(2011-07-08, 02:38 AM)Tim B. Wrote: [ -> ]If there was some compelling reason to add it back into 2.0 we might consider it but I'm not aware of a single forum that uses it by default when linear mode is an option.
If you mean a single
MyBB forum that uses it then sure, one is hard-pressed to find a MyBB forum that uses the threaded view, because it's extremely cumbersome to use. Give it a try at
http://community.mybb.com/showthread.php...&tid=64993
- Only one post is displayed at a time, so you have to keep clicking in the list of posts to display a new post at the top of the page. This is done via slow page reloads.
- You have to scroll down to the list of posts in the thread. Google Groups, for instance, has the list to the left, which provides for much better usability. Give it a try at http://groups.google.com/group/mongodb-u...3933972cb7
- All posts tend to have the same subject, and in the thread list, posts are formatted as "Subject - Author date". Emphasizing the author first (Author - Subject date) would make threads easier to follow.
The point I'm trying to make is by employing a UI tweak (post list to the left), the current threaded view can be made much more usable. Still, there's an even better way: displaying the posts themselves in the tree, like
reddit or
Slashdot.
Compelling reasons why a threaded view is a good idea
R1. More modern social news sites (reddit, the Stack Overflow family, to name a few) and commenting systems (Disqus (
example), Intense Debate (
example)) support, even favor by default, a threaded view.
R2. A threaded topic view is the general case of a flat topic view, because you could always render the threaded topic with an indent of 0 for all posts, and sort them by date, and you get the flat view.
R3. Users can also just reply to the whole thread rather than to an individual message, so they can choose "flat" even in a threaded system.
R4. Time is more and more precious today, and there's increasing competition for a user's attention. In large threads, the discussion may deviate for a few tens of posts in a direction that a user is not interested in. Threaded views solve that problem very nicely:
You can collapse a branch you are less interested in, or drill into a branch of the discussion that you are interested in. Asa thought experiment, try following our
MyBB 2.0 suggestions monster topic from the start, assume you're a new user who wants to add their thoughts about a particular suggestion they have in mind.
Objections that are often brought against threaded views can be satisfactorily addressed:
O1. How deep should a thread's indenting go?
A1: One solution is to stop indenting after a specified level (e.g. 3 deep, as advised in this quite comprehensive essay on
curating comment threads.
A2: There is a more elegant solution to excessive indenting: partially outdenting the branch. Here's an example from a
MediaWiki talk page - search for "31", then scroll down half a page.
O2. Unless you display the whole tree on one page,
pagination becomes more difficult. If you want to display 20 posts per page, you could end up starting a new page way over on the right side due to indenting (even if that page only contains posts at that level).
A: That's exactly what mwForum does (
example), and it seems to work pretty well. If you follow from the previous page, you have the mental context of where you left off. If you somehow (say, after a search) end up on a page that starts way over on the right side, the first post should either have a link to its parent, or pull the parent in dynamically (with the parent having the same kind of link or pulling in option). This is an improvement I'd like to see in mwForum.
O3. The post ordering makes it more difficult to
find just the newest items.
A: Reddit faces exactly this challenge when it renders your inbox of reply notifications. For each reply, there is a "context" link that displays the reply and walks back the parent nodes up to the root comment (
example).
Let's say a threaded view would highlight or put a border around new messages, and maybe collapse the read nodes between (but not including) each new post and its read root (entirely new branches would be shown fully expanded). How a user who wants to monitor a thread handles new items depends on their goals:
- those like me, who are only interested in specific branches of the discussion, will skip new posts in uninteresting branches. With thee classic flat system, skipping those posts requires skimming over them, so a threaded view wins time.
- those who want to monitor everything will read all the new posts, skipping from highlighted new post to highlighted new post, over read posts. But: this type of visual skipping to the next item of a particular style (highlight, border etc.) is way faster than the actual skimming through text in the previous case.
It could be argued that there are two distinct use cases, thus warranting a per-user, UCP, option. If one view had to be forced, from a utilitarian standpoint aiming to minimize time spent traversing uninteresting information, I would enforce a threaded view, unless the users who want to monitor everything outnumbered those who cared only about specific branches by a factor greater than
text skimming speed (1500wpm?)
divided by average speed of searching for the next highlighted post (1500 wp
s?).
As for context: if the new items need context, then, aside from what's already quoted from the replied-to post (if anything):
- in the threaded view context will be right there, one click away (if read parent nodes are collapsed). It might be interesting to display the immediate read parent of a new post anyway, so that context is readily visible without an extra click.
- in the flat view, there is no extra context. New posts are simply at the end. If there's no quoting, the context situation is even worse.
Conclusion
Threaded views are becoming the modern standard of visualizing discussions among new social discussion software, and traditional forum software (phpBB, MyBB, FUDforum, punBB etc.) has been left behind. By implementing optional threaded views, MyBB would satisfy
user demands and gain a competitive edge in the traditional forum software market.
