Timeline for What is the correct way to deal with obsolete answers?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
19 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 11, 2020 at 10:30 | comment | added | M H | Including adjustments relevant to more recent versions in, eg square brackets [....] could be a helpful alternative, as that could provide the new information clearly separate from the earlier version information, and also preserve the information re the earlier version of, eg, an OS which is older/ no longer officially supported, yet which is still in use. | |
| Mar 20, 2017 at 10:18 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
replaced http://superuser.com/ with https://superuser.com/
|
|
| Sep 20, 2016 at 11:25 | comment | added | qubodup | I "saved" a previously accepted answer by adding a oneliner summarizing the new answer and moving the previous answer under a "before version... this worked" superuser.com/posts/650625/revisions | |
| Feb 7, 2013 at 23:34 | answer | added | Qix - MONICA WAS MISTREATED | timeline score: -1 | |
| Jan 31, 2013 at 2:14 | comment | added | nitro2k01 | Sometimes it is the case that older versions of a program can do things, or can do things more easily, than later versions of the sane program, and so people have legitimate reasons stick with it. A seemingly obsolete answer can be useful for some people, including other people than the asker. As suggested above by others, edit or leave a comment. That's my opinion anyway. | |
| Jan 28, 2013 at 9:59 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/#!/StackSuper_User/status/295833559107788802 | ||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 23:38 | answer | added | Journeyman GeekMod | timeline score: 14 | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 11:38 | vote | accept | evilsoup | ||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 11:38 | |||||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 11:30 | comment | added | slhck Mod | I wouldn't feel too bad about downvoting, ever. We're not voting for people, but based on the usefulness of answers. Useful answers should go to the top, the rest to the bottom. As I said, if you can't edit the answer to fix it and it simply doesn't work anymore, maybe the OP can. Downvote, leave a comment, and if they fix it, simply undo your vote. | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 10:55 | review | Close votes | |||
| Feb 1, 2013 at 3:01 | |||||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 10:38 | comment | added | evilsoup | @slhck Another thing that I didn't put in the question is that I feel kind of bad for downvoting these kind of answers - since they're not actually wrong, and were written in good faith at the time, it feels wrong to penalise them with the points-loss associated with downvoting. It could also lead to perverse incentives - if someone is still active on SU, they may delete older answers, which may well still be of use to some people, because they don't want to deal with the points-loss... | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 10:38 | comment | added | Bob | possible duplicate of How to reopen an already answered question which is outdated?, What to do about permanently outdated questions/answers on SU, What should we do with outdated, but highly-popular questions?, Should I delete my answer when it gets outdated due to version changes? | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 10:11 | comment | added | slhck Mod | Don't forget: It's not like we're deleting the posts that become outdated. They simply aren't that useful anymore… Also, there's a difference between "tools" that you'd expect users to update regularly (like FFmpeg) and operating systems that – by design – stick around longer, where it's much less likely that existing solutions become irrelevant. Actually, in a similar case @DanielBeck also gave me an answer that I later simply unaccepted for the more up-to-date solution after the software had changed. | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 9:43 | comment | added | evilsoup | @Daniel ...what about software that is no longer officially supported? Should answers like 'oh you can do this in win95 like this...' be left as-is? In my example, the ffmpeg devs and the support mailing-list refuse to support any versions pre-the current stable release (and prefer the current git-head, but that's another issue), so it would be equivalent to using an outdated OS. Then again, I suppose SU shouldn't feel bound by the standards of other organisations. | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 0:26 | comment | added | evilsoup | @Daniel that's a very good point | |
| Jan 26, 2013 at 21:50 | comment | added | Daniel Beck Mod | Remember that the answers given aren't wrong, they simply apply to older versions of the software in question and can still help people using those: like folks still using software from the early 2000s that is still supported, e.g. Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 from 2003 — it's not like William called Pluto a planet. Adding a note such as "This approach works in versions A.B.C and earlier of ffmpeg" would be a good solution. | |
| Jan 26, 2013 at 16:55 | answer | added | slhckMod | timeline score: 13 | |
| Jan 26, 2013 at 16:50 | comment | added | slhck Mod |
I know what you're talking about… just do a search for sameq on Super User.
|
|
| Jan 26, 2013 at 16:38 | history | asked | evilsoup | CC BY-SA 3.0 |