Based on multiple requests from readers, we’re considering re-configuring Village 14 to display comments in sub-threads. The idea is that when you add a comment, you can indicate whether the comment is related to the post itself, or is a response to a previous comment. The comments are then grouped and displayed together. It tends to be clearer in the case of large numbers of comments on a single thread, where someone is responding to comment 10 or 20 above and its easy to lose your way.
One downside is that the most recent comment is not always at the bottom of the comment list. It will be at the bottom of a sub-thread’s comment list. In that case, if you really just want to see the comments in strict chronological order, you should be able to see that by selecting “Recent Comments” from the menu. I believe that’s true but I won’t be sure until I flick the switch to turn the feature on.
We’ll turn this feature on as an experiment. We’ll leave it on for a week while you can all test drive it. At the end of the week, we’ll turn it off, collect all your feedback and then make a determination of whether we leave it on permanently.
Once I turn it on. I’ll add a series of dummy comments for this post so we can all see how it behaves and whether or not we like it. Feel free to add your own test comments on this post to see how it work for those posting.
Nested comments are now on
I think this test run is great. Its sort of a sandbox where we can play around and see how we like it.
Jerry this isn’t a sandbox or a playground. It’s very serious business
I agree with Jerry. There’s nothing playful about Village 14 comments. It’s not a sandbox it’s a cesspool
I had thought cesspools were typically lined with sand and clay on the on the bottom for exfiltration, but the google informs me that they are usually limited to a pit made of perforated concrete or block.
So they have nothing in common with a sandbox.
Today I learned.
/As always, this is a personal statement.
I disagree with both Jerrys, these silly threaded comments are driving me crazy
Jerry – you are being SO JERRY!
Yeah I do indeed excel at Jerry’ness. It’s in my bones. I am so glad I’m not named Fred. That would just be confusing.
Jerry, you’re getting really skinny. Oops meant your comment above.
It’s a bit tough on a small screen. The indenting pushes out a lot of white space, especially as a thread goes deep into comments level. Phone readers with bad eyes and big fonts will hate it.
I think it’s a great change that may help with posts that have a lot of “discussion.”
Right off the bat I’m a bit confused. I don’t see how I attach a comment to a previous comment
Turns out I hadn’t turned it on correctly. Now its clear. There’s a Replay button beside each main comment in a thread
Commenting on a reply.
Commenting on a reply to a reply.
I want a Replay button!
I want a Fast Forward button
I want both – Replay and Fast Forward.
Sorry. I can’t open it.
Don’t worry Bob! The responses are all skinny one-letter responses per line as the comments to comments are added. It seems ridiculous to do this!
A “replay” button so now we are going to have to relive things over and over again, It’s bad enough that Jerry is monopolizing this conversation. Haha
It looks like each reply gets narrower and narrower formatting wise . Testing my theory
The current maximum depth is 5. This should be 5
Once you get to 5, there’s no Reply button beside it
These replies are like 5 characters wide (at least on my iPad.)
Is
This
What
We
Want?
If you want to add a comment to the main thread, rather than a sub thread you just don’t press any Reply button beside a comment. Just enter the comment in the normal Submit a comment and it will go on the main thread – like this
I am going to try and include something from another website on a totally unrelated topic that I emailed about earlier
website. https://operavision.eu/en/library/performances/operas/don-giovanni-national-theatre-prague
I just fixed your link. It was missing the first letter “ttps” rather than “https”. Looks like a simple copy/paste error
Commenting on main thread.
If you want to comment on the main thread just add your comment in the main “Submit a Comment” box and don’t hit any reply buttons … like this
Feel free to play around with commenting on this thread to see how it works,
The problem for me is with only 5 replies allowed, I can’t tag on to Doug’s wanting a REPLAY button.
Also it takes up a lot of room and how will it help on a mega-comment thread. It will just keep starting over.
Yes that is indeed one of the limitations. I think the best you can do is Reply to the comment above Doug’s. That should put it at the same indent as Doug and one below it (I think)
I just noticed a very weird quirk. On my laptop, this all works as expected and I like it. I just checked it on my Android phone and it was very confusing and I didn’t like it.
On my phone, if I go to the post and scroll down, below the post it says “There are 26 comments:” but below that it just show the four top level comments with no way to expand and see the rest of those four threads, sub-comments.
