Has anyone suggested adding an autolock feature to advanced options?

[jackg]

Similar to how you can make a topic self moderated, it would be interesting if you can toggle an autolock function so a thread locks after a certain number of responses.

I.E if you know it's a bit of a simple question, you could set autolock to 5 and then wait for those responses and the thread will automatically lock itself to new replies once the 5th reply has been made. There could be a way to toggle this once it's set to increase or disable the autolock if the topic becomes more interesting.

It happens a lot in this and other parts of the forum where a question gets answered and then someone picks up on something that has been said and just keeps going on about it even though it isn't related... Some memebers, like me will write about things just before bed or before going out in order to get a reply once we come back online so we can't sit patrollling the topics all the time. The alternativve to this is making everything selfmod but you can't do that in meta.

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[rhomelmabini]

The idea is great but what IF even after 5 responses there still haven't a good point or answer on the question, I guess that will leave the question unanswered. I know there are lot of great members lurking here on Meta to cater those needs especially what some answers as they are newbies or have limited knowledge on the forum. This is just my optimism by the way.

[r1s2g3]

I will vote for the time based autolock , If you got problem it need to be solved on a definite time frame, let say 3 days. So you can decide it will lock after 3 days because afterwards I am no more looking at more solutions.

The problem with auto locking after fix number of replies is that if sub par poster started replying in the topic then your topic will be already locked when it is seen by some good poster or good solution giver.

Anyway, making a habit for locking when problem is resolved is the best solution.

[jackg]

The idea is great but what IF even after 5 responses there still haven't a good point or answer on the question, I guess that will leave the question unanswered.

You can go back to the thread, unlock and bump it.

[Pmalek]

In that case the suggestion by r1s2g3 makes more sense (time based autolock).
You need a solution to a problem until Wednesday and that is when the thread will autolock as anything that gets suggested after Wednesday wont help you.

An example why I don't like the proposal by jackg.

User A opens a thread. He has a problem. User X knows the answer. But there have already been 5 posts in the thread and it has been autolocked.
User A is not satisfied with the replies so he re-opens the thread. The next day User X sees the thread again and again it is locked because of 5 new replies.
At this time user X just gives up.

It can be time consuming opening and closing threads that way and you could potentially miss out on the solution to your problem because your thread was closed at a time when someone was about to offer your the needed help.

[jackg]

I've pm Ed the op of locked threads before, why can't people do that?

You make it sound like a thread is the only response as people can only answer questions thst way but why would that be?

[TryNinja]

I prefer more conclusive answers and a well informed post (even with a few extra redundant/spam posts) than a couple of half-ass solution.

There is already a lock thread option. If we really want to reduce the spam on answered threads, we should put a warning telling the user to lock it when he is done; and not force a lock because there are 5 posts on that thread.

[HCP]

A mod bot that autolocks any thread that hasn't had an activity (to account for bumps etc) in like 1 month would be great... might stop some of the severe necroposting that happens here where someone responds to a thread from 2017 saying "I can help you recover that 1000 BTC you accidentally deleted, PM me"

[Pmalek]

I've pm Ed the op of locked threads before, why can't people do that?

You make it sound like a thread is the only response as people can only answer questions thst way but why would that be?

Of course you can PM the OP but in that case the discussion becomes private instead of public. Valuable information that could be posted in the thread is now sent over PM and other users can't learn from it or understand how to solve the same kind of problem ultimately leading to them opening a similar thread asking the same thing.  

[jademaxsuy]

Well you can lock it manually by yourself after getting some answers from the users. That if one has good memory on doing it remembering started threads that needa to lock up after a period or the number of replies expected that answers could be found.

But, if theymos will going to implement this kind of add on feature for advance users then it might do good as well. It seems that this will be effective in the SMT prohibiting it to bump over a period of time or number of post or replies  achieve in every thread.