Jump to best answer?

April 5, 2013 9:42 AM

Pony request: I know this is slightly silly, but I would like validation for something that I find myself doing occasionally - can clicking on the check mark next to a question with a best answer in it jump me straight to the first best answer in the comments? Sometimes I read a question and want to just see what the person thought the best answer is. I did not see any requests for this in a search going back to 2008, so I figured I'd ask.
posted by Hactar to Feature Requests at 9:42 AM (17 comments total)

It is possible for there to be multiple best answers to a given question. How do you propose to resolve where the click will land the user in those cases?
posted by gauche at 9:43 AM on April 5, 2013

It's a nice idea, but I think highlighting one best answer over another would be a problem. That would put pressure on to be the first best answer that doesn't currently exist.

It'd be a nice shortcut if there was only one best answer allowed per thread, but it's not too hard to scan the page and find all of the best answers once you click into a thread.
posted by pb (staff) at 9:45 AM on April 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've never thought of this, but I kinda love it.

And it'd just go to the first best answer, I'd think.
posted by Grither at 9:45 AM on April 5, 2013

Yeah, the multiple-best-answer thing makes this sort of a "rewarding people for being first" thing indirectly, which has zero upside. Like pb says, scanning a question just doesn't take that long given that best answers are already conspicuously styled.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:48 AM on April 5, 2013 [2 favorites]

You could just keep clicking on the checkmarks next to each best answer to go to the next one?
posted by carsonb at 10:11 AM on April 5, 2013

I don't think that would change the fact that the first best answer would be highlighted wherever the post is displayed across the site.
posted by pb (staff) at 10:36 AM on April 5, 2013

I bet someone could create a GreaseMonkey script that hid all of the non-best answers in a given thread.
posted by Jacob G at 10:40 AM on April 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

Here's the 2008 MeTa where I had the same idea. Same response as this time. I implemented it in Greasemonkey, along with scripts that removed the check, or removed non-best answers, but I haven't tested them lately.
posted by zamboni at 10:54 AM on April 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

I just want a grease monkey script that hides the best answer formatting if the asker marked 80% of the thread.
posted by michaelh at 1:16 PM on April 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

I'm using a GreaseMonkey script that hides the
posted by the quidnunc kid at 2:32 PM on April 5, 2013 [3 favorites]

I just want the laser-cat deleted-post one back.
posted by box at 2:53 PM on April 5, 2013

The problem with zipping straight to best answers only (other than the technical problem, of course!) is that often it's an outgrowth of the conversation, and without reading the forgoing answers first a marked best answer might make less sense.

(And a laser-cat might make YOU chase the red dot!)
posted by easily confused at 1:59 AM on April 6, 2013

What about a button that hovers or something which switches you to the next available best answer? This could be a mobile-only button.
posted by the cydonian at 11:01 PM on April 7, 2013

My greasemonkey script only hides best answers. I call it "mediocrefilter".
posted by blue_beetle at 8:18 PM on April 8, 2013

Why not click-link all the best answers in any given thread in a ring, and have the requested checkmark link take you to one of them at random?
posted by flabdablet at 3:15 AM on April 9, 2013

Only if we also generate an animated gif that says "WELCOME TO THE BEST ANSWERS TO THIS THREAD WEB RING".
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:04 AM on April 9, 2013

needs more hampster
posted by flabdablet at 11:59 PM on April 9, 2013