Questions tagged [deleted-comments]

For questions about comments that were deleted, deleted comments in general, or the comment deletion process

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Moderators can delete comments on any post but not undelete them prior to signing the moderator agreement

Is it expected behavior that an elected (but before accepting the agreement) moderator can delete any comment on the post, but unable to undelete them? Even for my own comments I got the error: An ...
αλεχολυτ's user avatar
3 votes
0 answers
72 views

I was notified of and viewed a comment, but the notification disappeared from my global inbox, and it isn't in the site's comment responses list [duplicate]

I commented on Session cookies seem to get lost and then, later while on another site, I was notified about Aaron Bertrand's comment reply. After responding several minutes later and, because I ...
John Omielan's user avatar
  • 12.9k
12 votes
0 answers
165 views

Make short "saved my <time>" comments single-flag-deletable

TL;DR The vast majority of short-length comments containing the substring "save" and certain units of time (hour, day, week, life) are useless (see "When shouldn't I comment" and ...
starball's user avatar
  • 18.3k
1 vote
0 answers
56 views

"Show X more comments" link appears even when there is nothing to be shown [duplicate]

My flag "It's no longer needed" was accepted for four comments under this question: Safeness of changing proto field number After deletion, when I revisited the post, it showed "Show 2 ...
iammilind's user avatar
  • 1,149
31 votes
0 answers
81 views

Let moderators delete comments while reviewing

Moderators can delete comments from Q&A pages by hovering over them; a red link appears, similar to how deleting one's own comments works: However, this functionality is not available in the ...
Glorfindel's user avatar
  • 247k
2 votes
0 answers
74 views

Can you @ping a user after they have deleted their last comment? [duplicate]

You can use @<user> to ping/notify a user that has commented previously. But if they have deleted their last comment do they still receive notifications if another user @-pings them in the same ...
MrWhite's user avatar
  • 2,058
37 votes
0 answers
202 views

"Bot" label appears next to my username when I delete a comment posted by the Community bot

On this post: A user asked an off-topic question The community closed it An irrelevant comment was posted by the Community Bot I (a moderator) deleted the irrelevant comment My username in the ...
Luke Sawczak's user avatar
26 votes
0 answers
249 views

Why wasn't this No Longer Needed flag automatically marked as helpful when the comment was deleted?

There's something strange going on with a comment under this question: How do you find how many questions have been asked on a given site? Timeline (September 17th, 2021, UTC): 16:45:10: created by @...
Glorfindel's user avatar
  • 247k
2 votes
2 answers
180 views

I should be allowed to delete as many of my comments a day as I choose to

I appreciate everyone who is trying to find me a suitable work around or explain to me the dangers of deleting too many of my comments, but you’re missing my point. The simplest way to “fix” my ...
ColleenV's user avatar
  • 19.9k
21 votes
5 answers
576 views

Should moderators be able to undelete any comment, including self-deletions?

Moderators were granted the ability to undelete comments, primarily to make cleaning up long comment threads more efficient. The idea was for the moderator to purge all comments, then selectively ...
Paul White's user avatar
23 votes
0 answers
141 views

Can we have a "toast" notification when visiting a direct link to a deleted answer/comment?

Background: Because users with <10k reputation cannot see deleted posts, visiting a link to a deleted answer, silently opens the parent question without a clear indication that the linked answer ...
41686d6564's user avatar
  • 15.1k
-17 votes
1 answer
144 views

Automatically remove all non-meta comments after a certain amount of time

Update: I was involved in some very useful discussion in comments under @tinkeringbell's answer. It helped clarify some of the arguments against automatic deletion. If there's interest in this ...
Jason Bassford's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
55 views

Do you get a notification if your comment is deleted? [duplicate]

Basically the title is the question: Do you get a notification if your comment is deleted? I couldn't find the answer in the help center or here on meta. But I'm pretty sure that I had comments under ...
miep's user avatar
  • 137
1 vote
0 answers
69 views

Notification about "I added the info you asked for" comment

On one hand, comments like "I added the info you asked for" should be deleted, as discussed here. On the other hand, if they get deleted, the previous commenter who had asked for the info ...
root's user avatar
  • 1,371
4 votes
2 answers
77 views

Flag comments "please edit to clarify X", "done" for deletion?

Should comments like "please add details of X to your answer", "done" be flagged for deletion? Deleting them would improve readability of the thread. The answer-relevant ...
root's user avatar
  • 1,371
-22 votes
1 answer
315 views

A system to undelete useful comments?

Sometimes a good question is deleted because a few people think it adds no value. Sometimes a good answer is deleted because a few people think it is not fit according to them. But there's the option ...
Ardent Coder's user avatar
-25 votes
1 answer
212 views

Why were my comments pointing out an error in an answer deleted?

