Question About Quick Reply

[David Cressey]

When you use the "quick reply" box where does it get the title for your reply from?

And where does it plug your reply into the discussion tree?

It almost looks to me as though it inherits your comment title from the title on the root of the discussion,  but it plugs your response into the top of the subtree that you just read.  But I am confused about it.

[JavaMouse]

Well, I'm using "Quick Reply" for this post, in reply to the root post.

[JavaMouse]

Now I'm using "Quick Reply" to reply to my own post which is 2nd in the tree. There's no place for me to change the title, and I notice the little toolbar with smileys and link creation is gone too.

[JavaMouse]

Now, I clicked on the root post. I'm using "Quick Reply" to create a response, so let's see if it goes in as a reply to the root post, or what.

[Edit: yes, it did go in as a reply to the root post.]

[JavaMouse]

Now for this post, I clicked on my response to your initial post, so I believe quick reply will show this post as a response to my own post. It should put this post three levels down below the root.

[The Gorn]

When you use the "quick reply" box where does it get the title for your reply from?  
 
  And where does it plug your reply into the discussion tree?  
 
  It almost looks to me as though it inherits your comment title from the title on the root of the discussion, but it plugs your response into the top of the   subtree that you just read. But I am confused about it.

David, you "got it" exactly.

Two ways to post: quick reply - uses defaults - minimal control over the result. And yes, it always attaches the new post to the original "first" post of the thread. Correction by JavaMouse: no! Quick Reply is a reply to whichever post is the "starting one" in the sequence that you are viewing. If you see a tree for the entire thread, and you click on a message within that tree, the "Quick Reply" in the next browser screen that comes up will refer to the message that you chose to view as the "target" of the new message.

Click the "Reply" or "Quote" link within a message - full control over the post contents. And determines exactly which existing post becomes the parent.

Titles: Every post in a thread, including the thread's starting post, has its own title. When you leave the "Title" space blank within a thread when posting, or if you use "Quick Reply", the title of your post defaults to "Re: " + the original thread title.

Parentage: as with the old Ezboard, it really matters which reply link you use. Whichever post within which you click "Quote" or "Reply" becomes the parent of your post.

I'm not really thrilled with the concept of the "Quick Reply" message box. What it does is cause some people who aren't tuned into these nuances to reply to the wrong post. Worst case, if everyone only used Quick Reply, we would have only flat threads.

[JavaMouse]

"And where does it plug your reply into the discussion tree?"

From my tests, it looks like it puts my reply as a reply to whichever post I had clicked on to hit "Quick Reply". That sounds kind of confusing. Here's what I did:
1) click on one of the posts in the thread, let's call it post A.
2) Fill in the "Quick Reply" textbox at the bottom and hit the "Quick Reply" button.
When I look at the corresponding tree, my response shows up as one level below post A in the tree (indented one more tab space to the right in the tree of posts).

HTH.  I never used Quick Reply because I wasn't sure what it was meant to do.

JavaMouse

[The Gorn]

This goes where?!!

[The Gorn]

Good work. As you noted, whichever post you have *viewed* is the "target" of attachment for quick reply. Not necessarily the root post.

[JavaMouse]

I'm using Quick Reply to reply to your "This goes where?!" comment... I clicked on that comment in the tree, and now all I can see is your single comment and the Quick Reply box.

[The Gorn]

Thanks!

[JavaMouse]

Right. Anyone should feel free to use this thread to play around with how Quick Reply works, if they feel a desire to use it

[David Cressey]

I'm not really thrilled with the concept of the "Quick Reply" message box.

Agreed.

[The Gorn]

You have vented some in the past about programmers who believe that they "understand databases" while they proceed to stupidly, pinheadedly, and in a misguidded techie elitist way, focus on nuts and bolts as they produce trashy schemas and bad DB designs.

This is kind of a case in point. In this instance, marketing probably thought that "Quick Reply" would get unwashed dummies to using Yuku more fluidly.

The cost inherent in this is that you make doing the wrong, unintended thing quite easy for all users. The "tree" view then means little since many users replied "the wrong way."

[datagirl]

I gather from this thread that we should only reply using the reply link at the bottom left of each post to respond to that specific post?  If that is the preferred method, then please state it as so.  In which case the default title schema must be manually overcome?  Is that the case?

I hate having to think this hard in a caffeine deprived state.

Regards,
-DG