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Things on the Stack Exchange network change over time, as they should.

One relatively recent change was that made to the workflow in the "Reopen votes" review queue, when a reviewer chooses the "Leave closed" option. In such cases, we are now presented with a "Why should this question remain closed?" pop-up, in which we can either select a close reason different from the original or choose "Original close reason(s) were not resolved." This is a very positive change, IMHO.

Also, over time, new close reasons are added and others are removed; this is also a sign of a healthy, dynamic community.

But what should reviewers do with questions closed for reasons that no longer exist?

I recently reviewed this question, which was closed for the following reason:

Questions asking for code must demonstrate a minimal understanding of the problem being solved. Include attempted solutions, why they didn't work, and the expected results.

This reason was removed some time ago. In this case, I felt that the question was still not really fit to be reopened and chose to leave it closed with that original reason. But, shortly afterwards, I started to think about whether that was really appropriate. For sure, the question itself has not been improved (or changed in any way since its closure) but is it really the case that the original close reason has "not been resolved"? After all, the community decided that that was not a 'valid' close reason – so has the issue been 'implicitly' resolved?

What should we, as reviewers, do in cases such as this? (Particularly if no other, current close reason is really appropriate.)

There are other close reasons that have been removed in which the situation is a bit clearer: for example, on Stack Overflow, two reasons (essentially, "Belongs on Super User" and "Belongs on Server Fault") have now been removed and replaced with a more generic, "Not about programming." When reviewing posts with either of those old reasons, I have no issue with leaving closed but changing the reason to the new one.

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    A close reason is only a kind gesture to the OP. For reviewers all that matters is: Can the question in its current version be answered on this site. If yes, re-open, if not, leave closed. Let's not get bogged down, specially on SO, by re-open/re-close cycles as that is a waste of votes, effort and time. We have better things to do.
    – rene
    Commented Apr 16, 2023 at 11:24
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    @rene Not sure about that. There are off-topic questions that can be answered, like those about servers and general computing issues, and those seeking software recommendations. And I really think that the reason presented in the blue banner should be both accurate and up to date.
    – Adrian Mole
    Commented Apr 16, 2023 at 11:26
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    I meant with "on the site" to be scope inclusive. I assumed we were level at that knowledge.
    – rene
    Commented Apr 16, 2023 at 11:28
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    OK. I was just using those reasons as examples. But, as for the close/reopen cycle and wasted votes: We can now (in theory) change the close reason without casting a reopen or close vote. If the question is already in the review queue, then it's already taken up reviewers' time and effort.
    – Adrian Mole
    Commented Apr 16, 2023 at 11:29
  • @AdrianMole Would you be able to come up with some more examples, perhaps from other sites? It would make your question less localized, and make it more obvious why this has to be answered from the perspective of all the sites, and not just SO.
    – Andreas moved to Codidact
    Commented Apr 16, 2023 at 13:16
  • As also mentioned by @Andreasdetestscensorship in the answer below, an easy fix is to leave closed as "needs details or clarity", the needed details being attempted solutions, why they didn't work, and the expected results.
    – Marijn
    Commented Apr 17, 2023 at 5:49

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Unless the question has been meaningfully edited, you should leave it closed with the original reason. Especially as this is an old question (close reason removed many years ago), the question itself is likely no longer of value to the original author. Some of the reasoning behind this particular close reason, was that these kind of questions are unfit for the site, as they do not bring any value to people other than the asker. So what is the point in spending time and thought at these questions? None, I'd say. I'd rather concern myself with reopening a question closed as a duplicate of the wrong target, and then close it for the correct one instead. That is neither something we do, so why bother with these old questions? The community decided that this close reason wasn't worded well, seemed rude, and wasn't appropriate, but they didn't decide that the questions closed with it were now good fits for the site.

If you really strongly believe that the close reason should be changed, too broad or unclear are likely appropriate.

Unless the particular site's ideas of which questions are a good fit, and which ones are a bad fit, for the site have changed, there is no reason to relabel the close reasons for all these questions.

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