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I have just flagged an answer. I shouldn't be able to flag it again, but the Flag button is still visible. I can click it, choose any flag reason and click Flag answer. This is when I will be shown the message:

You have already flagged this post

This is clearly some poor UX design. The best (IMO) solution would be to disable Flag button when it shouldn't be available and add an on-hover tooltip with identical message.

If this is not desired for some reason (for example checking issued flags is expensive and would significantly affect performance), then the check should be performed when user clicks the Flag button.

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  • I think the guys at MSO should know this. BTW, I'm pretty sure that if you flagged as Spam/Offensive both options gets disabled.
    – Braiam
    Commented Dec 14, 2013 at 19:10
  • IIRC you used to be able to flag as one reason (e.g. poor quality) and then flag 'needs attention' afterwards. @Braiam The team monitors all meta sites. Unless you want to discuss this, no reason to post on MSO.
    – Daniel Beck Mod
    Commented Dec 14, 2013 at 20:05
  • @DanielBeck that's exactly what I tried to do and it didn't work, so maybe that feature has been removed. UX design on SE sites is really good and I don't think such thing could be done by design.
    – gronostaj
    Commented Dec 14, 2013 at 20:09
  • @DanielBeck this is related to all the SE sites, IMHO should be discussed in the Meta.SE (aka Meta StackOverflow) since it doesn't affect one site only but the entire SE.
    – Braiam
    Commented Dec 14, 2013 at 20:20
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    @Braiam This isn't how the team sees it. If it's a discussion that should involve all the SE communities, MSO is probably the best site. But bug reports, which rarely involve the community beyond the original report? The team monitors all meta sites, and those are the ones you'd want to reach.
    – Daniel Beck Mod
    Commented Dec 14, 2013 at 20:50

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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This is actually by design, because 'other' is available to you even if you have flagged the post for something else. For instance, you might flag an answer as 'not an answer', see that it was edited 10 minutes later, then flag as 'other' to let the mods know that your previous flag should not be considered valid any longer.

Similarly, you could also flag as one reason, then flag as 'other' to give additional context (e.g. 'you should look at this user's history as well, because he's always writing smelly one line answers').

What we could do is make sure that 'other' is the only flag available in these circumstances, which I believe is a bit more intuitive. I also distinctly remember the system behaving in this manner (if you flag a deleted post, you only see the 'other' reason as one of the options) - this could be a regression due to some recent major overhauls.

I'll status-* something this accordingly once I find out more. Thanks for the report :)

Update

This does appear to be a regression, 'other' should be the only option that you see if you click 'flag' on a post that has a pending flag from you for any reason other than 'other'. Jarrod will have a peek at this and get it fixed.

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  • That's how I stumbled onto this, I tried to issue an 'other' flag after the first one - it didn't work, "You have already flagged this post". Maybe it will help to pinpoint the problem.
    – gronostaj
    Commented Dec 28, 2013 at 11:31
  • I found out that typing "not an answer" exactly into the custom flag box causes the system to treat your flag as a normal not an answer flag rather than a custom flag. This allows users to flag as not an answer multiple times on a same answer.
    – gparyani
    Commented Jan 7, 2014 at 16:46

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