How should we handle incorrect answers?
Recently a flag came to my attention on this post: https://codegolf.codidact.com/posts/280372/281943#answer-281943
It is a well-intentioned answer to the challenge, but unfortunately it is wrong, and despite being notified, the user who posted the answer has not fixed it.
What should we do in such cases?
^ That can be used. Yo …
1y ago
Respect both sides We should …
2y ago
Do nothing It's wrong but w …
2y ago
Lock it Locking a post disa …
2y ago
4 answers
You are accessing this answer with a direct link, so it's being shown above all other answers regardless of its score. You can return to the normal view.
^
That can be used.
You can try to contact the person who posted the challenge and have them mark the answer as "React -> Invalid". Or otherwise it seems that anyone can mark an answer as invalid? I think this was the original purpose of that feature for this site. The help text for the reaction also suggests this usage.
The proposed post/solution does not comply with the rules of this site/challenge.
This is otherwise non-disruptive and gives the one who posted the answer a chance to fix it. Doesn't seem that it requires moderator involvement either(?).
3 comment threads
Respect both sides
We should consider how an approach would affect the poster of the incorrect answer, and how it would affect the posters of correct answers.
Correct answers
In general, allowing an incorrect answer to remain leaves some or all of the correct answers lower in the automated per language leaderboard than they belong. This is unfair to the correct answerers, and misleading for readers (including voters).
Incorrect answers
We could implement some approach that identifies incorrect answers on the leaderboard and prevents them from showing higher than correct answers. This would protect the posters of correct answers, but at the expense of potentially embarrassing the poster of an incorrect answer. I think we should favour an approach which recognises that at least some incorrect answers are posted with good intentions. We should avoid embarrassment where possible.
Conclusion
For this reason my recommendation is to delete an incorrect answer as soon as it has been clearly and conclusively communicated in a comment on the answer that it is incorrect. This avoids leaving the answer on the leaderboard, which would be unfair to the posters of correct answers. It also avoids leaving the potentially embarrassing comment visible to other users.
Sensitivity
Some people (particularly new users) may not be aware that their deleted answer is not visible to other users. This should be made clear when deleting. It should be emphasised that deletion is not a rejection, but a way of removing the answer from public view until it is ready. It would be good to settle on a standard wording for this, to be used by the moderator who deletes the answer. It should also mention that the poster of the answer can flag the answer to be undeleted once they are ready.
Process
If you have reason to believe that an answer is incorrect:
- Comment politely to explain why you believe this, giving sufficient detail for a moderator to base a decision on.
- Immediately flag the answer for moderator attention, to reduce the time that the answer is left publicly accused (even politely) of being incorrect.
- The moderator can then either delete the answer (commenting that this makes it invisible to other users, and mentioning that it can be flagged for undeletion once ready), or comment explaining that it is already correct if the previous commenter was mistaken.
An alternative would be to put the detail of why you believe the answer is incorrect in the flag wording, so no comment is ever visible to other users. Personally I see this as unnecessary. In cases where the answer is fixed before a moderator sees the flag, the answer never needs to be deleted. This would not be possible if the comment were not visible to the answer poster.
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