I have twice posted comments under an answer by moderator Tinkeringbell to the question Under age users - could they just be suspended until of age? These comments have pointed out that the answer ...
phoog's user avatar
  • 145
8 votes
3 answers
273 views

Correct way to get rid of old unnecessary comments

What is the correct way to get rid of old unnecessary comments? I often visit one of my old posts and see that the comments have become "unnecessary", I then want to get rid of those comments. The ...
user avatar
7 votes
1 answer
278 views

How do I delete all my comments?

I want to delete all of my comments, but the https://api.stackexchange.com/2.2/comments/$ID/delete API method has a limit of 20 deletions per day. I don't want to call it every day for months, so is ...
Abyx's user avatar
  • 860
10 votes
1 answer
750 views

Why was the entire comment thread to this answer deleted? [duplicate]

The entire comment thread to my answer to this gender pronoun question was deleted. Can anyone with admin rights see the old thread? [Edit And explain why it was deleted?] Edit 2 Moving up comments ...
BobbyA's user avatar
  • 1,857
12 votes
1 answer
316 views

Can mods contextually delete comments?

Recently, I've seen comments get deleted but the context around them aren't: (For clarity, the above comments are all responses, 4 initial comments were deleted, the top one is in response to ...
Script47's user avatar
  • 17.2k
15 votes
1 answer
120 views

Some moderator tools related to deleted comments aren't working

Since at least 1 August, the moderator tool “show X deleted comments” leads to a 404 page. For example: on Is the calculation of infinite sums solvable by a computer?, I click “mod” then “show 7 ...
Gilles 'SO- stop being evil''s user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
90 views

When commenting before deleting a post, is the comment lost? [duplicate]

Sometimes it is appropriate to delete your own answer or question. That is often because someone explained a problem, and one accepts that the question or answer is not valuable. That is not directly ...
Volker Siegel's user avatar
-7 votes
3 answers
229 views

Should all comments be deleted?

Sometimes, mods delete comments. In fact, sometimes mods delete entire comment threads. This inspires people to come to this meta or site-specific metas to ask "why were my comments deleted" (e.g. ...
Him's user avatar
  • 805
-8 votes
3 answers
128 views

Is resources reduction one of the important reasons that questions/answers are deleted?

Today I clicked a link to a question on SO and got, 404 - This question was removed from Stack Overflow for reasons of moderation. That took me to another page, Why and how are some questions deleted?...
Mike's user avatar
  • 103
2 votes
0 answers
123 views

Why was the comment delete button changed from the X icon to the word "Delete"? [duplicate]

Update: I found my answer in an answer to another feature request. Basically, this was done for accessibility reasons, as well as to make the style match. I didn't find that post initially because the ...
Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog's user avatar
20 votes
1 answer
360 views

Help! I'm being haunted by a non-existent comment [duplicate]

This is a deleted answer. When I open it it shows me one comment, along with the option to "show 1 more comment": However, when I click on "show 1 more comment" nothing happens. That is to say that ...
Alex's user avatar
  • 10.3k
4 votes
1 answer
54 views

Any record of deleted comments? [duplicate]

I got an e-mail notification of three comments to a question I posted. Now going to look, I see one of the comments, but the other two are not there. Presumably, they were deleted. Since a record is ...
NewSites's user avatar
  • 273
-3 votes
2 answers
137 views

Can we share the workload of comment cleanup with the community?

The whole reason Stack Exchange exists is to let people post questions and answers to those questions. Since the very first day of Stack Overflow's existence, Qs and As have been considered first-...
SOLO's user avatar
  • 4,562
2 votes
0 answers
27 views

'Owner' formatting incorrectly applied on deleted comments [duplicate]

There is special formatting for user links in comments posted by the author of the question; it has a different background, to distinguish it from comments from other users. However, this background ...
Glorfindel's user avatar
  • 247k
1 vote
2 answers
339 views

Is it possible to retrieve comments deleted by a moderator?

I believe a moderator inappropriately deleted some of my comments. I have about 5K reputation there, and I am quite aware of the rules of Stack Exchange (SE) in general. My comments were ...
Tommy's user avatar
  • 175
-13 votes
1 answer
124 views

Show me a message if a comment I'm editing gets deleted

When I'm editing a comment, if the comment gets deleted in the meantime, I'm not notified in any way. This poses a problem because if I try to submit my edit, my edited comment is irretrievably ...
Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog's user avatar
19 votes
2 answers
390 views

Allow me to delete my own comments if they get moved to chat

Normally, I can delete a comment on a post at any time after I comment. However, if a moderator moves the post's comments to chat, I lose the ability to delete my comments that got moved to chat. ...
Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
57 views

What to do about "hanging" comments?

