Forcing email context - input requested

Feature
61

Was this actually implemented as stated?

62

I did not add post abbreviations, stuff is as it was, except that we now have always and never options.

63

Well, that is not what was decided. A more minimal default was desired, so perhaps a fourth option should be there “direct reply only” and as the default.

64

Yeah I can add something like that, it get a bit confusing though cause “Always” ends up being a bit more limited than “direct reply only” It may miss the direct reply.

65

Direct reply should be the default, what use is echoing last 5 replies when the thing they are replying to was 10 replies upstream? Alternately you could force the reply target to be inserted in addition to “last 5 replies” so it is strictly additive.

2 Likes
66

This is great, thanks @sam, @codinghorror! I’ll dust off our test instance next week and put it through its paces with our users, see how we get on.

3 Likes
67

OK! @sam changed this so the new email context default for all Discourse instances is

  • no “extra” reply context will be shown
  • the email will include the post this was in direct reply to, if it was indeed a direct reply (vs. a @name mention or a blockquote)

You can find this setting in your user prefs:

Pasted image865×317 24.9 KB

Include previous replies at the bottom of emails – [never]
Include an excerpt of replied to post in emails – [checked]

So if your argument was

and

There’s too much stuff in the email, which makes it confusing!

This is win-win because

  1. We now include no extra email context by default, so there’s less to be confused by, but

  2. We always include the thing this post was in reply to, if it was a direct reply

Based on the year long discussion here and elsewhere, I strongly feel this is a better default for Discourse.

5 Likes
68

“Include previous replies at the bottom of emails”

Doesn’t it encourage top-posting?

1 Like
69

Not following can you expand on what you mean here.

70

If I receive an email with the context at the end of the email, I’m encouraged to top-post. It doesn’t matter on a Web forum, because the email body is “managed” (normally), but encourages bad behavior on mailing-lists.

1 Like
71

You can disable both in reply to and previous posts in user options

Our email trimmer handles quite a few posting styles

72

Not everybody agrees on the best way to reply to a discussion (top or bottom) And I’m not sure someone will have the final word :slight_smile:

However supporting both, and inline comments is indeed important.