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Many times, someone will suggest an edit to a post that was closed within the last five days. The edit itself may be benign, and correct valid things such as grammar issues or a bad title. However, such edits may cause the post to be pushed into the Reopen Votes queue if there were no edits since the post was closed.

This presents a problem, as since the post can only be added to the queue by editing once per closure, and the diff shown in the review queue is that of the edit which pushed it (AFAIK), this deprives the post author (or anyone else interested in seeing the post reopened) of their chance to have it reopened. Sometimes, reviewers are attentive to this and reject these edits, but as there is no way to tell in the review itself, those edits are usually approved.

Can we add in a new notice, which says that if a certain suggested edit is approved, it will cause the post to be pushed into the reopen queue? This should be loaded live, because it's possible that the suggestion took place before the post was closed and is still up for review when the post gets closed. This way, reviewers know to check if the edit is really worthy to push the post into the reopen queue, and not just check it in general.

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  • I think that this would help us at GIS: gis.meta.stackexchange.com/q/4469/115
    – PolyGeo
    Mar 5, 2018 at 9:25
  • How about we just make it such only edits by the OP trigger the automatic entry into the reopen queue?/ If a someone other than the OP edits and feels it should be reopened, they can vote to reopen, or flag for a moderator.
    – Makyen
    Mar 5, 2018 at 15:03
  • @Makyen It used to be like that back when the closing system was initially revamped to include the five-day "on hold" period. But it was later changed. Also, someone else may make a good suggested edit, and then the OP can approve it.
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Mar 5, 2018 at 16:57
  • FWIW, the reason for the 3rd-party edit trigger is pretty much the same as the one for 1st-party edits: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/186722/…
    – Shog9
    Mar 5, 2018 at 17:39
  • @PolyGeo I proposed a more technically feasible version of this request, for binding edits: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/307590/…
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Aug 9, 2018 at 18:15
  • @SonictheInclusiveHedgehog I think you've accidentally linked back to this same question.
    – PolyGeo
    Aug 9, 2018 at 18:41
  • @SonictheInclusiveHedgehog I found it at meta.stackexchange.com/q/313932/215590
    – PolyGeo
    Aug 9, 2018 at 19:17

1 Answer 1

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This would be tricky to implement, since it's asking the system to predict the future. You identified one edge case - questions closed while an edit is pending review - but of course the question could get a reopen vote too.

Arguably, if we had something useful to say to reviewers in this scenario we should just say it to them all the time, regardless of who made the edit and whether or not the question had been in review.

But on top of all that... This thing you're worried about where someone edits and deprives the asker of getting a fair shake for their own edit... It rarely happens. Heck, even the scenario where a 3rd-party edit is followed by an asker edit is rare; the cases where it matters are few enough to make it hardly worth thinking about.

We'd be doing far more harm by potentially distracting reviewers from their task than we'd ever compensate for here.

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  • Is the diff shown in the reopen queue the original vs. current revision, or original vs reopen-queue-pushing-edit version?
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Mar 5, 2018 at 17:41
  • It should show any and all changes made since the question was closed, @Ano
    – Shog9
    Mar 5, 2018 at 18:11
  • Okay, then this already uncommon situation should be a bit less of an issue.
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Mar 5, 2018 at 18:13
  • "It rarely happens". It happens a lot! The next sentence ('Heck,...') I am not sure, but when this feature was implemented, it probably had the objective to give OPs a better chance (getting their question reopened). The following is a different approach I believe would work better: meta.stackexchange.com/questions/316115/….
    – Andre Silva
    Oct 2, 2018 at 0:44
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    I don't have numbers handy for the frequency anymore, @Andre - but for this scenario to occur the question has to get closed followed by two qualifying edits within five days. Most questions don't even get one qualifying edit, and most of the ones that do are OP edits. See: meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/355341/…
    – Shog9
    Oct 2, 2018 at 1:58
  • I appreciate your time answering me here and in the other post; I know you are busy. Looking at the reopen statistics from your previous post, 3rd party edits seem to be worthless (<1% of reopening rate). Considering that other post you pointed me too (the one which shows the complicated logic of sending posts to the queue after edits), I believe it would be even a better idea to simplify the logic and only send to the queue, OP’s first edit within 5 days of closure. Putting another way, it feels 3rd party edits are just noise in this process.
    – Andre Silva
    Oct 2, 2018 at 3:52
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    I'd say all of the triggers are pretty terrible, @Andre - the best of the lot is folks just voting to reopen, where the task enters review needing only 4 reopen reviews to reopen... Even that isn't effective in the vast majority of cases. So if we're gonna add another trigger, or make a change to existing ones, I'd want some indication that it'd be a substantial improvement. Owner edits are slightly better than 3rd-party edits, but that's pretty much the only thing you can say for 'em - they contribute almost 3x as much "noise" as 3rd-party edits.
    – Shog9
    Oct 3, 2018 at 20:23

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