Below that is is the regular “Submit a Comment” box. Below that are all the sub-comments for each of the four top level comments. Once you get down there the sub and sub-sub, etc comments are displayed as expected with varied indentation, and grouped the way I’d expect.
Definitely a bit odd and confusing.
Generally V14 doesn’t work well on phones.
Jack you’ll still get the behavior you want if you go to Recent Comments.
On a laptop that’s a choice on the menu at the top of the screen.
On my phone you click on the three horizontal bars icon and you can get to it that way
Recent comments only shows about 20. Not enough for high traffic days.
Your idea about replying worked. Wowser!
On my iPad (safari) after the fourth reply, the fifth/last comments remain the same narrowness, but is offset to the right by the full (narrow) width of the comment.
So original(1) to reply(4) all have the same right margin, but (5) has a right margin that’s offset to the right of the other right margin.
Am I right?
/As always, a personal statement.
Yes it looks like Level 5 hits a maximum right offset (i.e. as far as it can go and most likely a bit different on different devices), and all subsequent levels will be at that offset.
It’s also a simple tweak to change the maximum number of indents to 4 (instead of 5)
It looks like the “reply” button is eating into your margin. I’d have to get out of bed, pull the site up on a proper computer, and examine your html elements and css setting in detail to confirm, so it’s not happening.
/as always, a personal statement.
Yes Anne, I think if we do end up going forward with threaded comments we’ll probably also have to make few other changes to make them work better.
Maybe smaller page margins and/or a smaller font, or other tweaks to the page layout. At that point we’d get our site administer involved.
I must say that running this test has been a quick way to get a lot of feedback and to give people a general sense of how it might work.
I love this! So much more organized than one mega-thread. I would definitely vote for making the switch.
I think it will work very well if we make the right and left margins a little narrower and also narrow the right-hand column a little.
When you visit v14, you want to know what new thing has been said. You read up from the bottom until you see a comment you recognize. If you visit a threaded discussion on FB, you have to go looking into endless sub-threads for new replies. It takes a lot longer.
A slightly smaller font and less line space would also help.
Where’s the like button?
Its not a test of a Like button. It’s only a test of turning on threading with no other adjustments made
I agree with Jack Prior. I hate this!
test
Test 2
The reply button seems to be the limit for the right margin.
Original Comment:
[photo] words | words | words | words [reply]Replies:
[photo] words | words | words [reply] [photo] words | words [reply] [photo] words [reply] [photo] wordsIf you can find a way to reformat the header on each reply to allow for reply text (aka “words”) under the reply button that might help solve the reply width/screen real estate issue.
/as always, a personal statement.
//really hope all the code works, because there’s no preview button…
Ok, so I’ve never used so many non-breaking spaces in my life, and it was the carriage returns that did me in. Try 2 to model what I see about the reply button setting the left margin:
[photo] words | words | words | words [reply][photo] words | words | words [reply][photo] words | words [reply][photo] words [reply][photo] words/as always, a personal statement.
//really hope all the code works this time, because there’s still no preview button…
///I use netbeans as a word processor and no one can make me stop.
I’m off by a character, but close enough.
/as always, a personal statement.
You
Never
Have
To
Think
Outside
Of
The
Box
Once
You
Realize
There
Is
NO
BOX.
(Experiential post for experimental thread. Thank you for your indulgence.)
Where’s that Like button now that I need it?
Anyone else having issues reading comments here since the change to threaded comments? On my Galaxy using Chrome, it frequently jumps to the bottom of the comments. So I can no longer read and follow comments when I’m on mobile, which is most of the time.
I prefer the Globe style of threaded comments, which allows replies to comments, but not replies to replies. (So essentially one level of indentation.) That allows a conversation to develop that is tied to a specific comment, but helps prevent it from splitting off in so many directions. And you don’t end up trying to make sense of a reply that is a single column of letters.
If people were in agreement with that choice, its very simple to implement. i.e. set Allowed Number of Levels to 2
Two levels might be OK — I’d still prefer the old way. The key question is will it reduce the need for authors to post five posts on one topic over the course of two days?
Not likely ;-)
Test
Five seems a bit much, but I’d like enough levels to separate a side conversation I’m not interested in from comments on the post the conversation about the post.
So maybe 2-3?
Not my blog, not my monkeys.
/as always, a personal statement.
I think allowed levels=2 could be a good compromise. I’m all for trying it.