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I've just noticed something strange with deleted answers. If I write an answer, then delete it, I can still edit it (that's per design, from what I noticed on other questions).

However, what seems not normal, is that editing a deleted answers still counts as a normal edit, and puts the question to the top of "recent questions", even if there is no visible change (except for moderators).

I'm not fully sure if this is a bug or a feature, but I thought it was worth reporting.

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I'm quite sure that even the deletion event itself does this. Just anything that changes has this effect. –  Arjan Jan 22 '10 at 9:51
@Arjan - the deletion event does that too. But in a way, it is a "visible" change, because an answer disappeared. Editing a deleted answer, however, is just poking the question, without any visible change. –  Gnoupi Jan 22 '10 at 10:18
Can 10k's see deleted answers? Just out of curiosity, not that it would make this any less of a bug –  Andreas Bonini Jan 22 '10 at 11:03
Or: must 10k's see deleted answers, or can they still see the site like a normal user? –  Arjan Jan 22 '10 at 11:51
it just seems odd when the question pops-up, with last activity by some user, which doesn't appear in the question at all. –  Bozho Feb 3 '10 at 8:55

1 Answer 1

up vote 0 down vote accepted

A deleted answer is still an answer, from the system's perspective, so editing it will bump the LastActivityDate on the question.

I am not sure if this is a problem, nor am I sure if it even happens enough to warrant any kind of consideration...

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It is indeed not really a major thing. Only something small to report, but if indeed deleted answers are still considered as regular answers by the system, it would indeed require extra work to separate their behavior, for a quite small interest. –  Gnoupi Mar 16 '10 at 9:09
@Jeff: Dang, my own recent question is a dupe, though I did give some reasons why this behaviour should not occur. meta.stackexchange.com/questions/42066/… –  Jon Seigel Mar 16 '10 at 12:33

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