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On my answer here, the OP posted a comment saying something like, "sigh...that was simple, thanks!". To which I replied my usual response: "Happy to help."

I see now those comments were removed. Should I not be acknowledging "thank you" comments from askers?

I found this somewhat related question, on whether to say a preemptive thank you in questions: Removing "Thank you"'s from questions

I understand the desire to keep the fluff to a minimum, but I tend to agree with the comment on the answer to the above question:

...IMHO the word(s) "thanks"/"thank you" are totally appropriate and conducive to good community.

And I would think the same applies to acknowledging a thank you.

What is the best practice for this?

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    It's worth noting that there's logic built in the comment flagging mechanism that will automatically approve the flag & delete the comment if it meets certain criteria, for example "+1 thanks".
    – I say Reinstate Monica
    Commented Dec 19, 2017 at 1:18

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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While giving and receiving a "thank you" is fine as far as comments go they are, in the long term, little more than noise.

In the long term the best "this helped"/"thank you" is an accepted tick or an upvote as it is a very definite "this is a good answer" from whoever gave the upvote.

If instead of upvotes we just said for people to comment then we would have nothing more than a noisy comment stream of "+1"'s, "thanks", "cheers" and "woo hoo"'s. It wouldn't be useful nor helpful to anyone who came along to look at the answer trying to see if there was anything in the comments that clarified how to achieve the solution. In fact those noisy comments would be actively harming their experience and making it difficult to find a real answer.

I agree that as a community member being thanked is a good thing and makes you want to be here, it is definitely a good thing to be told in no uncertain terms that you helped. I personally would allow the "thanks" in the very short term but after both parties have acknowledged each other it becomes less useful and therefore noise to be deleted.

Those sorts of comments definitely have an expiry date.

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    new suggestion that'll never be implemented: 'Leave a message for xxx' - that is, a message which only pops up on the appropriate page, and users.
    – djsmiley2kStaysInside
    Commented Dec 18, 2017 at 18:35
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    Those sorts of comments definitely have an expiry date.... While I do aggressively flag such comments (indeed it was me who flagged the 2 comments in question) I do try to wait a bit so a thank you can be seen.
    – I say Reinstate Monica
    Commented Dec 19, 2017 at 1:13
  • @TwistyImpersonator exactly. Once I see that the other party acknowledge the thank you, I flagged both. I also leave thanks and response to thanks, but always come back to clear it up by myself :)
    – Vylix
    Commented Dec 22, 2017 at 1:58

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