1

Motivation

Let's say an OP asks a bundle of questions all in one post, he gets politely guided to ask one question per post, he ignores the guidance, the correct number of days go by, and now I'm cleared to jump in with my edit hat on to fix his question.

Is it sufficient to select one good question out of the bunch, remove everything else, and leave it at that? With a comment to the OP explaining what I did, and encouraging him once more to write more posts with the rest of his material.

The alternative is, it is my responsibility, if I want to edit and fix his question, to create the additional questions FOR him.

3
  • If anyone has a third approach, please add it.
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 12:07
  • 1
    The problem with asking the other questions for the OP is that s/he will not get automatically notified of answers to them (as far as I understand it).
    – mdewey
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 12:17
  • @mdewey - Do you support the "no" answer? If so, could you upvote it, please?
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 12:32

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
3

Neither

Leave a gentle comment and then wait. If the OP does not come back to clarify the post and narrow down the questions within a few days then the question should be flagged for closure as too broad.

3
  • I forgot about this one. Yes, this is definitely an option. But what if someone wants to rescue the question? When I did that, I was told first that I should wait several days (not clear how many), and then after several days I was told to create additional questions -- but my civic-minded instincts didn't extend that far and I really didn't feel like it. What's your opinion about whether I should be allowed to rescue the question if I want to do that, and if I want to do only that?
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 13:31
  • @walen - Maybe some feel that poor questions should not be fixed, as a general rule. That's not how I personally feel, but I'm interested to find out what the consensus is, and to do that, we need to hear from a variety of points of view.
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 13:37
  • 1
    I think a lot of what fedorqui explains in this answer applies here: Don't polish turds, focus on helping new users to learn to express themselves, "neither feel the urge to ask something the OP did not really ask, nor to clarify what others do not make clear."
    – Diego Mod
    Commented Sep 15, 2017 at 2:22
-1

Yes

It is the responsibility of the civic-minded question fixer-editor, to create the additional questions for him.

2
  • As you could probably tell, this is the answer, in my view. But I can't vote for it because I'm the one who set up the structure of this poll.
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 14, 2017 at 12:07
  • @walen - I could. But do I have to?
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 15, 2017 at 2:15
-1

No

It is sufficient to select one good question out of the bunch, remove everything else, and leave it at that. With a comment to the OP.

4
  • I must have been very sleepy when I set up this poll, because I managed to set it up backwards. Actually, this is the answer I support. In other words, I would like to be able to edit a bundled question and not have to go creating additional questions on the OP's behalf.
    – aparente001
    Commented Sep 19, 2017 at 11:55
  • 1
    The problem with this approach is that we lose content. And who is to decide which "good question out of the bunch" prevails over the others? It would be better to close the question, maintaining all content, and spin off new questions for each "good question", or at least leave the OP the privilege to edit their own post as they see fit.
    – Diego Mod
    Commented Jun 12, 2018 at 13:23
  • @Diego - Lose content? It's still there in the edit history, no?
    – aparente001
    Commented Jun 13, 2018 at 2:01
  • 1
    Yes, it would be hidden in the edit history available for those with enough privilege or willingness to use the functionality, audit the edits and finish migrating or spinning off the leftover "good parts" into new questions. While it wont be lost forever, it would be less visible, and I think that would prevent some content to be migrated.
    – Diego Mod
    Commented Jun 13, 2018 at 2:15

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