Frequently I'll be on various SE sites and see directed comments in direct response to others. Sometimes I find these intriguing as to what triggered the response, but I scroll up to find that the ...
Timpanus's user avatar
  • 143
-14 votes
2 answers
119 views

Comment deletion events in the revisions list

When a mod moves comments to chat, an entry "Mod Moved Comments To Chat" appears in the edit history (revisions list) of a question/answer (Example). I believe it would be useful if a similar entry ...
Federico Poloni's user avatar
11 votes
3 answers
297 views

Are comments which respond to another comment deleted by single flag?

I am aware that sometimes comments are deleted as a result of single flag if they contains some blacklisted words/phrases, as explained in several posts on this site. (For example: What is the SE ...
Martin's user avatar
  • 15k
3 votes
1 answer
130 views

Single Flag deletes comment with profanity [duplicate]

There is an existing question How is it possible that a single user who is not a moderator can delete a comment? 4 years old about a post a year prior, that focuses on a post containing the word(s) '...
James Jenkins's user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
221 views

Viewed, deleted comments staying in inbox

Lets start with a life-like scenario. User A receives an offensive comment in his inbox from the OP of a question. A then clicks on the notification in order to flag the offending comment. A mod sees ...
hat's user avatar
  • 6,406
1 vote
0 answers
33 views

Do questioners see deleted comments in their inbox? [duplicate]

Say Foo asks a question, then I comment "Yeah, right? Totally true, Foo." Then I delete it. Can Foo still read the comment in their inbox notification drop down?
user avatar
-12 votes
1 answer
240 views

Allow users to view deleted comment history

I had comments deleted on a question, losing some interesting information, which prompted me to raise this meta.vi question about how to see comments. This meta.SE question shows that there is indeed ...
Tom Hale's user avatar
  • 161
3 votes
2 answers
76 views

Can rude comments that were removed be accessed later on?

Over here I told a user that his question was off-topic; which triggered a really nasty reply by him. I flagged "rude" immediately (which is perfectly fine - it was rude); but now I kinda regret ... ...
GhostCat's user avatar
  • 37.9k
7 votes
2 answers
90 views

Comments moved to chat. Why all?

A question I posted was closed as duplicate (I think it's worth reopening and in fact I'm trying to get it reopened). Also, a bunch of people made comments and a moderator moved those comments and my ...
Emilio's user avatar
  • 181
-23 votes
1 answer
113 views

Auto-deletion of old comments based on the number of upvotes [duplicate]

I've encountered some Meta posts on the sites I am active or used to be active that complain about moderators' deleting comments without notifying the OP. Some OPs even complain that their comments ...
Rathony's user avatar
  • 1,736
0 votes
1 answer
65 views

Should I flag for comment restoration? [closed]

A user is accusing me of plagiarizing their comment as my answer. We both posted relatively the same comment within 30 seconds. My comment had a functional example though and the OP told me to posted ...
chris85's user avatar
  • 451
2 votes
0 answers
32 views

Broken highlighting on deleted comments [duplicate]

There is a minor bug in the display of deleted comments (visible to ♦ moderators and SE staff only) that is, well, bugging me. Background Moderators can see deleted comments, which is very handy when ...
elixenide's user avatar
  • 3,698
5 votes
1 answer
100 views

Delete comment on mobile version shows weird-looking combination of icon and letters

This probably is a bug. When I tried to delete my comment on the mobile version (particularly, Android mobile, Chrome browser, Stack Overflow's post), I noticed this strange looking combination of ...
Ian's user avatar
  • 231
2 votes
1 answer
116 views

Allow users to see deleted comments on their own posts

I know that moderator access tool (10k) is required in order to view deleted posts. I am talking about showing deleted comments on users' own posts. For example, this post of mine has this comment ...
Pandya's user avatar
  • 10.7k
0 votes
0 answers
55 views

What is the point of 5 minutes comment edit window, if we can delete and re-post? [duplicate]

I am aware of the "comment-timeout" which prevents the user to edit comments after 5 minutes edit window. But, it doesn't prevent the user from deleting and posting a new comment with modified ...
Snazzy Sanoj's user avatar
9 votes
2 answers
148 views

I made a comment and then later realized it was wrong; How do I make sure not to annoy the person I replied to?

I made a comment asking if something was correct (@user shouldn't it be foo not bar?) then later realized that I was an idiot and they were completely correct. So, my first thought was to delete the ...
Shelvacu's user avatar
  • 603
5 votes
1 answer
875 views

Can I view my comments if someone deletes them?

I would like to know whether I can view my comments under someone else's answer to my questions once someone deletes them. I do not know why they were deleted. They seem to constructive to me. Weather ...
Jack Maddington's user avatar