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I just read Question like this on StackOverflow:

and there are plenty of them, at least, on the #wordpress tag, are more relevant to WordPress, and they should be belongs to WordPress Development StackExchange.

Why?

01. Because StackOverflow != WordPress Development

Just because it IS the WordPress Development StackExchange, StackOverflow solely isn't.

02. Because threads are not interconnected 'cross platforms

And it'd be nice having all the WordPress related answers in a single platform, where there are similar posts suggestions, related topic warnings, and especially WordPress enthusiasts are present.

For cross-site posting, on related topic, it isn't connecting each other on a viewer's POV. Suppose: SO thread like this is connected with a WPSE question like this, but there is no notification on the sidebar:
Related posts

not in either of the sites.

03. Search on the same topic isn't getting network data

If you search on a topic in WPSE, it won't give you result on SO, even though the topic is related and both or all the sites are in the same network.

What to do then?

Need a Migrate Button in StackOverflow so that, just like WPSE to SO migration we can migrate SO threads to WPSE.

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  • +1 It would make sense to migrate on-topic threads where they belong, mainly because this, as you said, is the WordPress Stack and WordPress related information should optimally be at one place.
    – Nicolai Grossherr
    May 4, 2015 at 12:22
  • I was gonna write a long answer on this but after reading some SO meta posts it seems that migrations is kind of discouraged. Between the 60 day limitation on migration, having only 5 sites to migrate to and no "Other" button, and the long list of closed migration suggestions makes me believe it's not even a topic anyone is willing to discuss. Stack Overflow is a place where "programmers" get their questions answered quickly, they're not interested in building a knowledge base or making question asking a "last resort". Simple dumping ground...
    – Howdy_McGee Mod
    May 6, 2015 at 4:11
  • Simple dumping ground... - hahahahaha
    – Mayeenul Islam
    May 6, 2015 at 5:13

2 Answers 2

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There is an interesting historical twist here:

  1. The WordPress questions are on topic for WPSE.
  2. The WordPress questions are on topic for SO.

See, the easy (and wrong) conclusion to jump to is that WPSE having happened made it “main” destination for WP questions. It actually didn't.

As far as SO is concerned people are welcomed to ask WP questions there and implying that WPSE is preferable for them is invalid, until SO community decides so.

That's the choice they haven't made (or even discussed thoroughly to my knowledge) so far.

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  • So the status quo - most definitely - remains. Doesn't change the fact though, that it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to have two, pretty much not connected, knowledge databases for one topic - from a holistic perspective. I might be wrong, but that makes it ultimately clear(er) - to me - why the administration aspect, e.g. in context of the renaming discussion, has been held up for WPSE, because for programming related things there is SO, which in a way would make WPSE obsolete, if there weren't additionally things on-topic.
    – Nicolai Grossherr
    May 4, 2015 at 13:21
  • Maybe there haven't been that concrete thoughts to this anyway and for historical reasons, just because SO was there at the beginning, there are two possibly with WordPress topics concerned communities. After all SO is the big mother-ship. But why have specialized stacks with overlapping topics then. Excuse my flow of words, probably all things definitely only so/se-executives can answer. So thanks for explaining.
    – Nicolai Grossherr
    May 4, 2015 at 13:32
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    To be clear this is not hypothetical, there was a mod discussion about this. SO had not given up WP questions out of their scope. You can go make case to them about it, we can't decide it here.
    – Rarst
    May 4, 2015 at 13:36
  • Sounds like, if you really want to, then be WPSE's Don Quixote or Sisyphus :)
    – Nicolai Grossherr
    May 4, 2015 at 13:39
  • Someone got to make sacrifices. Or be sacrifices. :)
    – Rarst
    May 4, 2015 at 13:41
  • Haha, maybe sometime, but for now I have a life to live :) 70k+ questions on SO, which would have to be looked through, provided that they could be convinced.
    – Nicolai Grossherr
    May 4, 2015 at 13:50
  • I've sometimes popped over to SO to try and answer any WP related questions but many of the questions I've seen are really poor. Either poorly worded, plugin specific, or asking for a complex answers while showing no work of their own. I wouldn't mind sifting through the trash to find a few gems to migrate, but I don't want to do that if the mods on both sides aren't onboard, it may not be worth the effort.
    – Howdy_McGee Mod
    May 4, 2015 at 13:57
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I do agree with @Howdy_McGee on this topic. I'm also active on SO answering wordpress questions from time to time. In all honesty, most questions that is related to Wordpress is low quality questions, mostly plugin related, questions that shows no research or effort, questions where the answerer needs to do all the work.

