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I see a lot of users who do the following:

  1. Sign up to askubuntu
  2. Ask a question
  3. And never respond or comment or reply

Can we add a timeout for the activity on the question so that if no body returns back, his question will be deleted

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  • I think it already exist... but for 6 months
    – Braiam
    Feb 13, 2014 at 11:56
  • 1
    @Braiam Any official link please. And this is a very long time. So Askubuntu will hold a lot of unanswered questions because of it
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 11:58
  • 2
    There is only little automatic deletion on Stack Exchange, but unanswered questions are cleaned up.
    – user98085
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:06
  • @FEichinger Can we request this automatic deletion feature for askubuntu and define the timeout for example 1 month?
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:09
  • @kamil It is already active on Ask Ubuntu, with the very same criteria.
    – user98085
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:09
  • @FEichinger ok thanks. Now how can I close this question as there is no answer below?
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:09

1 Answer 1

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Deleting the question would not help anyone either. It may even happen that another user comes up and asks the same question and goes away, leaving the answerer(if any) in a hapless state of unawarded(rather unaccepted) hard work.

Keeping a timout for every post, expiry of which will scan the post for 4 possible cases:

  1. The question has been upvoted but does not have an upvoted answer. Close the post until another user votes for re-opening with a genuine reason.

  2. The question has been upvoted and has at least one upvoted answer. Leave this post as it is. If it has an upvoted answer, leave it as it is for future visitors to benefit from the answer.

  3. The question has not been upvoted and does not have an upvoted answer. Delete the post.

  4. The question has not been upvoted but has at least one upvoted answer. Again, leave the post as it is for future visitors.

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  • But if the originating user is sleeping and no one has the privilege to mark as answer. It's a useless question, isn't it ?
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:16
  • Why would it be a useless question? It may have benefitted the thankless OP who didn't mind marking it as answer. Also, someone else may come up with the same issue and repost it in its absence. However, deleting the post would leave the answerer(if any) with nothing but agony of having answered for a thankless user.
    – jobin
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:19
  • Ok I agree. I may change the feature request to be: Can someone take ownership of an old unanswered question and mark it as answer?
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:22
  • @kamil: That can be another way of handling that, but not pretty sure whether that is feasible.
    – jobin
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:24
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    Please don't worry about accepted answers - The primary way we decide whether a post is helpful to the community at large is upvotes. An accepted answer that ends up outdated after a while could be more harmful than no accepted answer at all.
    – user98085
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:25
  • @FEichinger I will go with you. I understand
    – kamil
    Feb 13, 2014 at 12:28
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    If it is a bad question give it a downvote, the Community user deletes posts with a negative score after 30 days.
    – Seth
    Feb 13, 2014 at 15:38

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