For the sake of de-cluttering the main topic view and keeping it interesting, it would be cool if moderators could make the issue “resolved” and then the topic could go into an archive. The original poster could veto that decision if they don’t think the issue has actually been resolved, which would restore the topic to the main feed, and original posters could mark the topic as Resolved themselves, as well.
That way the Resolved Posts could still be available in search results, but wouldn’t have this forum presenting topics it doesn’t need to present to people.
OR - perhaps near the topic name, there could be a “resolved” icon or text so it would still be visible and not archived necessarily, but you can see right away that it is resolved and you don’t need to go into the thread to see if someone needs help. Perhaps this is an admin only feature and/or the original poster.
Although, I think there’s shades of grey at times. Some questions aren’t ever resolved; they always benefit from further suggestions, because there’s often more than one awesome solution, and more may be added with time. So having 3 categories of resolution, with the writer of the initial topic having voting power on an imposed resolution status, might be useful. Unresolved, Resolved-ish or Discussion-level, and Resolved would let potential helpers in the forum know how much attention to pay to each topic. Symbols could be used to quickly identify posts.
? for “Needs Help”
~ for ongoing “Welcomes Suggestions and Thoughts”, which might be discussions or partially resolved questions.
- for Resolved