1

This question How do I tell my boss that he may be underestimating how much work/cost my project entails? asked in September 2017 was marked as a duplicate of this question As a developer; Not getting time to test, receiving extreme deadlines and not being listened to by the manager asked in July 2018.

Surely this is backwards? Is it appropriate to mark an old question as a duplicate of a just asked question?

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
6

Is it appropriate to mark an old question as a duplicate of a just asked question?

I believe we should keep the best question open without regard to if it is the newest or oldest or somewhere in between.

But there are no rules regarding which of two questions must be marked as the duplicate. People are free to choose whichever they like. They can choose the newest, or the least comprehensive, or the one they just don't happen to like.

4
  • 2
    guidance at MSE seems to agree with this approach: "If the new question is a better question or has better answers, then vote to close the old one as a duplicate of the new one..."
    – gnat
    Jul 30, 2018 at 15:06
  • 1
    Yup. Actually, I was the one who noticed both questions and decided to VTC the older post first. The link @gnat provides is what I used as guidance.
    – DarkCygnus Mod
    Jul 30, 2018 at 17:44
  • The problem is the wording of the close message: "This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question." It makes it seem like the original OP did something wrong, when in fact the new OP (apparently) didn't see the old question.
    – CJ Dennis
    Aug 1, 2018 at 5:02
  • @CJDennis if you want the wording changed, that is something the folks at Meta SE would be interested in reviewing. I agree that it could be phrased more politely
    – DarkCygnus Mod
    Aug 1, 2018 at 15:51

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .