on this very old question of mine. How am I suppose to know the original asking date of this question? If I deduct 11 hours from today's time then it will give me a wrong date and not the actual date when the question was originally asked i.e. Jun 5 at 11:39. Of course, I can click on the question itself and get the date from the question-status area. But, I wasn't expecting this result from the newest tab.

Let me give you an actual working example here.

Take a look at the results shown by Meta.SE's questions tab (sorted by newest) link. The questions are sorted by the time originally asked (newest first) and displays the time (hover over for timestamp) of the creation. Also notice how the time is shown, it ranges from:

n secs ago > n mins ago > n hours ago > yesterday > 2 days ago > actual date.

This result strictly shows the newest questions that were asked. No modified/edited (i.e. any kind of recent activity) questions there at all. That's what exactly I was expecting from my profile's questions tab (sorted by newest) action. These results are sorted by asked date but confuses when you see the date and time shown on the questions displayed especially on the recent activity ones (stamps with modified time) .

I don't know how to interpret succinctly (need a little help here) my profile's questions newest tab's behavior for the results given, but let me summarize it by saying:

The most recently asked questions, sorted by creation date (newest first) but labeled with the timestamp of recent activity (if <= 2 days old) of any kind (including replies and edits).

As far as my knowledge goes,

activity tab is for the questions that have recent activity

and

newest tab is for the most recently asked questions.

Note: recent activity vs. recently asked

Why show the recent activity time instead of displaying the actual asking date and time? I can get my newest questions with recent activities by clicking on the activity tab on left.

Does this belong to one of those category? I am totally confused here.

I opted for using tag instead of tag as I am not sure on this and may be too early to call this as a "Bug". I will await for the possible answers from fellow members and SE team. Please share you thoughts.

Improve this question

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

If you visit the question itself, you will see why it says "13 hours ago HackerKarma". How? Because the time shown next to the question in your questions tab is the time your question was most recently active. When I mean active, I mean edited in some way in your case. In this screenshot, you edited the question 13 hours ago, thus the:

... 13 hours ago HackerKarma (Most recently active 13 hours ago) enter image description here

So really, it's .

Improve this answer
5
  • By status-bydesign you mean to say sorting under "newest" tab will show the "edited" timestamp while sorting them and not the original date of asking .
    – HackerKarma
    Jul 16, 2015 at 17:13
  • 1
    Precisely. It is weird that it shows the edited timestamp though.
    – Anthony Pham
    Jul 16, 2015 at 17:17
  • Exactly. Also, if you look at the top 5 links on newest tab then you will see it goes like 32 mins ago, 2 hours ago, 6 hours ago, 1d ago, 2d ago .... and I can do the calculation for those top ones by deducting hours / day from today's date BUT if the same rule applied to this very 1st question by deducting 11 hours from today then its wrong
    – HackerKarma
    Jul 16, 2015 at 17:41
  • You asked one hour ago. The time you made the screenshot was probably 1.5 hours before I made my answer. Hence the difference from now and then. Anyways, now it is probably 13 hours ago or 14, just like it should be.
    – Anthony Pham
    Jul 16, 2015 at 17:45
  • I'm stumped... "BUT if the same rule applied to this very 1st question by deducting 11 hours from today then its wrong date.... I will not get Jun 5 at 11:39 i.e. the day this question was asked
    – HackerKarma
    Jul 16, 2015 at 17:49

You must log in to answer this question.

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