The meaning of flag
When we write comments in SD website , we can see borrar and flag. The former Is to delete. What Is the meaning of the latter?
Dictionaries do not give me an answer.
3 Answers
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/flag
VERB
[WITH OBJECT]
• 1Mark (an item) for attention or treatment in a specified way. ‘the spellcheck program flags any words that are not in its dictionary’
- 1.1 Draw attention to. ‘cancer was flagged up as a priority area for research’
It means to mark it in a way that calls the attention of the moderator, which is usually due to there being something against the rules. It takes 10 points away from the person who is flagged, so it is a definite negative in the context of this site, although as a general term it does not have to be negative.
Here is what it brings up:
Why flag?
• Unclear or Inaccurate
• Spam
• Offensive or Abusive Speech
• Requires Moderator Attention
Do not do it without good reason, but do it if something needs to be removed for being offensive or illegal advertising.
Don't do it for an honest mistake in someone's efforts though.
To flag, a term for information technology (IT) in Spanish, is señalar un error.
Since you are so helpful on this site, Polenta, you probably will run into situations where you want to use it. Sometimes you are the first person to check out a new question and you find that it is either spam or contains very offensive language or is something that has a link to it that if someone would click on it they might unintentionally give themselves a virus or anything else that might be harmful to the site, click on "flag" and that will bring it to the attention of a moderator. They can delete it from the site if they think it is bad.
We use the flag to warn the other folks who might click on it that they should "watch out".