One out of 20 questions might be a good one if you're lucky. Users are using SO to post all their crap as frankly they do not get any positive feedback from us here.

Yes, it doesn't make sense to have two platforms with the same content, but what are we going to migrate from SO. In my opinion, we have much better content here. Most answers to good questions are also very poor quality. Answers that are links or code only answers, answers using poor or outdated code etc.

My question is, if we ever are going to migrate from SO, what will be migrated. We must remember, there are plenty users on SO with no knowledge of Wordpress, which leads me to believe that the day that SO are going to allow migration that everyone is going to jump in and going to vote to migrate all that crap to here, all off topic questions and low quality questions.

With the amount of users currently helping with the moderation of this site, it will just be a matter of time before WPSE is in the state that SO currently is.

In my opinion, the following needs to happen

  • SO needs to take a stand on their own policies. Wordpress questions are actually off topic on SO as the SE stack have a dedictated platform for Wordpress questions

  • SO should not implement a migration option to WPSE. Who is seriously going to moderate what will be migrated and what not

  • The woocommerce stack should see the light of day. It is currently in proposal on Area 51. Should that pass, us and SO should have fewer questions posted about woocommerce which will take care of one of our biggest problems.

  • New users should be forced to read and understand the policies of the site they are posting on and should also know what the minimum requirements are before posting a question. Some kind of punishment from the system side should exist in the event that such users does not confirm the minimum. In all honesty, most new users posting low quality questions are blatantly lazy. They do not take time to research their issues and don't even try something. They use the SE stack as first option, and not the last as it should be. Most of them take on paid projects without even having the minimum knowledge and then expect that we do the job for them

  • We should all deal with our own issues. What I mean here is, the users that participate on multiple stacks should moderte and use the stacks according to that particular stack's policies. It is of absolute no use making SO's problem WPSE's problem and vica versa. I totally moderate the sites differently when I'm doing reviews on SO and WPSE as the policies differ on the two stacks

I hope all of this makes sense :-)

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  • 1
    On one-hand I feel that if it's low quality it should be closed on SO anyway. On the other-hand I feel if there was a move to migrate good questions and shut down bad questions the SO mods would be overwhelmed. On the other-other-hand if everything gets migrated and we have to sort it out ( doubtful ) we would be overwhelmed. This leaves the option of SO outright not accepting WP questions and redirecting the WP tag to WPSE which is a decent option. Leave questions where they are and redirect anything new to here. That would also, probably never happen though.
    – Howdy_McGee Mod
    May 5, 2015 at 23:49
  • It's again again, but please note, I never asked for any low quality question migration - I asked for Question migration only. If the question doesn't meet the site's rules, it should be closed anyway - I have no sympathy for bad questions.
    – Mayeenul Islam
    May 6, 2015 at 5:15
  • @MayeenulIslam it was just something to mention. You and me know what to migrate, what about other users on SO. If you see the review queue of SO, many users vote and flag just for the sake there of. I can promise you now, more than 90 percent of users will vote to migrate any quality post just because it is tagged wordpress. There is unfortunately a huge difference between users on WPSE and SO. So I think we need to be careful with wanting this feature on SO :-)
    – Pieter Goosen
    May 6, 2015 at 5:27
  • @PieterGoosen you are right. I agree with you. But can we vote for at least a cross-site 'Related Questions' widget like the Hot Network Questions?
    – Mayeenul Islam
    May 6, 2015 at 6:03
  • We can certainly do that. I think it might be quite helpful :-). @MayeenulIslam
    – Pieter Goosen
    May 6, 2015 at 6:23

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