Minimum edit size a bit too strict

Question

A couple of time I've come across minor typos and Mathjax fixes I wanted to make to (other people's) questions which turn out to be too few characters to be passed by the Save Edit checking code.

Sometimes, IMO, especially with Mathjax, even a relatively minor tweak can help readability and clarity.

Does anyone feel the minimum character requirement is a bit restrictive ?

Could it be changed to a warning, rather than blocking small edits ?

Any ideas welcome.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Yes, this is a known 'issue'. The 6-character limit is inherited from SE-wide policy, and it was primarily designed for sites with overwhelmingly text-driven content where it is very rare (though still possible) for a two-character edit to really make a crucial difference in the meaning of a post. The presence of MathJax does change the equation (ho, ho, ho) a bit, making it more likely that a post will require very punctual but still crucial intervention.

However:

• That edit still bumps up the post on the front page and other activity-driven listings, so it still degrades the signal-to-noise ratio of the site.
• The six-character limit goes away at 2k with the ability to edit posts without going through peer review, and there is a healthy population of 2k+ edit-active users on the site.
• It is really rare (though it does happen) that a post crucially needs a 2-character edit but has absolutely nothing else, at all, that can be fixed.
• In the rare case that this happens and it's seen by a <2k user, they can just point it out in the chatroom or in a comment.

Mostly, it's just so much of an edge case that it can be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. Asking SE for site-specific alterations to the core Q&A engine is possible but there needs to be a very compelling reason behind it; this doesn't make the bar by any stretch.