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So I go to edit a post, and it already has a suggested edit on it, blocking me from editing.

Well, fine. The suggested editor fixed all of the spelling errors, so I'll just approve his edit.

1 more users required to approve this edit.

AAUGH!

Anyone with edit privileges should just be able to summarily approve these edits. Otherwise, why did we bother giving them editing privileges?

Please fix this.

Note: I am already aware of Allow 10k users to unilaterally accept or reject suggested edits and Instant approval of revisions for users with edit privileges, but it's been five years and there's been no movement, so I'm raising my hand again. Also, 10K is fine, but the bar we set for unilateral editing was 2K, not 10K.

I'm also aware of this turd polishing argument. The problem is not polishing turds, it's that I'm blocked from any further editing efforts until the review is unwound.

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  • Well yeah, this is the only thing that irks me about suggested edits where I come from. Believe me, it feels like heaven.
    – M.A.R.
    Oct 8, 2016 at 17:48
  • Isn't Community supposed to reject the suggested edit on a post you just edited as "conflicts with a subsequent edit"?
    – dorukayhan
    Oct 8, 2016 at 19:07
  • 3
    @doru he means that if we approve a pending edit on a post, we can't edit it ourselves anymore. On smaller sites, I should wait for a second reviewer if I misclick until I get bored and close the tab.
    – M.A.R.
    Oct 8, 2016 at 20:16
  • -1 just because you post a duplicate on purpose instead of bumping existing request in the proper ways. So what if it's there for 5 years? It's not declined yet, no point having two similar requests open.
    – Shadow Wizard Says No More War
    Oct 9, 2016 at 10:30
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    Not quite sure why this question is getting so much negative attention; three reasonably high-voted answers below with no downvotes all say the same thing: "that's what the Improve Edit/Reject and Edit buttons are for." But those same answers also say that it's a sub-optimal user experience.
    – user102937
    Oct 10, 2016 at 3:44
  • No, because that forces you to edit for no more reason than to submit the edit immediately, thus resulting in low-rep users getting pissed off at high rep users "stealing" their work. If we're lucky, they'll even come to Meta to complain about it. How would we fill meta with low-quality dupe bait without annoying restrictions like this??
    – user1228
    Oct 10, 2016 at 14:18
  • @RobertHarvey For me the conclusion is: fix the sub-optimal experience and not the review mechanism.
    – Patrick Hofman
    Oct 10, 2016 at 14:21
  • @PatrickHofman: I don't care how it gets fixed. But I'm not proposing changing the review mechanism anyway. All I'm asking is that unilateral editing privileges mean exactly that.
    – user102937
    Oct 10, 2016 at 14:38
  • Note to self: never click the "approve" button.
    – user102937
    Oct 11, 2016 at 16:23
  • @RobertHarvey that's the way to go indeed, see Encouraging attentive suggested edit reviewers to skip every uncontroversial review "the answer was simple but blew my mind: skipping anything that would likely be accepted just fine anyway by the unstoppable train of auto-acceptances"
    – gnat
    Oct 13, 2016 at 22:17

4 Answers 4

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This is more or less exactly what the Improve Edit and Reject and Edit) buttons are for. They unilaterally accept or reject the edit and allow you to edit the post.

Only approval without doing anything requires two reviewers. I can only guess the rationale, but this makes sense to me as you are much less likely to miss something (or robo-review) if you edit the post yourself.

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  • 8
    The UX for this isn't good, though, because if you hit "Approve" first, whether through accident or ignorance, or any other reason, you can't go back and "Improve" until more people have shown up. At the very least, choosing to improve after approving should be an option.
    – jscs
    Oct 8, 2016 at 19:04
  • @JoshCaswell agree, apparent solution for that would be that after one clicks Approve, review screen for that post would show them only Improve Edit and Skip buttons active, with the rest being grayed out
    – gnat
    Oct 13, 2016 at 21:18
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Wrzlprmft already explained why this feature is not very useful. It is an easy step to click Approve and Edit and then edit the post.

The problem with that feature though is pointed out by Josh:

you can't go back and "Improve" until more people have shown up

Well, that is a bad experience. If you have second or third thoughts on a post and you want to edit after approving a valid edit, you have to wait for ages until someone comes and reviews the posts. That is useless.

Let's change that! Allow me to edit after I have approved or rejected and edit and you will be done. No need for this feature request any more.

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  • I kinda thought that's what I said in my post. Oh, well.
    – user102937
    Oct 13, 2016 at 16:48
  • You propose to allow one single user to end the review queue. I just propose to fix the editing issue.
    – Patrick Hofman
    Oct 13, 2016 at 17:09
  • My post says that the fundamental problem causing the editing issue is that unilateral editing privileges don't work in this context, which is true. But really, the workflow is too complicated. Improve and Edit/Reject and Edit are binding votes, but Approve isn't? Makes no sense. Should just be Approve or Reject, with binding votes for users with unilateral editing privileges.
    – user102937
    Oct 13, 2016 at 17:12
  • Sorry, but I think me and others had another impression from your question. I agree there is a problem but I disagree with your proposed solution.
    – Patrick Hofman
    Oct 13, 2016 at 17:28
  • There really isn't anything to disagree with. Unilateral Editing Privileges means you either have them, or you don't. I didn't really specify how the problem should be fixed, only that it was a problem.
    – user102937
    Oct 13, 2016 at 17:33
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I was going to say I totally agree then I remembered that the 'Improve Edit' button is for exactly this.

It is a pretty perfect system for the reasons mentioned elsewhere in this post.

Instead, I'm going to agree that the process could be improved simply by adding the option to improve even after you've already accepted; as it's a very easy and common accident that I would bet occurs regularly. I've done it myself more than once.

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0

I think it's good that it takes more than one person to approve edits. When reviewing other people's improvements, users may not look that thoroughly before approving. Therefore, I think it's useful to have more than one pair of eyes on it before approval.

However, when improving the post themselves, they will probably give it more attention.

So, as others have said: Keep the requirement of multiple users to approve edits. However, after clicking "approve", users with editing privileges should still be able to go back and improve it, and this improved edit should be applied instantly.

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